How to Fulfill your Potentials Quickly and become a super hero

Challenges stimulate champions but managing them creatively may turn an ordinary potential into a super hero, irrespective of your trade or profession. Granted that there are different problem solving methods, one of the easiest ways to get to the top quickly is to secure a coach or mentor. Who is a coach or mentor?
He is that rare gem who believes in you and your potential. He or she is willing to accept or offer to nurture you into a promise-fulfilled. He is the experienced player in any field who is ready make the sacrifices (time, energy and comfort) to help the protégé or mentee become a super performer. His greatest tool being the experience he has in the field or area of endeavour which you are interested in. On classic example of what can happen between the protégé and his coach or mentor is that between Thomas Edison, the inventor of the electric bulb and Henry Ford the founder of the Ford Motor Corporation.

BETWEEN FORD & EDISON
Gerald Ford was an admirer of Edison. While he was working on his gasoline powered car, people mocked him and made mockery of his efforts. They said he was wasting his time on gasoline energy because Edison's electricity was the only future to energy for cars. Ford,  not discouraged, decided to ask Edison himself whether there was a future for gasoline cars. 
    Here is Edison's reply to the future of the gasoline engine:
      
"Yes, there is a big future for any light-weight engine, that can develop a high horsepower and be self-contained. No one kind of motive power is ever going to do all the work of the country. We do not know what electricity can do, but I take for     granted that it cannot do everything. Keep on with your engine. If you can get what you     are after, I can see a great future. (Ford, My Life and Work, pp. 234-235).  "Yes, there is a big future for any light-weight engine, that can develop a high horsepower and be     self-contained. No one kind of motive power is ever going to do all the work of the country. We do not know what electricity can do, but I take for granted that it cannot do everything. Keep on with your engine. If you can get what you are after, I can see a great future."

This reply from the greatest expert on energy of the time made Ford develop confidence in his invention and kept his eyes focused on his activities. Perhaps without this encounter, Ford may have given up.

The story is also told of a mathematician who had cracked a centuries old problem without knowing it. It was the view of his mentor that led to his publication of a theory that went on to change history of mathematics significantly.

Speaking on the importance of having a coach, Ryan Giggs, the most decorated player in English football says this of his coach, Alex Ferguson: he "has been the best thing to happen to my career. I have met him since I was 13 years and he (the coach/mentor), has helped me to get this far. I don't think I would have had such an awesome career without him". Incidentally, some of the greatest footballers of our time have passed through Ferguson and Arsene Wenger. So why is a coach so important?
Your coach/mentor helps you to learn more about your values, clarify your vision, and reduce your learning curve by more than half. Goal identification is another reason for wanting a coach. Many people with high potentials end up with half fulfilled aspirations. The reason is that they were not well guided. If you have not identified your goals in life, it seems inevitable that you would need the services of a mentor/coach.  He would help in identifying your strengths and weaknesses, creating a winning strategy for turning strengths into giant performance and weaknesses into strengths. As we saw in the case of Ford, he needed endorsement or encouragement that he was on the right tract and that comment by the greatest inventor of his time gave him a good dose of confidence to continue. Again it is Thomas Edison who said: "Many of life's failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up." See what would have happened if Ford had given up?

Who Needs a Coach? 
We often seem to believe that only young people need coaches. This is erroneous. Coaches are so by experience in a particular area. A coach in one situation could be the expert in another. So when ever one desires to learn a new thing, he automatically becomes the mentee or protégé. So the protégé is one who s willing to learn and obey instructions and one with a humble heart to appreciate and commend the efforts of the coach.  Remember that the Bible says: "a soft tongue breaketh the bone". (Prov. 25:15).

In Which Areas of Life do we need a Coach?
In every area-professional, social, career, sports, business etc. There are no exceptions. You are your own advisor in this matter. Thorough examining yourself and see in which areas of your life you need the most help. Get a coach. You could have more than more than one coach at the same time but more than one in a life time. Usually, life is segmented into phases, and the life coach you select should be one that can help with your current level of development e.g. career, academics, post-school development etc.

Where to Get a Coach?
You can get a coach from amongst family members, school teachers, lectures, or from the church. However, career guidance services are available at Counseling offices or from related service providers.
The above mentors are visible but we have invisible coaches and mentors too. Invisible mentoring can take place through televisions, internet, books, audio and video Cd's etc. Reading articles and books of successful authors can help you become better at doing everything you set out to do.

What You Would Benefit from Coaches
1.    Experience: No amount of money can buy experience for you
2.    Hands-on know-how or tricks of the trade that help you to outsmart your opponents in the office or the open contest
3.     Puts you through a rehearsal or training that improves your potentials and skills
4.    They provide you with energy that drives your goals and visions
5.     They assist in crystallizing goals and help in fulfilling them
6.    They could connect you to life transforming knowledge, processes, information and institutions

Conclusions

The fable of Albert Einstein turning places with his driver helps to close this topic. The legend holds that Einstein for one reason or the other could not deliver a speech and had consented to his driver of many years delivering the speech. In the process, the driver was said to have done the assignment so well that the audience did not notice the difference.


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How to Organise an Effective Sales Promotion

Experience has shown that an effective sales promotion is best seen as a Project to be planned, managed and executed as such. As in project management there are few stages involved in the process which should be meticulously executed. Whether it be a product or service, the stages are basically the same and would only vary in their details and application.

The first task is to think up a list of committed team members to help in the process. This step is crucial to the success of the Campaign because if the wrong hands are selected, then there would be no commitment to agreed goals and implementation would suffer from a lack of initiative. Remember no matter how well planned the process, there is always a chance that something important is escaping the radar of the planners’ attention. Wrong assembly or ineffective team composition may also lead to shortage of ideas and wish-washy execution.

The next step is to plan out a programme of action. This plan of action or check list in marketing circles is a comprehensive list of all actions required for success of any programme or campaign. Your Check list should ideally include: Venue, Date, Speakers or Speakers or entertainers, dancers or any other attention grabbing devices that may be agreed. Budget considerations are crucial because they determine how extensive or limited the Campaign is to be.

Another step is to consider whether to use internal or external staff or to use a compliment of both. As the Football World Cup approaches for instance, it would be a surprise if Guinness would promote her products in any other way except by the efforts of External Consultants as she has always done. Whether to use Internal or External staff is contingent on a couple of factors: availability of trained and able staff, possibility of retaining and effectively using the team at the end of the Campaign period. It is also crucial that the length of the campaign is considered and whether the company wants to have sales promotion over a long period. Experience shows that long running Campaigns are fraught with tedium, wear-down syndromes.

A good Check list should also include information on resources, Topic or Theme, Public Address System procurement, Publicity materials printing, choice of printers and finance, elevated stands, technicians (PAS), instrumentalists, selection of sub team leader (which should be done be recognized Group heads/ leaders.) As I noted while writing on a similar topic recently, “the complete answers may not be available to these queries but it would do to itemise them and fill them up as the decisions are made concerning what or who would carry out each function”. I also recommend that “you should have alternative processes, venues or actions itemised and crossed out as the events unfold.” As I learnt from Sir Chris Ogbechie of the Lagos Business School (LBS) it is essential to assign responsibilities immediately so that those with various responsibilities would begin to chew up their tasks and improve on what ever they have been assigned. Although this is no guarantee of success, it reduces the chances that you would make a mistake or leave out crucial roles.

The next step is to check out the tasks as they being implemented. Getting a Venue can be problematic if the Campaign coincides with any of the seasonal events in Nigeria. Beginning from September, choice venues like Muson Centre, Eko Hotels, The Event Centre and others are fully booked with rare chances that a day or two may be available in between. For a Campaign that should, all things being equal, last some weeks or couple of days, this will not do.

As with Centres, entertainers such as comedians and dancers are often very busy towards the Christmas festivities. It may become troublesome if you do not start out in time too. Another reason for starting out early is that their names may be required in the publicity materials.

Whether the Campaign is national or localized is also important in choosing which medium to utilize. There would be publicity stunts to promote the Campaign and this will depend on budget, medium, relevance and reach of such media. Every decision to be taken concerning publicity should be weighed against the backdrop of the ROI of the campaign; although it is important to note that a weighed distribution (per annum) may be used to rate the ROI of promotions instead of a Project tenure view. In which case, promotion is considered only as a fraction of the Marketing cost.

The next important step is to get your publicity materials printed on time. Having the computer print out scrutinized by the members of the Committee will help reduce error and promote solidarity amongst the team. Where external teams are involved, it is important to get the views of the Consultants concerning the theme of the Campaign. After all they are the ones to encounter the end users. It is important to note that a feedback form or any other mechanism should be devised such that it would be possible to reach out to the respondents or those who participated in the Campaign. A theme and Scheme may be devised for this purpose.

Security is always an issue in open air Campaigns. There should be a liaison with relevant police authorities in order to safeguard men and materials.

Finally, experience shows that where external consultants are utilized in Campaigns, reporting procedure may be compromised. The Sales Director or Manager therefore needs to include the information that payments to consultants would be contingent upon satisfactory report and return of materials used in the Campaign.

Once the Campaign has rolled off, then you need to keep your eyes on the ball. Ensure that there is regular and constant supply, replenishment of stock. An efficient supply of stock is cost effective and important to success.

If you have done a good preparation, the chances of local variations would be reduced. However, there should be a quick feed back method that ensures that decisions are made quickly. Levels of autonomy available to Sub team leadership are contingent on earlier agreed conditions.

How to Organise an Effective Open-Air Christian Crusade | eHow.com

How to Organise an Effective Open-Air Christian Crusade | eHow.com

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