The Invisible Mentor

Archive for September, 2009

Here are the tweets that I think Thomas Edison would blog about on Twitter:

@Edison I improved on a 50-year old idea to produce a light bulb that worked. What can u improve upon today?

@Edison I had very little formal education, so lack of formal education is no excuse for failure. Persistence pay

@Edison Held 1,093 patents for different inventions, many of which influenced your life

@Edison Don’t be mesmerized with the idea of success. I’ve had some whopping failures, but I’d like 2 think I failed forward 2 success

@Edison As a child I consumed books: The History of the Rise and Fall of the Roman Empire, History of The World, and  The Anatomy of Melancholy

@Edison I’ve been partially deaf since childhood, but I didn’t let that stop me from contributing to the world

@Edison Home schooled by my mom after being kicked out of school. She used 2 b a teacher, & her belief in me, made me believe in myself

@Edison Mentors r key. As a teenager, an inventor allowed me 2 work w/ him in his basement. Started my work in electrical telegraphy there

@Edison Inventors & innovators often build on the work of others. Look at what’s been done b4 and try to perfect it

@Edison I was married twice and had six children

Below is a 22-minute Google video on Edison

Source:

The Inventions of Thomas Edison

The Biography of Thomas Edison

Thomas Edison Biography

Thomas Edison   Biography / Autobiography / Memoir Resources

Photo Credit: Public Domain via Wikipedia (Edison as a youth)

I interview many highly successful people, and one of the questions that I ask is, “How do you motivate yourself and stay motivated?” These very accomplished individuals know something that many do not know. They are self-motivated because they are doing what they love to do, so they just do it. Yes, many of them do work hard, but because they are doing what they want to do, and are having fun doing it, the time flies.

Are you doing the things that give you joy? What baby steps could you take, so that one year from now you are self-motivated because you are doing what gives you joy? Do you need help getting started? We are on this journey together, I am here to help you.

Photo credits: Avil Beckford

As an avid reader I sometimes find books that transcend time. They are filled with timeless concepts and ideas. Here are five such books: Jonathan Livingston Seagull by Richard Bach Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin by Benjamin Franklin, The Book of Five Rings: The Classic Guide to Strategy by Miyamoto Musahi, The Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett and the Analects of Confucius.

Jonathan Livingston Seagull Five Great Ideas

1. You are perfect and unlimited
2. Never stop learning and practicing and striving to understand more of the perfect invincible principle of all life
3. Break the chains of your thought, and you break the chains of your body too
4. Practice to see the real person, the good in every one, and to help them see it in themselves
5. Look with understanding, find out what you already know, and you’ll see the way to fly

The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin Five Great Ideas

1. Develop a Code of Conduct for the way you live and work, so that when situations arise you know how to respond
2. Provide useful information to your clients
3. After making the first $1 million, it is easier to make the second
4. Before going into partnerships, develop contracts with clearly defined expectations and exit clauses to protect all involved parties
5. History is filled with mistakes, learn from them

The Book of Five Rings Five Great Ideas

1. Lay your plans with true measure and then perform the work according to plan
2. If your strategy doesn’t work change it. When you’re in a deadlock change your technique. Abandon efforts that do not work, think of your situation in a fresh spirit
3. You must train day and night to make quick decisions
4. Do what you have to do, even if it means doing it alone
5. Everything is difficult at first

The Secret Garden Five Great Ideas

1. “You learn things by saying them over and over and thinking about them until they stay in your mind forever…”
2. “The beginning is just to say nice things are going to happen until you make them happen.”
3. Make life meaningful by doing work that you are passionate about. Live each day as if it were your last
4. Everyone wants to be liked, appreciated and wanted. People also want to feel like they are a part of something bigger than themselves
5. To receive compassion you have to be compassionate and to earn respect you have to respect others

The Analects of Confucius Great Ideas

1. Confucius said, “Those who are born with the possession of knowledge are the highest class of men. Those who learn, and so readily get possession of knowledge, are the next. Those who are dull and stupid, and yet compass the learning, are another class next to these. As to those who are dull and stupid and yet do not learn; they are the lowest of the people.”
2. The philosopher Yu said, “When agreements are made according to what is right, what is spoken can be made good. When respect is shown according to what is proper, one keeps far from shame and disgrace. When the parties upon whom a man leans are proper persons to be intimate with, he can make them his guides and masters.”
3. “To see what is right and not to do it is want of courage.”
4. The Master said, “Hold faithfulness and sincerity as first principles. Have no friends not equal to yourself. When you have faults, do not fear to abandon them.”
5. The Master said, “When internal examination discovers nothing wrong, what is there to be anxious about, what is there to fear?”

How could you integrate or implement some of these concepts into your work and life?

Related Posts

Review of the Autobiography of Benjamin Frankin

The Way of Strategy – Review of the Book of Five Rings

Review of the Analects of Confucius

Photo credits: Avil Beckford

One of the things I do for work is conduct interviews of highly accomplished people and I always ask each one the same questions. I was going through the interview responses to lessons learned and I culled 15 for my blog readers. Learning from others, helps us to shorten the learning curve.

Major Lessons Learned

1. Resentment and negative thinking harms you and prevents you from being the best you can be
2. Listen hard
3. Learning never stops
4. Staff will always leave but that doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t train them to do their jobs better
5. There is always another hurdle to overcome
6. It’s important to understand how your business runs at every level – from the strategic to the operational
7. Know what you’re passionate about, know what you can do that can beat the world, and know what metrics drive your business. The better you get at doing this, the better you became at solving crises
8. Business success is 10 percent inspiration and 90 percent discipline. You have to work in pursuit of your goal
9. We, and not other people, define who we are
10. Nobody gets through life on a scholarship.  You have to adjust and adapt
11. You have to believe in yourself and stay positive
12. Everything costs more than originally budgeted, so keep a tight control on expenditures or you may drown before you finish
13. Ensure that your partners/staff actually have the level of expertise they have presented to you
14. Ensure that all legal documents are signed and sealed, trust unfortunately only goes so far when issues develop
15. Be true to your moral compass

What are your thoughts on the above lessons? What might you add?

Invisible Mentors are unique leaders who we can learn things from. To decide which Invisible Mentors will take you where you want to go, where do you see yourself personally and professionally in the next one to three years. Are their gaps in your skills that you have to fill?

1. Who are five unique leaders who have accomplished what you would like to accomplish? Or, who are five people who have walked the path, or are farther along the path than you?
2. Have any of these experts given important speeches and produced information products such as books, ebooks and audio programs that you could use to expand your knowledge base in the area(s) you identified above? Write down the titles of the speeches and the names of the products for easy reference later.
3. What traits or behaviours do these unique leaders have in common?
4. What is it about them that you are attracted to?
5. Do their core values and philosophies align with yours?

Observe these five unique leaders (Invisible Mentors), read their books, watch their presentations and videos, listen to any interviews they have given. Immerse yourself in everything about them so that if you are problem solving, you could ask and answer the question, “what would Invisible Mentor x do if she were in this situation?”

There are many phenomenal people who we can learn from, all we have to do is make the time to do so. What are your thoughts? What would you add?