OPPORTUNITYISNOWHERE

Part 1 of the O W N – I T series

There are two ways to read the above title. One is, “opportunity is nowhere”, the other is “opportunity is now here”. If you chose the latter keep reading.

Opportunities to grow, learn, improve, increase sales or get to the next level are all around us. Everyone we meet, and everything we read or experience can open doors to opportunity if we put our selves out there and keep an open and receptive mind.

1. Get OUT there.

Opportunities of all kinds exist all around us, but they will not reveal themselves to us unless we get out there and find them. If we get stuck in our comfort zones, our offices and our same old routines we can easily become closed off and isolated from opportunity. If we want to increase sales, we need to get out there and let people know who we are, where we are, and what we do. We need to get involved in our communities, advertise our product or service, and get busy creating remarkable experiences so that people start talking about us. The best opportunities in life and in business don’t come to us, we need to get out there and go to them.

“A good hockey player plays where the puck is. A great hockey player plays where the puck is going to be.” – Wayne Gretzky

2. Be OPEN minded.

Now that you have discovered an opportunity, it is important to approach it with the right frame of mind. Too many opportunities die in the concept phase because the parties involved fail to approach it in a spirit of openness, adventure and creativity. Maybe the initial opportunity presented is not exactly what you were looking for, or perhaps it appeared to create more problems than solutions. In any case always be creative, look for alternate approaches, don’t be too quick to say no, and keep brainstorming. I like the word “brainstorming” because it suggests that the participants are not stuck in an either or approach, instead they believe that completely new ideas and opportunities come out of these types of meetings that are often bigger and better than the ones they went in with.

“A pessimist sees the difficulty in every opportunity; an optimist sees the opportunity in every difficulty.” –Winston Churchill