Good Gardeners Make Good Businesses

When Napoleon accused England of being a nation of shopkeepers, he wasn’t, presumably, giving them a compliment. Nearly 200 years later, this description of British business is still accurate.

Although you’ll find all sorts of tiny businesses there that don’t qualify as shops, the country still values individual enterprise. Even in London, 90% of all businesses employ fewer than twenty-five people.

Consultants, craftspeople, writers, designers and freelancers of all sorts have created marvelously innovative niche businesses for themselves.

This philosophy of small scale enterprise gained global attention in the seventies when economist E.F. Schumacher wrote his popular book, Small is Beautiful: Economics as if People Mattered.

Schumacher’s ideas made sense to those concerned about global issues, as well as those who suspected that one of the functions of business was to help people actualize their potential. He pointed out that those benefits could only come from small scale enterprises that cared about people and the planet.

In the US, Schumacher mainly caught the attention of the counterculture, since conventional business was still focused on a bigger is better mentality. Even though Schumacher’s writing didn’t make much impact on the reorganization of big businesses, it had a resounding influence on new enterprises that started small and were determined to remain small.

There’s still a great deal we can learn from our English cousins. Why have they sustained such a long history of small business success? Might this have anything to do with the fact that this is also a nation of voracious gardeners?

Consider, this advice from the great British garden designer and writer Penelope Hobhouse. A real hands-on gardener, Hobhouse and her late husband were the gardeners at Tintenhall in Somerset.

Several years ago, she shared her ten life rules of garden design with an American gardening magazine and the parallels to good business design were obvious.

What business wouldn’t benefit from applying these rules?  I’ve also added a couple of comments in parenthesis.

You might want to post these in your garden—or office.

1. Never go anywhere without a notebook. Be a perpetual student.

2. Find one mentor, or many.

3. Do your homework.

4. Trust your own experience. Keep notes of what works and what doesn’t.

5. Don’t get hung up on plants (or products or services). A garden is bigger than all that.

6. Never think you’ll get it right the first time. If a plant isn’t happy, don’t hesitate to dig it up and move it to a better spot.

7. Encourage self-seeding plants to seek their own place in your garden. (Find your own metaphor in that.)

8. Don’t forget that sunshine and shade are design elements.

9. Avoid fussiness. Above all, simplify.

10. Focus on the garden you really want.

 

Making Room for New Growth

My 7-year-old granddaughter came over early today before the heat and humidity rolled in. Without any prompting from me, Zoe headed to my balcony garden and began deadheading the dianthus.

I’m just learning to garden in this new-to-me climate, but I’ve already discovered that deadheading is my friend. My lavender plant, which seemed ready to give up when all its blooms turned brown, sprang back to life when I snipped off the dead blossoms which were promptly replaced by a new crop of buds.

Novice gardener that I am, I had always assumed that plants were deadheaded simply to remove the unattractive blooms that had completed their life cycle. I couldn’t have been more wrong.

According to a gardening expert, for many plants, deadheading promotes more flowering on the plants  than would occur without such plant care. It’s another fine lesson from the garden that we can transplant to our businesses.

Every ninety days or so (or even every month), take a look at what’s blooming and what’s just hanging on. Are there activities that are more duty than they are joy? Clients who aren’t really a good match? Entire parts of your business that need cutting back?

If you’re haunted by scarcity thinking, this is a challenging thing to do. You’ll start recalling the many times you’ve been told that a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.

You’ll be tempted to hang on to what you’ve got for fear that letting go will be the beginning of the end of your Joyfully Jobless life.

Poet David Whyte got my attention when he wrote, “Anyone or anything that does not bring you alive is too small for you.” Reminding yourself of that is an excellent way to decide where deadheading is in order.

Consider this. What if deadheading those things you’ve outgrown is actually your way of making room for new growth?  What if getting what you want begins with getting rid of what you don’t want first?

In one of the early chapters of Catherine Ponder’s classic The Dynamic Laws of Prosperity she talks about this very thing (although she doesn’t call it deadheading). She suggests that when we fail to see progress in our lives, it’s often because we haven’t made room for what we truly want.

She writes, “Begin moving the tangible and intangibles out of your life in the faith that you can have what you really want and desire. Often it is difficult to know what you do want until you get rid of what you don’t want.”

Deadheading, as my garden is reminding me, is an on-going process, one that pays visible dividends. In my business, it’s the way to keep evolving ahead.

As Catherine Ponder points out, “It takes bold, daring faith to set it into operation, as well as a sense of adventure and expectation to reap its full benefits.”

Whether it’s a luscious garden or a luscious business that you’re growing, be bold in clearing out that parts that don’t fit. Don’t wait to discover that deadheading really is your friend.

 

Lessons From the Garden

When I moved to Minneapolis in late summer of 1986, I rented a third floor apartment that had a nice little balcony. The following spring, I decided to see if I could grow a plant or two out there.

Before I knew it, my plant or two had evolved into a gorgeous little garden complete with an old wooden ladder-turned-plant-stand and a bentwood trellis from Smith & Hawken. There were vines, pots of daisies and begonias.

At the time, none of my neighbors were balcony gardeners. When I left a dozen years later, balcony gardens were in bloom throughout the complex.

Gardening is contagious apparently and, oh, how I’ve missed it.

After my sabbatical in 1999, I returned to Minneapolis and moved into a wonderful apartment that, sadly, was without any outdoor space. I made do with houseplants.

When I relocated to Las Vegas, I didn’t even attempt outdoor gardening although I heard rumors that it was possible.

I wasn’t always enthusiastic about growing things. I’d half heartedly planted a vegetable garden one year and vowed it would be my last. Weeds took over as I avoided spending time in what I came to think of as a mosquito habitat.

Eventually, I caught the gardening bug from my friend Chris Utterback and she caught the entrepreneurial bug from me. It was a fine trade.

When we met, Chris was new to self-employment. Her passion for gardening had led her there.

An enthusiastic herb gardener, Chris had her first foray into business thanks to a bumper crop of tarragon. She harvested the herb, arranged bundles of it in a wicker basket and called on chefs at all the French restaurants in Denver.

Not only did she sell out, her new customers begged for more. Chris was hooked.

The more she learned about growing things and growing a business, the richer her world became. She went on to publish Herban Lifestyles newsletter for several years. That led her to connect with many other passionate gardening entrepreneurs.

As I’ve been tending my new balcony garden, my first in a dozen years, I keep thinking about how many things that happen in the plant world are mirrored in the business world.

In Paul Hawken’s marvelous book, Growing a Business, he points this out repeatedly. He says, “Ideally, every business student should study biology, the science of life and therefore change. At the heart of the business enterprise is the implementation of true and lasting change, creating the real out of the potential.”

This month I’m going to be sharing lessons from the garden. My little startup blooms are wise and patient teachers and I can’t wait to pass along the things they’re showing me every day that can also help us grow luscious businesses.

What are you growing this summer? Learned anything from your plants?

 

 

Read the Best Books First

My granddaughter Zoe is zooming through the Harry Potter series. While that’s quite an achievement for a first grader, she’s not trying to set a record. She’s loving the stories and, I suspect, loving that she can read these complicated tales on her own.

While Zoe’s reading skills expand, so does her self-esteem. I’m guessing she’ll also discover that reading good books spoils you in the best possible way: your standards go up and you become more discriminating.

Musician Todd Rundgren said, “You are never any better than the influences you have.” Once you realize that, you become wiser, I think, about whom you listen to—including the authors you read.

What you’re currently reading is, of course, determined by where you are in your journey. As E.M. Forster pointed out, “I suggest that the only books that influence us are those for which we are ready, and which have gone a little farther down our particular path than we have yet got ourselves.”

To make the most of the time we spend with books, we need to ask ourselves, “What do I need right now?” Sometimes the answer may be that we need a push or a reminder to challenge our fears and doubts.

At other times, the answer may be that we need information about how to organize a housesitting business and market it.

Many newly self-employed spend all their time gathering information while ignoring the equally important role of inspiration which helps us grow in other ways.

If successful self-employment is a high priority for you, your reading diet needs to strike a balance between books that are informational and those that are inspirational.

Here are some of my favorite titles in both categories. They’re just a sampler, of course, but each of them makes a fine addition to a Joyfully Jobless library.

Inspiration

The War of Art by Steven Pressfield is, quite simply, the best explanation of how resistance keeps us from living the life of our dreams—and what we can do about it.

This Time I Dance by Tama Kieves guides the reader through the process of finding right livelihood while challenging old assumptions about the role of work in our lives.

A Whole New Mind by Daniel H. Pink is subtitled Why Right Brainers Will Rule the Future. A guidebook to your creative self.

The Creative License by Danny Gregory will help you reconnect with your creative spirit.

Feel the Fear and Do It Anyway by Susan Jeffers is the classic on tackling the big obstacles to making it on your own.

The Hungry Spirit by Charles Handy looks at the spiritual side of work and shows why it matters.

The Art of Possibility by Rosamund and Benjamin Zander is a book I reread regularly. Brilliant insights on living from a place of possibility.

Information

Growing a Business by Paul Hawken is an old favorite about creating a business that’s an extension of who you are and the things you care about.

Selling the Invisible by Harry Beckwith takes the mystery out of marketing services.

Small is the New Big by Seth Godin is a collection of the author’s blog columns covering a wide range of subjects on how to create a remarkable business.

Rework by Jason Fried & David Heinemeier Hansson. Two smart young entrepreneurs share what they’ve learned.

The Difference by Jean Chatzky explores the thinking and behavior that makes for creating prosperity.

The Tipping Point by Malcolm Gladwell deserves to be in every self-bosser’s library. It’s a clear explanation of how an idea goes from obscurity to visibility.

Many of these titles plus several other favorites are included on the Bookshelf page of my Joyfully Jobless site. You can also order those you’d like to add to your library over there, too. Pay a visit.

How many a man has dated a new era in his life from the reading of a book. ~ Henry David Thoreau

 

Finding the Time to Read

Psychologist Eda LaShan says that middle-age occurs when you realize that you won’t live long enough to read all the books you want to read. According to LeShan’s definition, some of us were born middle-aged.

Finding the time to read isn’t just a problem of our busy, modern world, however. Back in the 14th Century, Italian poet Francesco Petrarca faced the same dilemma and solved his conflict this way: “Whether I am being shaved, or having my hair cut, whether I am riding on horseback or taking my meals, I either read myself or get someone to read to me.”

Doubling up on activities is, of course, one way of squeezing in more reading time. Here are some other ideas from voracious readers.

Carry a Good Book

Having a book with you at all times is a good idea. Paperbacks have made it easy to tuck a current favorite into your purse or briefcase and use unexpected free moments to read a chapter or two. Electronic book readers are increasingly popular portable reading devices.

Some readers finish a number of books every year in those odd moments waiting for the dentist or a lunch companion. Accessibility is the key.

Eliminate Something Else

What habitual time-users fill your days? Cutting out just one television program or adjusting your schedule ever so slightly could open up reading time.

Take a look and you might surprise yourself.

Listen to Audio Books

Authors and actors narrate both fiction and nonfiction titles. These are great for listening during drive time, while doing housework or walking with your iPod.

Audible.com is a popular source with over 85,000 titles available for download.

Travel by Public Transportation

My idea of paradise is a long train trip with a stack of books. If it’s possible to take a bus or subway, rather than drive yourself, you can get lots of reading done.

Wear Headphones

Just don’t turn them on. If your reading time takes place in a noisy restaurant or airplane, don a headset. It will block some outside noises and deter others from chatting with you—if you’d rather read.

Don’t Finish Books That You Don’t Enjoy

Sounds obvious to me, but many folks think there’s something wrong with stopping midway through a book. Nonsense. Get on to another that brings more pleasure.

And be discriminating. I’m amazed at the number of people I see on airplanes reading books that were hastily purchased at an airport shop. I always travel with a book that I’ve started and know will be a delightful companion on my flights.

Learn To Skim

Time expert Alan Lakein suggests, “When you pick up a book, start by reading the headlines on the book jacket. Then glance through the book quickly, looking for something of interest to you….Your job in reading a book is to find the key ideas and understand their application to your situation. The preface and table of contents, as well as summaries that are sometimes found at the beginning and end of a book, will help you do this quickly.”

Skimming isn’t a substitute for reading an entire book, of course, but it’s a way to reinforce the most valuable ideas that you want to remember.

Have A Daily Reading Time

Tune into your own speical body clock and discover the times when you feel less energetic, less creative. Take advantage of these times to schedule your reading.

Even reading for 15 minutes every day will yield big results over time. The critical thing is to make it a part of every day, like brushing your teeth.

It’s still true that the person who can read and doesn’t has no advantage over the person who can’t read.

Philosopher Jim Rohn points out that by reading two books every week, you’ll have acquired the knowledge of over one thousand books in the next ten years.

“Do you think,” he asks, ”that acquiring the knowledge inside a thousand books will influence the many dimensions of your life?  Missing skills, missing knowledge, missing insight, missing values, missing lifestyle are all a result of not reading books.  Remember, the book unread is the one that can’t help you. You can’t read too many books, but you can read too few.”

 

Books Are The Bomb

During a time when I was wondering if I’d ever figure out what to do with my life, it was a book that lit the way. One evening years ago, I read a short newspaper article about two women who had started their own business using their natural talents and imagination to create a successful enterprise.

The next day, I went to the bookstore and found their only copy of Supergirls: The Autobiography of an Outrageous Business by Claudia Jessup and Genie Chipps. Their story became my handbook.

Although I ultimately started a very different business from the one they’d created, I gleaned so many lessons from their story.

They started on a shoestring. So did I.

They got lots of free publicity. Me too.

They evolved into a very different business over time. That’s what happened to me.

I still wonder if I would have found my entrepreneurial spirit without that book to point me in the right direction.

What I know for sure is that books have made a continuous contribution to my growth and development as a person and as an entrepreneur.

Of course, I am not alone in discovering the impact of reading on the Joyfully Jobless life.

Tim Sanders is a consultant and former Chief Solutions Officer at Yahoo’s in-house think tank. In his book Love is the Killer App, he speaks passionately about the importance of books. Here’s what he has to say:

Here’s another 80/20 rule: Spend 80 percent of your time on books and 20 percent on articles and newspapers. And by books, I don’t mean just any book. I mean hardcovers. A paperback is made to be read. A hardcover is made to be studied. There’s a huge difference.

True, hardcovers are more expensive. But I’m talking about your career. If you can afford to party, or to buy new techno-gadgets, or to eat in fancy restaurants, you can afford a few hardcover books. The books you read today will fuel your earning power tomorrow.

Simply put, hardcover books are the bomb. They are fun to hold. They become personal the first time you mark them up, the first time you bend back the binding. There’s something exciting about writing down the ideas that interest you. Soon your book becomes more than just pages between covers. It becomes your ticket to success.

The ability to transfer knowledge is a huge advantage for anyone struggling to succeed in the new economy. It’s an easy skill to learn, it’s simple to facilitate, and there are more good books than you will ever be able to use, which means that the resources are unlimited. In fact, it’s so easy that there’s no reason why you shouldn’t start now.

Buy a book. Carry it with you. Its power is so great that you will feel as though you were carrying plutonium in a briefcase.

Jim Rohn was a popular speaker who frequently encouraged his audiences to take up reading if they want to succeed. “Miss a meal, if you must,” Rohn said, “but don’t miss a book.”

Rohn’s fans are also familiar with Mr. Shoaff, the man who mentored Rohn and taught him the valuable lessons that became the basis of Rohn’s philosophy. Mr. Shoaff instilled in the young Rohn a love of reading and eloquently inspired him to spend time with books.

I’m not sure I’ve ever heard it put any better than this: “Mr. Shoaff  taught me that life puts some of the more valuable things on the high shelf so that you can’t get to them until you qualify.

“If you want the things on the high shelf, you must stand on the books you read. With every book you read, you get to stand a little higher.”

 

Why Bother Reading?

Shortly before I began teaching high school English, the International Paper Company began an advertising campaign with the theme Send Me a Man Who Reads.(Yes, it was back in more sexist times.)

Those ads became regulars on the bulletin boards in my classroom. The gist of the campaign, which ran for several years, was that readers made better employees.

Of course, readers make better entrepreneurs as well. That’s no big surprise to those of us who wandered into entrepreneurship thanks to our devotion to lifelong learning.

Nevertheless, there are plenty of struggling businessowners who don’t seem to realize that books are their friends—and business mentors. Equally shocking is the fact that many small business bloggers and book authors do not acknowledge the writing of others.

I once knew a frustrated entrepreneur who dismissed reading as a frivolous waste of time. Evenings on the road were more apt to be spent in the hotel bar than curled up with a book that could have inspired or informed him.

Instead he labored to figure everything out himself. He was making his journey far more difficult than it needed to be.

As Mark Twain once pointed out, “The person who can read and doesn’t has no advantage over the person who can’t read.”

Why does regular reading matter so much to building a business? Here are some of the gifts.

Catch the spirit “Stuff yourself full of stories,” advises Ray Bradbury. “I’ve never had a dry spell in my life because I feed myself well.”

He was talking to writers, of course, but the same thing holds true for entrepreneurs. Many inspiring stories have been written by and about those who have gone from employee to entrepreneur.

Such stories not only inspire for telling the tale of overcoming challenges; they also are vivid records of entrepreneurial thinking in action.

By the way, fictional entrepreneurs can also help readers build an entrepreneurial mindset.

Keep curiosity alive “What I already know is enough,” is not the mantra of the successful. Passion begets passion, of course, but keeping passion alive is closely tied to staying curious.

Whether it’s human behavior or building an online presence that catches your fancy, books can keep you stretching.

Acquire wisdom Nobody has to tell you that we are living in changing times. Those who ignore the changes, operate at a huge disadvantage. It may be more serious, however, than just being handicapped.

As Jim Trelease points out, “People who have stopped reading base their future decisions on what they used to know. If you don’t read much, you really don’t know much. You’re dangerous.”

By all means, don’t confine your reading to quick Internet searches.

Leisurely reading, thoughtful reading, challenging reading can connect you with innovative thinkers and eloquent storytellers. For a few dollars, they can move into your World Headquarters and help you build a better business—providing you spend time with them and put their good ideas to work.

As Jim Rohn so aptly reminded us, “The only thing worse than not reading a book in the last ninety days is not reading a book in the last ninety days and thinking it doesn’t matter.”

 

Have a Nicer Flight

Tomorrow I head out for the Un-Job Fair in Denver. Usually the day before such a trip is spent getting ready to travel.

My wardrobe has been chosen, the notes for my opening speech, Why Aren’t We All Self-employed?, and my afternoon workshop, Building a Winning Portfolio, are packed. My boarding pass is printed.

That was the easy part.

Since this trip involves nearly ten hours in airports and on planes, a great deal of thought went into picking the perfect travel companion.

For me, having a nicer flight begins with bringing along a book I’ve been dying to read. After all, I seldom have ten hours of nearly uninterrupted time to hang out with a great story so I do not take the selection of my travel reading lightly.

I also do not leave this decision to chance hoping to grab something acceptable at the airport shop—unless I’m in the mood to cuddle up with Vanity Fair. Like many trips, this one includes a novel that I’ve recently rediscovered.

An early mentor of mine used to remind me that the biggest influences in our lives are the people we meet and the books that we read. I’ve kept that in mind ever since I first heard it. I am not about to spend my time with the mental equivalent of airport food.

Bringing along the right book not only enhances my flying time, it also helps ensure that I’ll arrive at my destination in a happier state of mind.

This month we’ll be exploring the connection between reading and the Joyfully Jobless life. I’ll be sharing some of my favorite reads and reminding you that it’s important to read for inspiration as well as information.

If you’re already an enthusiastic reader, your To Read List may grow longer.

If reading isn’t part of your business plan, I’ll do my best to convince you that your life and your enterprises will be richer if you take it up. It’s not just an airplane journey that gets better with the right book companion.

As the oh-so-entrepreneurial Walt Disney once said, “There is more treasure in books than in all the pirates’ loot on Treasure Island…and best of all, you can enjoy these riches every day of your life.”

 

Got Excuses? Read This

The other day someone posted a link to this blog post by Jon Morrow. Since I’ve been following Jon on Twitter for quite a while, I decided to see what he had to say. I couldn’t have been more surprised to learn his story.

I quickly posted it on my Facebook page and the people who took time to read it left comments that pretty much sounded like one big AMAZING.

This one’s going in my permanent files. You might feel the same way about it after you take a look. Incidentally, it’s been retweeted almost 2000 times as of this writing.

How to Quit Your Job, Move to Paradise, and Get Paid to Change the World by Jon Morrow.

 

Interruptions Driving You Crazy?

In her autobiography, actress Joan Collins revealed that she ended her affair with Warren Beatty because of his annoying habit of accepting business calls in the midst of their lovemaking.

While you may not share Collins’ problem, interruptions can plague anyone who is trying to accomplish a dream. This seems to be especially true for those who are running a business from home.

Years ago, my mother called to ask me to run an errand for her and prefaced her request by saying, “Since you don’t work, dear….”

Your family and friends may think the same of you if you’re running a business from home. Such disruptions can not only impede progress, they can cause you to lose sight of your most important goals.

An interruption occurs when a lower priority intrudes on a higher one. We usually think of interruptions as being caused by another person who distracts us from what we are doing, but  we can also interrupt ourselves by letting petty things take up our time and attention.

Consider this confession from author Jessamyn West: “Whenever I’m writing a book I never get out of bed, because if I do get out of bed I always see something that needs dusting.”

The best way to handle interruptions is to prevent them before they happen and that requires taking a proactive stance. If you sense that distractions are sabotaging your efforts, keep track for a day or two of every interruption you encounter.

Is there a pattern? Are there people who keep showing up? What causes you to be distracted?

If people are causing the interruption, your first line of defense is to establish boundaries with those people who may have gotten used to your availability.

“No, I can’t run over and help you turn your mattress right now, but I will be glad to help you this evening,” is one way to handle requests that interfere with the project you need to complete.

The people who live under your roof also need to understand your need for uninterrupted time. One woman with teenaged children took to wearing a hat  when she was working to signal her family that she was to be left alone. Another gave her children permission to interrupt her only if someone was bleeding.

Don’t assume that other people will know that you don’t want interruptions. Tell them when it is and isn’t appropriate to contact you.

Whether it’s your family or friends, you’ll lower your frustration level considerably by explaining in advance that you are serious about your business and will be unavailable at certain times.

Preventing unnecessary interruptions falls under the general heading of Good Time Management. “Without the management of time,” said William Reiff, “you will soon have nothing left to manage.”

People who are highly productive tend to guard their time carefully. Your work matters, too, and deserves your full attention when you’re creating, inventing or planning.

Yet many people seem oblivious to the importance of limited accessibility and the mobile phone has made it possible to reach them anytime, anywhere.  Unless you deliver babies or repair computers, there’s probably no reason to be on call twenty-four hours a day.

Since the telephone is most frequently the instrument of interruption, it makes sense to be its master. Some people find it easiest to have a regular time to receive and return calls. Your answering message could even explain to callers that you will get back to them between 2 and 4 , or whatever fits your schedule.

Keep looking for creative ways to limit interruptions. Consider a quiet location other than your office for doing some of your work, for instance.

“Things that matter most,” said Goethe, “must never be at the mercy of things that matter least.”

Start every day with a brief review of what you want to accomplish and determine what has the highest priority.

Knowing what matters most is what makes it possible to finish that novel while the dust piles up—or to give your partner your undivided attention because you’ve finished your work for the day.