Biggest and hardest mindshifts

[changinglanes12]

What's Your biggest and hardest mindshifts that you had to change in order to grow fastlane business? Mine is still that you have to be talented and have high IQ. And i still catch myself thinking how to chase money not how to provide VALUE.

 

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[jpl]

Mine is still that you have to be talented and have high IQ.

In my opinion you don’t need either. You don’t need to have any special talent or rank high in an IQ test.

I think that far more important is a healthy resiliency, determination and being able to learn - from others as well as your own mistakes. Also you need to push further instead of giving up. Referring to Unscripted : Continue to look for the golden ball.

 

[Deleted78083]

In my experience, high IQ is actually a hindrance for many entrepreneurs. People who are super smart tend to think that their IQ will compensate for a lack of hard work. It might short-term; it won't long-term.

My biggest mindset obstacle was thinking that successful entrepreneurs were somehow different than "normal" people. I used to believe that entrepreneurs were born, and if you didn't have the "entrepreneur gene," you might as well give up.

It was when I got to know some very successful entrepreneurs personally that I realized that there is no entrepreneur mold -- it's just normal people who preferred to blaze their own trail.

I would tend to disagree about intelligence being a hindrance.

I look at Zuckerberg, Jeff Bezos, Bill Gates, Vitalik Buterin, Peter Thiel, Elon Musk...these guys are smart. Not "120 IQ" smart. More like 150+. Their intelligence enabled them to see and comprehend things others couldn't. They solved problems most didn't even know existed, and got massively rich for doing so. Their intelligence was a huge help (but let's be clear, they also worked their asses off).

I think intelligence is a tool. It depends on what you do with it, and how you use it. It can be a barrier if you use it wrongly, but it can also be a propulsor.

Luckily, as an entrepreneur, you don't have to be smart. Employees need to be smart, which is why they need to go through some cognitive tests before working in a company. As an entrepreneur you do the same: you hire smart people.

Thank god I always failed all cognitive tests I passed. My path as an entrepreneur was written in Destiny

To answer your question, my biggest mindset shift happened thx to Andy Black. It was focusing on production (eg: writing) instead of consumption (eg: reading).

Then it was to focus on others' desires (eg: "what do you need") instead of my own desires (i WaNt mOnEy).

 

[Deleted78083]

You could be right. I'm just going by my experience, and I have absolutely no data to support my hypothesis...

That said, keep in mind that naming six people who were extremely intelligent and succeeded doesn't disprove my hypothesis. There are tens of millions of entrepreneurs -- a sample size of six (or even 10,000) doesn't prove or disprove anything one way or the other. (And again, I admit, I have no data either.)

Btw, if you want to use these six entrepreneurs as your sample, I would also recommend looking at the following data about each of them:

- How affluent were their families growing up?
- How connected were their families in the business world?
- What type of education did they get?
- Did they come from a line of entrepreneurs?
- Etc...

While it's possible that it was their intelligence that set them apart, it's also possible that it was one or more of the things above (or a host of other things).

Again, just basing my hypothesis off my personal experience, including my own entrepreneurial journey...

Yes, I agree with you.

Intelligence is a tool and depends on how it is used, which depends on values, mindset, vision, etc.

In my own observations of the richest people in the world (roughly the top 1000), it just happened that an enormous majority of these people were exceptionally intelligent.

Was intelligence the only reason why they became rich? Certainly not. Did it play a part? It certainly did. Does it mean you have to be a genius to be a billionaire? Probably not. To quote Jeff Bezos, "a point of view is worth 80 IQ points". But let's be honest, had Bezos not been that smart, I doubt he'd have been able to fix the problems he did.

Intelligence is a tool. It can help you, or hinder you.

 

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[changinglanes12]

You could be right. I'm just going by my experience, and I have absolutely no data to support my hypothesis...

That said, keep in mind that naming six people who were extremely intelligent and succeeded doesn't disprove my hypothesis. There are tens of millions of entrepreneurs -- a sample size of six (or even 10,000) doesn't prove or disprove anything one way or the other. (And again, I admit, I have no data either.)

Btw, if you want to use these six entrepreneurs as your sample, I would also recommend looking at the following data about each of them:

- How affluent were their families growing up?
- How connected were their families in the business world?
- What type of education did they get?
- Did they come from a line of entrepreneurs?
- Etc...

While it's possible that it was their intelligence that set them apart, it's also possible that it was one or more of the things above (or a host of other things).

Again, just basing my hypothesis off my personal experience, including my own entrepreneurial journey...

Yes, I agree with you.

Intelligence is a tool and depends on how it is used, which depends on values, mindset, vision, etc.

In my own observations of the richest people in the world (roughly the top 1000), it just happened that an enormous majority of these people were exceptionally intelligent.

Was intelligence the only reason why they became rich? Certainly not. Did it play a part? It certainly did. Does it mean you have to be a genius to be a billionaire? Probably not. To quote Jeff Bezos, "a point of view is worth 80 IQ points". But let's be honest, had Bezos not been that smart, I doubt he'd have been able to fix the problems he did.

Intelligence is a tool. It can help you, or hinder you.

I have intelligent friend and he overthinks all the time. He just wants to get an exciting job. He laughs about the idea of entrepreneurship as something impossible. Take example Nikola Tesla. He is the biggest genius in history. Man died without a penny. IQ follows Bell distribution. Only 2.1% of people have IQ 130 or above and only 0.1% have IQ above 145. How many of them become entrepreneuar? 68.2% of population falls around the mean (100). In a range 85-115. Most entreprenaurs fall in this range? So yeah, i think technically it's possible for everybody to become an entreprenaur unless you have an IQ of 70. And there is more to an performance than IQ. Cognitive skills like working memory, executive functioning etc play a role aswell.

 

[jpl]

What would it change for you to know that you have XX IQ and believe that it is somehow going to affect your entrepreneurial path? In my opinion someone who feels entitled to something or impeded by his IQ score, whatever it may be, is just looking for excuses or making up reasons, why something should or should not work out.

And there is more to an performance than IQ. Cognitive skills like working memory, executive functioning etc play a role aswell.

"etc" plays a role as well... Don't get me wrong, I think being smart or stupid for sure is somehow important on how you tackle choices in front of you. But cognitive skills, executive functioning and a hundred other aspects play a role in being successful depending on your specific situation as well.

If you want to study the effects that some IQ score is having on entrepreneurs, that sure is an interesting topic. But since you asked for a "Mindshift" I think IQ should not be the focus, since there are many more important factors.

 

[Brrr]

Re IQ, I would argue vision & determination both play a larger part in the success of an entrepreneur. I'd say the former is linked to IQ to some degree the second definitely isn't.

For me, the biggest mindset shift was moving away from "just one more thing and it'll all be ok". This idea that if I just solved the next few problems, everything would suddenly begin to run smoothly and I could take the foot off the gas and kick back.

I realised that this has never been the case, you will always have problems to deal with, new headaches, new challenges, and that as long as you are no. 1 in the organisation, the To-Do list never gets cleared. Realising that this was just part of the gig gave me a sense of calm, that I just had to do my best to improve things but that new problems would come along and I would just have to handle them the same way I handled all the other problems.

The second big mindset shift I had was last year during the first lockdown. I decided then and then that I would not give up and do everything I could to keep my business alive and see through the next 12 month, even if I didn't make a penny and no matter what happened. Realising that as long as you don't give up fighting you can't lose built up a lot of long-term resilience.

 

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[MJ DeMarco]

What's Your biggest and hardest mindshifts that you had to change in order to grow fastlane business?

Right now I struggle with working ON the business, vs IN the business. Right now I'm trying to keep employees to a minimum, especially since I plan on moving out-of-state soon. This has me doing more grunt work than I'd like to admit.

Mine is still that you have to be talented and have high IQ

Don't think you need either.

Persistence and focus.
Problem solving ability (entrepreneurship is just one long endless list of problems to eval and solve)
Reasonable expectations.
Ability to learn and grasp new info/concepts/skills.
Communication skills.

Ill take those any day over supposed IQ.

 

[The-J]

Instead of weighing in on IQ (IDGAF about IQ) I'll just add my answer to the question.

1. That you have to do it alone and figure out everything yourself. Don't know why I thought this, but it's 100% not true.
2. That hiring people is a bad thing. It's wrong. People are one of the most powerful assets a company has.
3. That you need to have money to make money, and that you need to bootstrap everything you do. This one was taught to me by my parents, who aren't entrepreneurs so I don't even know why I listened to them.
4. That you need to have connections. It's true, but you can just... MAKE connections. Seriously, networking is easier than you think. You don't need to go to Stanford. Don't have social skills? Me neither: the only skill I have is to ask questions. I just want to learn about other people & their businesses and figure out what I can do for em.
5. Pretty much everything I thought I knew about work was wrong. I'm still working on this: I have a tendency to simultaneously overwork and underwork at the same time. I still have the habit of overwork on the grunt work, and underwork on the important stuff. In reality it should be the opposite. The problem is, it's often hard to distinguish what's urgent and what's important. For some people, everything is urgent and important. You can't be like that as an entrepreneur. See:"The ONE Thing" by Keller & Papasan.
6. That just because a business already exists, you shouldn't try and compete with them. A lot of businesses are successful enough to stay in business but aren't doing the best job possible. That's the opportunity... and there might even be opportunity for disruption.
7. That you have to be an expert in order to do something effectively. You don't need 10+ years of experience in something in order to be taken seriously, IF you bring something valuable to the table.

There's probably a lot more. My entrepreneurial journey has been slower than a lot of people on this forum, but I can look back on countless limiting beliefs I've had and I don't even know where I got them from. I think I reasoned my way into a lot of them! Some of them came from other places. For example I've always been hesitant on hiring people because they're expensive, they add another tax burden, and working with people can sometimes be an infuriating experience.

It might just be that there's a lot about business that is non-intuitive to people who spend a great deal of time thinking. But I think there's something else. Every single limiting belief I had took time to break, and every time I had to break a limiting belief it was uncomfortable and risky. And, if something I did failed, all it would do is reinforce my limiting belief. I've still got limiting beliefs that I'm not aware of, I'm sure.

If you grew up like me (middle class household, child of immigrants) you might have a distorted view of business and entrepreneurship that will require assessment and breaking of incorrect beliefs. This is why the whole IQ debate, in my opinion, is pointless: there are so many other factors that matter more than IQ it's crazy.

 

[Tom H.]

Developing a bias for action. Charging. Getting after it.

That's been the challenge for me, at least. Now I take action and I'm more effective, but I've gotta keep getting faster, I'm not there yet.

I was surfing a few hours ago at sunset and I realized I'm getting a lot better because I've added this layer of charging, committing and going for it, it makes all the difference. I'm doing the same in business and all areas of my life.

 

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[Deleted68316]

To answer your question, my biggest mindset shift happened thx to Andy Black. It was focusing on production (eg: writing) instead of consumption (eg: reading).

Then it was to focus on others' desires (eg: "what do you need") instead of my own desires (i WaNt mOnEy).

Really interesting. Thank you and Andy Black

 

[changinglanes12]

Right now I struggle with working ON the business, vs IN the business. Right now I'm trying to keep employees to a minimum, especially since I plan on moving out-of-state soon. This has me doing more grunt work than I'd like to admit.



Don't think you need either.

Persistence and focus.
Problem solving ability (entrepreneurship is just one long endless list of problems to eval and solve)
Reasonable expectations.
Ability to learn and grasp new info/concepts/skills.
Communication skills.

Ill take those any day over supposed IQ.

Yes, flexible thinking and communication skills. Mayority of people don't have to worry about talent and IQ because they fall into the average range anyway. So there is practically zero competition from "smarter" people. But being flexible and having empathy (knowing what people need and listening) are most valuable skills.