All of us have had a date with disaster. We’ve lost a job, experienced a significant financial blow, suffered the loss of a loved one, been hospitalized, or have been victimized in some manner. Especially in today’s economic environment, it’s pretty normal to meet people who are in crisis. We are all acquainted with grief, and it is one of those things that connect us all. However, the strength and resilience that it takes to get through the grief also connect us.

Have you ever wondered why some people seem to grow stronger when facing their date with adversity, while others sink to depths of despair or bitterness? Some people don’t just survive, they thrive. Thrivers do not totally give in to despair. They move through adversity and emerge stronger. Then, they find ways to help others going through similar crises.  In his book, I Will Not Be Broken, Jerry White offers five steps to guide people out of being a victim and on toward fulfillment:

1. FACE FACTS.  One must first accept the harsh reality about suffering and loss, however brutal. “This terrible thing has happened.  It can’t be changed.  I can’t rewind the clock.  My family still needs me.  So what now?”
2. CHOOSE LIFE.  That is, “I want to say yes to the future.  I want my life to go on in a positive way.”  Seizing life, not surrendering to death or stagnation, requires letting go of resentments and looking forward, not back.  It can be a daily decision.
3. REACH OUT.  One must find peers, friends and family to break the isolation and loneliness that come in the aftermath of crisis.  Seek empathy, not pity, from people who have been through something similar. Let people in your life into your life. “It’s up to me to reach for someone’s hand.”
4. GET MOVING.  Sitting back gets you nowhere.  One must get out of bed and out of the house to generate momentum.  We have to take responsibility for our actions.  “How do I want to live the rest of my life?  What steps can I take today?”
5. GIVE BACK.  Thriving, not just surviving, requires the capacity to give again, through the service and acts of kindness.  “How can I be an asset to those around me, and not a drain?  Will I ever feel grateful again?”  Yes, and by sharing your experience and talents, you will inspire others to do the same.

Millions of professionals have LinkedIn, Facebook and/or Twitter accounts. To get the most out of social media, i.e. to turn potential time wasters into sources of revenue, traditional marketing techniques should be mixed with social marketing tactics.

Give due consideration to the following three traditional marketing goals to help ensure your social networking and relationship building efforts are not met with disappointment.

1. Determine if your target market is on your chosen social network: You don’t want to find yourself being in the wrong place with your message. Take the time to determine if your target market is represented on social networking sites. One way to do this is to find out if your current customers and prospects have social networking accounts and how they are using them. You can also conduct queries to determine if your ideal prospect profile is represented on a specific site.

1. Know your target market and its needs: Social networking sites are more about meaningful conversations than they are about advertising. It’s imperative that you have a good understanding of what the target market wants and why it is important to them. Then, you can relate how your product or service can solve real business problems. While social media content can be developed and distributed in an instant, you should give thought and scrutiny to what you post, and why.

1. Reach out and build relationships: Social networks enable you to develop new contacts in real time. When you develop meaningful interactions with your customers, they tend to become more loyal resulting in customer referrals, repeat purchases and follow-on sales. Social networking sites have several ways to reach out to other members to begin building relationships. For example, LinkedIn allows you to send messages directly to other members, request introductions through your base of contacts, and to join and interact with affinity groups. Similarly, Twitter allows you to send direct (private) messages to other members as well as to post public comments directed at a specific member.

Most businesses are adopting social marketing as part of their overall marketing strategy. By applying traditional marketing practices, social networks can transition into valuable business development and relationship building venues for you.

Bob Burg and John David Mann, in their books “The Go-Giver” and “Go-Givers Sell More,” tell us that most people look at sales backwards. They think of sales as a set of techniques, designed to put your product into the customer’s hand and the customer’s money into yours. It’s an idea that often doesn’t work, the authors suggest. They say selling is about giving time, attention, counsel, information, value and so forth.

For example, sales people are generally thought of as being “talkers.” The authors suggest they would be better served by being “listeners.” Sales should not focus on the “close.” Rather, it should focus on the “open.” Instead of focusing on the presentation, sales training should help sales people learn to ask great questions and keep the discussion focused on others.

The key difference between traditional sales and what the authors describe comes down to control. Sales usually include multiple techniques to make certain the salesperson stays in control. Instead, truly great salespeople have shifted their focus from getting to giving. That is not only a positive way to conduct business and live life, but also very profitable, the authors tell us. Even more, great salespeople “create a vast and spreading sphere of goodwill wherever they go. They enrich, enhance, and add value to people’s lives. They make people happier.”

The authors define “five laws of stratospheric success” that can be applied to selling:

1. The Law of Value: Your true worth is determined by how much more you give in value than you take in payment.
2. The Law of Compensation: Your income is determined by how many people you serve and how well you serve them.
3. The Law of Influence: Your influence is determined by how abundantly you place other people’s interests first.
4. The Law of Authenticity: The most valuable gift you have to offer is yourself.
5. 5. The Law of Receptivity: The key to effective giving is to stay open to receiving.

If you would like something to hang on your wall, you can download the five laws in presentation form at http://www.thegogiver.com/downloads/The-5-Laws.pdf.

We all have a plan, whether it be for our business, finding a new job, meeting our sales quota, buying a new home, or funding our retirement. Many times it is not written, but hopefully it has been thought through.

All plans contain a set of assumptions about the future. These assumptions can be very straightforward and predictable, or can be determined by the complex interplay of numerous variables that are difficult to predict. You only need to consider our economy over the last 18 months to understand how outside forces can be complex and unpredictable.

Most significant failures result from faulty assumptions that were made during the planning process. If you want to add certainty to your future, especially during uncertain times, take these five steps to confront the uncertainties in your plan.

• Identify your assumptions. This is the most important step of the process. While it will be easy to list many of your key assumptions, seek to identify those hidden assumptions that underlie your plan and that may be overlooked in the process.
• Prioritize your assumptions. Rank them in importance based on the how heavily the success of the plan rests on the assumption, and how vulnerable the assumptions are to future events. In other words, evaluate the strength of each assumption.
• Measure your assumptions. Identify and collect metrics that will help you to evaluate the validity of your critical assumptions. Regularly review the results to identify causal factors affecting performance against plan. Define trigger metrics that will initiate reassessment of your plan.
• Test your assumptions. Where possible, develop real-world experiments that will prove or disprove your assumptions. Your goal is to develop knowledge around your most critical assumptions at the least possible cost as you execute your plan.
• Back-up your assumptions. Ensure you have a “Plan B.” No matter how well you may have planned, you may need to take corrective action. Develop contingency plans and courses of actions should certain key assumptions become invalid.

Most approaches and publications about business planning suggest that you document your assumptions at the end of your plan. However, you will be better served by actively planning and monitoring the validation of your assumptions. It should be at the core of your planning process.

In today’s fast-changing interconnected world, the tools of this day allow us to reach across the globe in an instant. While technology provides the potential to make powerful new connections, leveraging these connections requires a dramatic shift in our strategies for getting ahead. And, it necessitates the need to form and maintain relationships in radically different ways.

Shared goals and values open more doors than building a vast data base of contacts, or attending one more “networking” meeting. Society teaches us to look out for “number one.” Tragically, this attitude places us on a path to a shallow and unrewarding life.  Recent economic upheavals have left many people hurting and discouraged. Our world is in desperate need of people with compassion – people with a “we” perspective rather than a “me” perspective.

Relationships pull us through the tough times, and enable people to achieve great things – things that might be out of reach if attempted individually. They may be formed in unusual ways and places, and that there are more productive relationships waiting to be formed than anyone has time for.

If you want to realize your dreams, help others fulfill theirs. No matter what situation you are in or what circumstances you face, you have the opportunity to make a difference in someone’s life.

Everyone has dreams and visions. Yet so often the dreams and visions of people remain just that – dreams – and never find a way of becoming reality. This could be for many reasons, depending on the individual circumstances of the people involved. Maybe they haven’t recognized their desires as a ‘calling’; maybe they haven’t felt equipped or supported to act; maybe they’re too busy serving other peoples’ visions to run with their own; maybe they haven’t had access to funding; or maybe they haven’t had the contacts, or knowledge that other people are already running with their vision.

If you could use more hope in turning your dreams and visions into reality, try these three suggestions:

1. Expect Success – In times of uncertainty, we are tempted to worry about almost everything. Many times, we dwell on the absolute worst possible outcomes that could happen in our situation. If we are not careful, these can become our reality. Instead, choose to focus on the possibilities and successful results.
2. Ask for Help and Support – We all face struggles, large and small. During life’s ups and downs, turning to others for help and support will help pull you through. We function best when we are connected with others, rather than facing issues all alone. Seek out others to help you connect with helpful people and resources. Make a point to get together with people who encourage you and energize you.
3. Take Action – Give careful consideration to your goals, develop a plan, and execute. You will feel fear, but move forward courageously. Don’t be afraid to change course if necessary, but give time for the seeds you sow to take root.  And, make sure that you consistently do the things most critical to your success.

Change is a fundamental aspect of business. It feeds innovation, drives efficiency and fuels strategies for expansion. But how can businesses effectively adapt to abrupt and monumental changes in the marketplace?

Today, many companies face their first major recession. Even legacy, Blue Chip operations that have weathered the storm through several economic downturns are finding it difficult to stay afloat. Asset values, available credit and consumer buying power have all plunged simultaneously. As a result, many business owners and executives have raised the white flag.

But studies spanning several recessions indicate that this behavior is exactly what savvy business leaders need to gain a competitive advantage. In fact, a study conducted by American Business Press and Meldrum & Fewsmith concluded that both “sales and profits can be maintained and increased in recession years and [during the years] immediately following by those who are willing to maintain an aggressive marketing posture, while others adopt the philosophy of cutting back on promotional efforts when sales appear to be harder to get.” This is because most businesses face fewer competitors due to the rise in bankruptcy and due to reduced marketing expenditure and efforts. Furthermore, those remaining competitors are far less motivated than they were in the past.

McGraw-Hill Research’s Laboratory of Advertising Performance also analyzed the 600 industrial companies during the 1981 to 1982 recession. They found that business-to-business companies that were able to achieve higher sales growth during this period had also maintained or increased their marketing expenditure.

As you ramp-up sales and marketing, it’s also wise to start thinking even further outside of the box. Consider creative financing to assist credit- and cash-strapped consumers. Leverage web-based marketing opportunities. Most importantly, use abundant free-time to boost customer relations.

Web-based marketing options are an extremely cost-effective strategy that can provide continual benefits. For example, online video delivers a high-end, personal connection with existing and prospective customers, generating leads, raising product awareness and building enthusiasm for new product or service introductions. Studies show that viewers are six times more likely to respond to a video offer for more information, and that video expedites buying decisions by 72 percent over print. Similarly, email marketing can effectively populate a company’s short- and long-term pipeline. Resist the temptation to ask your sales professionals to ’just make more calls’. Investments in email marketing better leverage their time and can exponentially increase qualified prospect leads. On the other hand, traditional cold calling is not leveraged. It limits production and can be an inefficient use of their time. Businesses can also share their knowledge and ideas on professional blogs and networking sites.

Businesses can further recession-proof their bottom line by implementing creative pricing options. Make purchasing more attainable by offering one-time or limited-time discounts, financing plans or delayed payments. That said, resist the temptation to slash price in order to boost sales volume. During a down economy, buyers opt to pay premium prices in exchange for risk reduction. No longer can they afford to risk purchasing from an unknown yet lower-priced vendor. They instead choose the safe and predictable, yet often more expensive, alternative.

Finally, strengthen your existing customer relationships to enhance purchase loyalty, foster strong customer relationships and encourage word-of-mouth referrals. Regardless of the state of the economy, Pareto’s rule dictates that 20 percent of your customer base will contribute to 80 percent of your revenue. So use this time to connect with customers and conduct face-to-face visits. Work even harder, listening to and understanding your customer’s needs while pitching real solutions that address the pressing challenges they face.

At the end of the day, make a concerted effort to stay upbeat, optimistic and positive. Pessimism never closed a deal. Celebrate wins. Commend yourself and your employees for successfully enduring – and thriving – through some of the most challenging times in history.

Just the mere word ‘learning’ conjures up images of universities, stressful exams and advanced degrees. But once we’ve graduated, it should all be behind us, right? Wrong.

Lifelong learning helps us master new job skills, enjoy new technologies, grow and express our innate talents. If we stop learning, we stop living, improving and thriving. Yet an alarming 42 percent of graduates stop reading books altogether after college. The first step to lifelong learning is rediscovering how truly fun and rewarding it can be.

Leaders and winners view learning as an integral part of life. No longer a formal student, we gain the freedom to explore topics that really interest us – and this can change from day-to-day or year-to-year.

When we become a parent, we learn how to communicate with a toddler, ‘tween and teen. We set boundaries and instill values. When we pick-up a new hobby, we become enthralled in finding out everything we can about that subject. We learn by doing, practicing, reading and sharing with friends, family and business associates. When we make mistakes, whether in our personal or professional lives, we gain the insight no textbook could effectively convey. When we travel, we experience new cultures and traditions, languages and topographies first-hand. And when we read blogs or news publications, we gain insight into current events, politics, personal finance, sports, arts and entertainment.

Lifelong learning is immensely rewarding, boosting our self-confidence and personal fulfillment. It makes us feel worthwhile and excited. It also improves our physical health and reduces the risk of illness. The most tangible benefit may be that lifelong learning can propel our income. The average person will only increase their salary by two to three percent annually. But top achievers, or those who continually learn and grow, double their income every three to five years.

Let’s look at ten simple ways to weave learning opportunities into our everyday life.

1. Find and accept work that promotes learning. Challenge yourself each day, requesting more responsibility at work and finding solutions that improve current processes.

2. Ask questions. Take the opportunity to learn from others including topic experts, managers, mentors, instructors, friends or coworkers.

3. Step out of your comfort zone. Try new things and meet new people. Go to networking meetings or attend local seminars, and seek ones where you will know few people. Learning opportunities will appear for you that you have not imagined.

4. Invest in relevant tools and resources. Read professional journals, trade publications and books, participating in convenient online or offline continuing education courses that interest you.

5. Accept constructive criticism. On occasion, we can learn from constructive criticism. Before debunking hurtful comments, see if you can find a morsel of truth or wisdom hidden within.

6. Teach others. The best way to learn is by teaching others what you know. Share your knowledge with your co-workers, business associates, children and friends.

7. Learn from your mistakes. To err is human. While never intentional, mistakes can catapult growth and self-realization. Ask yourself where you might have gone wrong and how you could avoid the same from happening again in the future.

8. Learn from the mistakes of others. Negative examples can provide a lesson on behaviors to avoid. Learning what not to do can be just as beneficial as learning what to do in a given situation.

9. Apply your knowledge. Take your book knowledge to a completely new level by applying your studies to real world situations. Some of the best lessons in life arrive through practical experience.

10. Stay open-minded. Don’t be afraid to change your mind. Change typically means growth.

Regardless of where you are in life or how much you’ve accomplished, there’s always something new and exciting to learn. So rediscover the joy in lifelong learning. Challenge yourself and follow your passion. When you do, you’ll enjoy the journey just as much as the destination.

With the holiday season upon us, you have undoubtedly spent some time thinking about the past year or two and what you hope to accomplish in 2010. If you have not prepared your plan for 2010, there is no time like the present. When you plan and prepare carefully, you should expect to achieve success. Recognizing and developing your winning qualities enables that success to emerge.

Regardless of your goal – increasing your sales, saving for your child’s education, or starting a business, you will give yourself a much greater chance of realizing it by taking the proper steps to develop both the plan and the person (you!). While business planning is crucial, the focus of this writing is on developing the proper mindset to succeed.

Today, you may feel uncertain about your future and how to go about achieving your goals. Are you struggling with worries about your own capabilities or focusing on the obstacles you might face? The path from where you are today to where you want to be at the conclusion of 2010 is not going to be smooth and straight. While your fears may have merit, obsessing on them will only be counterproductive to your goals.

Expect success in 2010. The reason for twists and turns in your journey may have little to do with you. Typically, it has more to do with the fact that others are not as interested in your success as you are. Competitors, funding sources, and other people may accidentally hinder your efforts in some manner. As you encounter these bumps in the road, your character, commitment and attitude will be the determining factors of your success.

Deciding to expect the best as you pursue your goals will help you to release your fears and doubts, and will give you the confidence to persevere through all challenges. Having doubts about your ability to succeed is normal, but allowing these doubts to dominate your thoughts will prevent you from making your best efforts toward your goal.

An optimistic and positive mind is much more likely to develop creative solutions to issues than a mind that is focused on self-defeating thoughts.  The more time you spend expecting success and prosperity today, the more likely you are to help enable it in your life.

Expect success and you can achieve it in 2010!