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 Practice Startup Success

Information Advice Encouragement

SPECIAL FOCUS EDITION

October 1, 2007                                                                                  ISSN 1934-3248

“Concentrate all your thoughts upon the work at hand. The sun's rays do not burn until brought to a focus.”                        Alexander Graham Bell

In this issue:

  This edition of the newsletter is all about FOCUS.

One of the great startup killers is lack of focus.  Trying to do too many things at once causes you to do none of them.  Case in point:  I talked with someone who wanted to go into practice right after graduation.  She got busy working on her business plan, but then she dropped everything to go to a seminar, and then… and then she decided to visit a doctor, and pretty soon it was graduation.  I’m not saying the seminar and the doctor weren’t important, but her TOP focus item, she said, was her business plan.  Would the seminar have been offered later?  Would the doctor be there in a few weeks?  You get the idea….

Oprah said, “Energy is the essence of life. Every day you decide how you're going to use it by knowing what you want and what it takes to reach that goal, and by maintaining focus.” If you don’t focus, then you’re wasting your energy running around trying to do so many things, and you’ll be too worn out to do the thing you say you most want to do.  (Is that too convoluted?  Know what I mean?)  If you say you want to finish your business plan, decide that’s what you want to focus your energies on.  Do what you have to do that day, the next, and the next, and nothing else, until the business plan is done.  When you reach that goal, go on to the next. 

The trick with focus is not to get distracted by those pesky BSO’s (Bright, Shiny, Objects).  I do it – email, Spider solitaire, reading a book.  I even went online while writing this and spent 15 minute attempting to see if there was anything out there on “BSO’s” (there wasn’t).  See what I mean?

To avoid the attraction of the BSO, give yourself a few minutes each day to play, and then get to work.  Don’t make any big plans or commitments until you’ve achieved your immediate short-term goal.  Break up your large task into smaller, workable segments.  Do one segment each day until you’re done. 

Remember, the ability to focus is key to successful startup.

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 Ask Dr. Jean Murray a question (email jean@dcpracticesuccess.com )
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