Have you heard of the book, The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People?
Well, what we’re going to discuss today is the complete opposite.
If you’re serious about having a successful bookkeeping business, stay away from the following 13 destructive behaviours because if you don’t, they'll cause you plenty of pain.
INC.com contributor, Bill Murphy Jr. explains:
1. Procrastinating
We’re all human. We all procrastinate sometimes.
Heck, I’m writing this column at 11:30 p.m. However, pathetically unsuccessful people take it to the extreme, living by the mantra, don’t today what you can put off until tomorrow (or later).
There’s always an excuse, always a distraction--and somehow things never get done.
2. Blaming
Blaming others, that is. The sadly unsuccessful among us always can point the finger at someone else. And after they’ve spent so much time and energy blaming others, they still haven’t accomplished anything.
3. Minimizing
Other side of the coin: It’s not just extremely unsuccessful people blame others for their failures, but they talk down other people’s achievements.
Whatever other people accomplish, these are the folks who are there to talk about how it wasn’t actually so great.
4. Consuming
There’s a smart saying--if you want to be successful, spend more time producing and less time consuming. From scarfing fatty junk foods to spending hours watching mindless television and trashy pop culture, the pathetically unsuccessful among us spent a lot of time consuming.
5. Talking
…and talking and talking and talking. Where successful people spend time making an effort to listen actively to others, the ridiculously unsuccessful among us believe they already know it all.
Clearly, they have no need to infuse their knowledge with others’ experience.
6. Assuming
Closely related to talking too much, wholly unsuccessful people make assumptions left and right. Often, they’re wrong; often they miss opportunities as a result.
(They’re just so certain that things will be doomed, or too difficult to be bothered with.)
7. Naysaying
It’ll never work; that’s a crazy idea; the deck is stacked against us. These are the types George Bernard Shaw had in mind when he said, “People who say it cannot be done should not interrupt those who are doing it.”
8. Malingering
They talk big about the things they’re going to accomplish. Then, suddenly, they’re “sick.”
They’ve got a cold or a phantom health issue they have to take care of or an allergy you’ve never heard about before and they’re a last minute scratch--not able to participate. They never win gold, silver or bronze--they’re perpetually in the “DNF” category, for “did not finish.”
(Clearly, some people have legitimate medical conditions. We’re not talking about those people here; we’re talking about the perfectly healthy folks who always seem to make up “convenient” maladies.)
9. Loafing
Relaxing is important. We all have times when we need to just kick back, but the ridiculously unsuccessful among us are the slothful lurches who seem always to be lying down, letting time pass by and accomplishing nothing.
10. Equivocating
You were counting on them to do something for you? (Oh, you must have misunderstood.) You were sure they were passionate about following their dreams?
(Meh, you must have been reading into it.) No matter what these people say, you can be pretty sure they’ll be backing off it later.
11. Safeguarding
There are legitimate times to cut your losses or be cautious.
However, the chronically unsuccessful among us are so cowed by the fear of losing what little they have that they never have the courage to try anything great.
12. Sourgraping
Whatever it is they couldn’t accomplish--well, they later spout off a reason why they didn’t really want it. The project their team really needed them to accomplish? It wasn’t all that important to begin with. The love interest they never had the guts to pursue? He or she probably wasn’t that great anyway.
13. Quitting
Whatever goal they might have set for themselves, they decide later it’s too hard or it’s too unlikely to succeed or it’s just not worth the effort. Suddenly they have other priorities--not that those other priorities wind up coming to fruition either. It’s pathetic. By definition, truly unsuccessful people can only be trusted to do one thing consistently -- fail.
Thank you Bill for the list.
There truly is a difference between those who are winners and those who are not.
They great thing is you have control of your actions.
So today, choose success over mediocrity.
It’s in you.
To your success,
Michael
