NAVY SEALs or soldiers that have been in combat are a great source of inspiration for the modern day entrepreneur. They bring with them fundamental qualities and attributes that can make a successful business owner. Things like discipline, tenacity, resilience and elite performance are just a few things that one could learn from them.
Here are the top five NAVY SEAL tips:
Plan your mission and be agile: NAVY SEALs plan attentively and carefully. They prepare for various scenarios and pay attention to every detail. However they know the fact that you can never plan for the unknown. Their teams are quick, can handle surprises, are capable of making adjustments on the fly and are agile. Modern day entrepreneurs need to prepare diligently. But it’s the combination of preparation and agility that turns a good team into a successful company.
Embrace Chaos: NAVY SEALs are always dealing with uncertainty and crisis. They need to prepare themselves to be bold, swift and be gone. Results and outcomes matter. A business owner’s day-to-day life would start and end with issues: sales issues, legal issues, service issues, financing issues, product issues, recruiting issues, you name it. There are always thousands of tasks to do and only time for 100, and this would never change. So you need to make peace with the idea of being around constant chaos and the sooner you embrace it, the faster you grow. Break down your objectives into components, define them, plan them, execute on them, and train yourself to be calm under fire.
Never stop training: SEALs believe in 80% training and 20% execution. When they’re not on actual combat deployments, they are spending the vast majority of their time training for a number of different types of missions. In contrast, at start-ups business owner typically spend 100% of their time executing and zero percent of their time training. So it is important to build a culture of training at all levels. Entrepreneurs should never stop learning or taking up training lessons that will build better skills. They should make it a point to build the same atmosphere around their teams and/or company.
Leave no man behind: SEALs make it a point that they leave no one behind during the time of combat crisis. The essence is teamwork. Your teamwork spirit should just not end at holding meetings or assigning tasks. You should be passionate and to an extent highly possessive about your team. Also, showing loyalty to your team is one of the most powerful messages in business leadership. We all know that plans can fail. Objectives can fail. Products and/services can fail, but an entrepreneur’s loyalty towards his team should never fail.
Be focused and minimalistic: No great team or company is ever built without discipline, focus and good habits. Try to focus on what you need to do your job and try not to waste your resources and energy on things that are not necessary in life. Success, failure, turmoil and chaos are a part of the entire entrepreneurial journey. Try to live it and fight it with all that you got and eventually you would discover the important things that actually helped you through the good and the bad times.
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