Your Next Five Moves

MOVE #1: UNDERSTAND YOURSELF

• Knowing who you want to be (including your deepest desires, core beliefs and values) and start behaving as if you were already that person.

• Knowing where you are now, by being totally honest with yourself on your strengths/weaknesses, what motivates you, and what you truly want (not what you think you should want).

• Knowing your ideal path. Does entrepreneurship really suit you? Or are you better off striking out as an intrapreneur within your company?

MOVE #2: SOLVE PROBLEMS EFFECTIVELY

To achieve success and fulfillment, you must handle thousands of problems and decisions. Hone your problem-solving skills to get better outcomes and pre-empt problems in the future. This requires that you:

• Learn how to process issues rigorously. Bet-David shares the “Investment-Time-Return formula” you can use to optimize your resources, and how to take full responsibility for your desired outcomes.

• Learn to “Solve for X”, i.e. find and address the root causes or underlying issues behind a problem or situation.

MOVE #3: BUILD A WINNING TEAM

No matter how brilliant you are, you can’t do everything alone. Surround yourself with the right people who can address your weaknesses and blind spots, multiply your strengths, and help you and your business to grow.

This move probably warrants a book all by itself. Bet-David addresses several key aspects, including:

• How to hire and retain the right people. This involves attracting the right talents and advisers,  having a robust recruitment process, and developing an attractive compensation plan to retain people.

• How to build a winning culture. This involves establishing common values, principles and beliefs, translating them into concrete behaviors in your daily work, building trust, developing a succession plan, encouraging constructive conflict, and  tailoring your approach to each team member’s love languages and motivators.

MOVE #4: STRATEGIZE TO SCALE UP

There are several strategic elements that determine if your business will grow, stagnate, or even collapse. To scale up and achieve exponential growth, you must:

• Raise and use capital wisely, to generate both linear and exponential growth.

• Grow your people alongside the company. Demand the best from people, hold them accountable for their own career or life goals, role-model the expected levels of rigor and accountability, and track the key metrics in your business.

MOVE #5: GET GOOD AT POWER PLAYS

Power plays can determine if you emerge a winner or loser. Master your strategic maneuvers to beat established incumbents, frame your story, and leverage social media. This move is about:

• Finding the right levers so you can beat the giants (i.e. the huge, established market leaders in your industry) who have much more resources, experience and capital than you. Bet-David advocates using social media as a key marketing tool to engage your audience, shape your story and influence public opinion.

• Learning to negotiate, sell, and influence. This requires that you do your homework before every major meeting, build strategic partnerships, and progressively develop your negotiation skills and power.