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Success Advice

3 Lessons Plants Can Teach You About Taking Action

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What image comes to mind when you think of taking action? Newton’s laws? Gears in machines? Someone intently focused on a task?

How about plants? Yes, they seem simple and slow but action doesn’t need to be flashy to be effective.

Look at us humans, we’re more animated than plants but they’ve been around for millions of years before we arrived. Forms of life that have been around for that long are doing something right and there’s something we can learn from them. Many ancient philosophers studied nature and her creations to model their own lives.

Below we’ll look at three lessons nature can teach you on taking action:

1. A sunflower’s direction

The journey of a plant seed starts in the darkness below the ground surface. After tasting its first drops of water, it’s aided by a hormone called auxin to peek out the soil by moving in the direction of the sun, like a compass set on True North.

Some species, like the sunflower, will keep track of this True North by bending towards the sun until it sets. It will then turn eastwards so that it can catch the sun rise again the next day.  

The True North in our own lives is the direction which will bring the highest short-term and long-term gain in our pursuits. Plants can get by with a few goals in life: sunlight, water, minerals etc. But you on the other hand are pulled by a limitless number of competing desires, and by choosing one you cut off all the other options.

The solution is to create a long term life direction or goal which can guide you over long periods of time. This will give you something solid to base your decisions over the days, weeks, months, and years ahead, and help you create consistency to achieve long term-term goals.

“Sometimes the smallest step in the right direction ends up being the biggest step of your life.”

2. A roots stability

Plants gain stability from their roots. Some even stabilize soil and prevent erosion on steep gradients.

Depending on the species and the type of soil they’re in, plant roots vary in how wide and deep they’ll grow. Most only grow a few feet. But some tree researchers have discovered roots growing as far below as 174 feet (53 meters).

Plant roots are like the stability you feel in the environment you’re in – your competence in business, confidence in social life, or skill in keeping physically fit. This stability is affected by your level of certainty. And when your uncertainty rises it becomes harder to take action because we spend more time worrying about what can go wrong.  

The solution is to strip ignorance away by learning how the world works. Unlike plants which grow their roots slowly and automatically, you have power over the rate and depth at which you grow your understanding of the world. You can read more books, listen to more audios, and watch more videos in less time than you’re used to.

The more you understand how things work, the more stable and certain you become when taking action towards life goals.

 

3. A flytraps potential  

The venus flytrap is a patient plant. It waits and, like a capacitor, it builds potential energy in its convex-shaped lobes which have small, sensitive hairs that respond to touch. The plant is designed this way to release its built up energy to catch unsuspecting insects in under a second.    

Just like this plant, you grow potential energy over time, not by sitting around but by gaining knowledge.

But harnessing your potential is useless if it’s not converted. The reason flytraps build their energy is to survive. They take action when they sense an opportunity arising. The main reason to gather knowledge is to leverage it in achieving your goals to live a better life, not to become book smart.

Life is sprinkled with opportunities and many times you’ll need to have prepared yourself for them by gathering certain skills and knowledge. The next step is converting that potential into mechanical energy by acting on the opportunity. This is how we increase the returns of the knowledge we’ve gained.  

“To reach your greatest potential, you’ll have to fight your greatest fears.”

Besides satisfying our hunger or desire to see beauty in nature, plants can give us new perspectives to use in life. Creating direction and stability isn’t easy.

The same goes with spotting and acting on opportunities before they disappear. But with consistency, the natural long-term result is an overall improvement in all three.  

Of the three points above, which lesson relates most to a recent life experience of yours?  Please leave your thoughts in the comment section below!

Tom Lekhanya is a Ghostblogger – yes they exist – from WordExcursions.com. He’s driven to help small-to-medium sized businesses cut through the online noise with engaging blog posts aimed at reaching more people to benefit from their offers while building a long-term connection with them.

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Success Advice

How to Alter Your Business Approach With Technological Advancements

Keeping up with technological trends has become a challenge for almost every business owner.

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altering business approach
Image Credit: Midjourney

Technology’s evolution has impacted everything, and business is no exception. Keeping up with technological trends has become a challenge for almost every business owner. Entrepreneurs unable to do so are being wiped out of the market.

There is no doubt that AI (Artificial Intelligence) and ML (Machine Learning) have taken over the business world. These technological advancements are impacting decision-making, success percentages, and other entrepreneurial aspects.

Adapting to these developments is integral to business success. Let’s explore how you can accomplish these milestones.

Embed the strength of AI and ML.

AI has modified business operations in major ways. For instance, companies have employed bots for customer support. These bots go through an effective learning process via Machine Learning before being able to answer like humans.  

Bots can also perform detailed data analytics and make business moves with high success percentages.

ML is used more for the analysis of data chunks and generating successful predictions. This simply means that business owners do not have to worry about large-scale financial losses. 

In terms of deployment and usage, a reputed company like Netflix employs machine learning for decision-making.

Blockchain is increasing the count of business opportunities

Tampering of financial transactions is quite common and causes severe monetary damage to customers. With the rise of digital payments, this risk has increased. 

Blockchain is used to elevate your experience for monetary transfers. It combats penetrating events to extract confidential customer information. 

Most business sectors are using block chain but finance and supply chain management sections have a higher count. These two corporate sections have several monetary deposits and withdrawals taking place. 

In terms of percentage, approximately 72% and 5% of finance and supply chain firms have implemented block chain successfully.

Dedicate Yourself to Continuous Learning and Individual Development

You invest in learning some of the very important skills, including digital marketing, financial management, and how to gain customers as an entrepreneur.

You need to set up your knowledge base about doing business on Coursera and Udemy with the basics that are necessary for the business, building further by networking with experts through webinars.

Besides, Agile methodology will introduce elasticity to your company: this review and feedback system with further correction regularly will allow for enhancing efficiency and promptly reacting to the market.

Developing key skills to achieve goals

Running a business successfully is not only about having niche/domain knowledge. Business owners need to have communication / soft skills as well in addition to niche information.

Here are some key technical/domain-related areas that business owners should have a strong grip on.

Data Storage on Cloud: These days, companies do not store their data on physical servers. Therefore business owners should know how data is stored/edited/removed/updated via AWS, Azure, Google Cloud, and other platforms.

Data Analysis/Interpretation Qualities: These days, data is as precious as gold. Business owners with data analysis abilities make correct predictions. As a result, their ventures grow in volume.

Development/Coding Knowledge

Programming knowledge gives business owners an edge whether the application is developed in-house or outsourced. It assists in getting updates deployed and handling application underperformance without getting professional support every time.

Hacking proof framework

There is no benefit of having an advanced automated system if can be penetrated. Successful business owners have above-average knowledge of cyber security and hacking attempts. They are able to choose top-notch anti-hacking software without much of an ambiguity.

Communication Abilities/Soft Skills

Here are some key communication qualities that business owners should have:

Communication/Conversation: Business owners should use to-the-point sentences in both written and oral communication.

Issue Resolution Abilities: Business owners should be able to drill down to problems and solve them. This is done successfully only if an entrepreneur has in-depth business domain knowledge.

Agile Implementations

It is mandatory for business owners to have knowledge of iterative/agile models. With such a competitive environment, it is impossible for business owners to succeed without adopting an agile framework.

Create a productive well-crafted Business Strategy

A productive business venture starts with a clear vision. The first factor making a business successful is the idea behind it. It helps with endless growth and combating competition successfully. Katherine Philips once mentioned that business goals are inevitable if goals are set concretely.

  • Goals should be based on smart achievements instead of complexity. Focus on the value that each one of them adds. 
  • Business objectives should not be vague. Key indicators should be constructed to measure the success/failure of each milestone.
  • Be realistic when setting goals. Do not aim at impossible milestones since they can be demotivating.
  • Milestones/goals need to be time-bound. Set a completion deadline for each one of them. 
  • Business goals should not be alien. Owners can think out of the box but not be obsolete / unrelated.

Create a productive well-crafted Business Strategy

Business owners cannot succeed without having a network. Some tips help in this case. Attend conferences and professional gatherings to connect with other entrepreneurs.
Here are some other related points business owners should pay attention to.

  • Attend meetings and conferences to stay updated with trends and meet business owners who already have well-set ventures. This helps in enhancing the learning curve of new / growing entrepreneurs.
  • Being a part of business communities/groups is very productive. When one shares opinions and discusses decision-making tactics, it helps in preventing errors and enhancing success rate.
  • Even the most experienced business owners have mentors as learning never stops. Take part in mentorship programs so there is an assurance that you are following the correct roadmap.

Conclusion

There is absolutely no doubt that business dimensions have evolved with technological advancements. Successful entrepreneurs have grabbed these changes in due course of time and continue to evolve. On the other hand, people following old paths and conventional steps fade out of competition. In a nutshell, keep an eye on the processes and practices you follow as these factors decide success rate.

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Success Advice

Understanding the Power of Yes and No: How to Create Boundaries For Success

These words have a significant impact on how our success unfolds

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Creating legal boundaries
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The two smallest yet most powerful words in life, “Yes” and “No,” have a big impact on our growth on both personal and professional levels. In addition to affecting the choices we make every day, these words have a significant impact on how our success unfolds. (more…)

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Motivation

From Couch Potato to Go-Getter: A Step-by-Step Motivation Plan for Everyone

By understanding what motivates you, you can turn your dreams into reality

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How to be motivated
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Are you tired of feeling like a couch potato? Do you want to transform your life and become a go-getter? You’re not alone! Many people struggle with motivation, but the good news is that change is possible. (more…)

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Success Advice

10 Micro Financial Habits for More Wealth and Peace of Mind

The World Economic Forum still reports that half of U.S. adults lack financial literacy

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micro financial habits
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You’ve heard about developing financial habits, but what about micro-financial habits? Micro habits are the tiny things you can do every day with minimal effort that, together, transform your future. (more…)

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