How Failing Can Be Motivation To Success!
I know this feeling. I understand that Dr. King knew the photographer caught him in a moment of reflection. It did not disturb him. He is not looking into the camera, his mind is elsewhere, dealing with the problems at hand when running an organization. Make no mistake Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was the leader of the Civil Rights Movement, but make no mistake he was also head of one of the most powerful political organizations in American History. I recently found out my company was not a finalist in the LaunchKC contest. LaunchKC is an business incubator, organizations that help start ups. In an instant my dreams of being a fairy tale were gone. Of course a few seconds later the realization that I did not want to be a fairy tale made me regain focus. This is our first bump in the road, but how I react as leader determines the future of a growing company.
Reflection Time Is An Asset
I hate losing. Today we see it in the context of race relations, but it can cover way more ground. I was hesitant to use hate as a description due to its negative connotation. I do not thinking losing should ever be in a positive connotation. It does not mean I believe that people should feel less of themselves when they fall short. It means the exact opposite. To me it means that it proves there is more work to be done.
Losing is a terrible feeling, especially when you have given your everything. I have lost before, I may lose again, but I will never like it, nor congratulate myself for a job well done. Everyone does not get a trophy in life. We can make excuses to ourselves until the end of our lives or instead we can reflect on why we lost. Turn our weaknesses to strengths, and our strengths into expertise. I will not to mince to describe my ambitions or my company’s goals. I was upset reading the list four times. The name of my company did not appear magically. I lost. It bugs the hell out of me.
Instead of lashing out to blame our loss on LaunchKC or my employees. A great leader should never pass the buck, even if getting caught with the hot potato burns. It is a risk that comes with the job. Instead I began an internal reflection on what we had done, what we could have done better, and what we will not do again. Reflection allows a leader to see the entire picture from perspectives other than their personal. A great leader must be able to face the brutal facts of reality to confront the problems. In our case, we did not make the best presentation we could have and I accept full responsibility. After my reflection and seeking outside input which led to invaluable insight on how to ensure next time we are finalist. I no longer think about it except for the purpose of this article because I have to concentrate on how to move the company forward.
My fledgling company is growing day by day. It takes time to hone the ability to step away from our ego to view reality with no prejudice. Best Selling author Robert Greene and media mogul Curtis Jackson aka 50 Cent advise in their collaborative book, The 50th Law:
A wise leader will hone their ability to see situations for what they are, strip away the emotion, face the brutal reality of the situation to find the key to success in each instance. A great leader knows not to repeat the same strategy instead stay in tune with the moment in order to win.
Losing should be temporary. In my opinion. Losing is a teaching moment to help us understand where to improve. It is a waste of mental energy to worry about things beyond our control. I have a friend that is constantly worrying about what others are saying about me, about my belief in my ability to start a company. It angers him that I do not react or share his feelings. In reality I have no time to devote to thinking of anything other than those things that positively impact my ambitions and serve company goals. It really pisses him off when I tell him to wish them well. Its not that I am above or below anybody. Most times I must remind myself that life exist outside of building this company. I am not advising anyone to behave in this manner, it is just how I am. My company will be a global presence because that is our mission.
Focusing on past events as excuses for current conditions is not how a person becomes successful. That path lies to bitterness, jealousy, and a lifetime of frustration. Do not be succumb to the poison of mental stagnation. It will impede the ability to move forward taking clear action. Time alone is always well spent when one is unafraid to dig deep into themselves. It is not about finding fault or assigning blame, but a period of looking inside or having the courage to reach out. Leadership is more than a title and pictures in magazines. I have already heard that by not being a finalist it was God’s way of saying I should re-enter politics. I can only chuckle. People always try to blame God, nah, this was my fault. Next time I will be a finalist. I have given it great reflection.
The Importance of Incubators
Business Incubators are a relatively new organizations that help small businesses. The technological revolution is changing how we interact with the world. It is also helping to create new support systems to ensure that new ideas have a chance to compete in a field that makes a Where’s Waldo page seem sparse. In applying for the incubator I was hoping to secure funding, mentoring, and most important to me, access. Access to a network of other like minded people looking to change their worlds and the world with their contributions through business. Business Incubators are one of the best aspects of our transforming economy. They are similar to the ways the original robber barons of America gave back but now a few generations later, they know how to do so while continuing to make their money work for them. It is the greatest way they can help their country, even beyond charity in some cases, because in order to stay a powerful thriving nation we have to produce.
A Business Incubator is a unique and highly flexible combination of business development processes, infrastructure and people designed to nurture new and small businesses by helping them to survive and grow through the difficult and vulnerable early stages of development.
LauchKC is providing a valuable service for the city of Kansas City, MO. I truly believe Kansas City is set to become a larger part of many economies that help power the new world of technology. Many argue there is a lot of politics involving an incubator. That may be so, but the idea of things being easy is making us soft. Of course I wanted to be a finalist, it is no one’s fault but my own. Using my reflection time to review our submissions, I found flaws on the first read. That is terrible. I know now to improve our communications.
One of a few things we are doing to create a strong culture and build a dynamic company. By fixing the flaws this opportunity has given us to learn so our next opportunity is a milestone.
Fairy Tales and Unicorns
Everyone loves the happily ever after formula of fairy tales we are told as children. They have a hero with a seemingly insurmountable task that lies ahead with little chance of success. The hero always presses on despite all odds to achieve their objective or happily ever after. The thing about fairy tales is their basis may come from inspiration of real tales of courage, they just leave out all of the bits that shows how our hero stumbles, makes mistakes, even suffer setbacks because that does not make for good entertainment.
Even Hollywood turns the journey success into a training montages showing our hero getting ready to a soundtrack. Rocky has one of the greatest montages in film history, acted superbly, edited well, a great score, and most importantly well written. Plans take time to unfold. Patience is a virtue I constantly wrestle with due to a life time of conditioning of the overnight success model sold by our media.
There is no such thing as overnight success. Success is not a straight road, no matter how easy they make it seem in articles, the countless hours any successful person spent toiling, sacrificing, and pushing themselves to not quit. Even today, Unicorns have been given new life by the business media. A unicorn is usually a tech company that is raising billions of dollars in investments despite not knowing how they can turn a profit. If real unicorns are anything like the Unicorns of the valley then its no wonder they went extinct.
Failure Is Not Acceptable
Failing happens. Failure on the other hand is not something I have ever seen as okay. In my opinion failure is when a person or organization stops trying. Failure is to quit. In life, there will be many ups and downs. We will fail at some point throughout our lives, but I choose to see those moments as teaching moments. It was not an easy exercise, changing my mindset to understand there is something to be taken from everything. Lessons are not just in schools, books, or list replacing articles online.
A person can learn from anything, anywhere, anytime, and any place. Of course the most obvious is access to technology, notably the internet. Learning is not a cursory glance at the top three picks of the search engine’s first page. I am constantly awed by people that do not push beyond the surface to truly understand. Even before technology the only excuse for boredom was a person choosing to not do something with their time.
Boredom is nothing more than a word given meaning by comfortable people. They are happy with what they know. They are content with where they live and work. Good for them. I belong to the latter group. Over the years I have taken many hits for my ambitions but you learn it comes with the territory. Having ideas is the easy part. Writing a plan is next. Doing the work to make them a reality is the job that never ends. There is no such thing as boredom in my opinion. I have to make myself take time to do nothing, because there is so much I want to know and understand. I am not including the time I devote to growing my business. I am successful and grateful that I refuse to ever give into to the idea of failure.
What Is My Business Anyway?
Why am I so confident about my success? I have a profitable business model and a determination that comes from standing on the soldiers of giants. I own a second generation online network to provide quality independent movies from across the world directly to customers all over the world. 3 billion people will own mobile phones by the end of 2017 according to recent data, not all of them have cable or satellite.
thaBoulevard is not trying to compete with Hollywood or New York. They do a wonderful job in the industry they created and perfected. thaBoulevard is the second generation of Online Networks, but the first generation of a company that understands the future is omnitainment. Entertainment was went to theatres, cineplexes, zoo’s, circus’s, literally entering a building or tent at another location to take pay for a show. thaBoulevard travels wherever the user and their chosen device find most comfortable.
thaBoulevard works with the global independent film community to showcase movies not seen anywhere else, bringing the cinema experience to users for less than the cost of a movie ticket monthly. By utilizing mobile phones, PC’s, tablets, televisions, and gaming consoles the birth of omnitainment is a new era in user customization. All users will have the power to customize their experience and taste in movie genres’. Their interaction through the advances in tactile interface makes thaBoulevard more responsive than a search engine.
The driving force of thaBoulevard is to share stories with the world by collaborating with with companies across the world providing a powerful new outlet for their wonderful movies and webisodes to share. We create a new way for passionate people to earn a living doing that they dream, creating compelling movies and series to omnitain. We intend to showcase the diversity of the world through humanity’s oldest technique, story telling. It is a new era for everyone, because people will have a place to hone their skills, Hollywood and New York have curated content to discover new talent, but most importantly provide more opportunity for those who did not fit the mold of the current system.
thaBoulevard is not the next, we are thaBoulevard, a second generation online network providing world class movies and episodes as the next generation of providing cinematic experiences on demand. We are apart of the Hollywood 2.0 movement to create new opportunity for not just new stars but a million new jobs done by humans to help our community. We already We may not have made the first Incubator. It happens. There will be many bumps in the road throughout our existence. It will only make our commitment to providing quality streaming service utilizing the latest in packet streaming and OTT technology. Basically, we can give you the quality as the other providers, only we go anywhere. Of course Netflix is in our industry. We wish them more success. We honor them as pioneers. We can exist without harming each other just as television stations have done for nearly a century. We are the future, thaBoulevard is coming soon. Not seeing my name of the list of finalist only serves to drive me forward. I wish great success for all of the finalist in the LaunchKC competition. It’s not the end, we’re only just starting.
