How To Manages 3 Companies And Still Remain Human

Carlos Ghosn, is a businessman born in Brazil, who is half French and half Lebanese and who at the time spoke only enough Japanese to make short, formal speeches. the joint CEO of Renault and Nissan, became such a hero in Japan for saving Nissan that a manga maker released a 7-part comic about him in 2002. That’s right about a businessman. The manga was a best-seller.

Since then, Ghosn has taken Nissan from has-been to industry leader, aggressively pushing into electric cars — the Leaf is by far the top-selling electric in the world — and declaring that “autonomous drive” vehicles are coming up shortly. He’s also continued to expand his reach, this summer completing the takeover of Russian automaker AvtoVaz, which makes the top-selling Lada. Ghosn is now AvtoVaz’s chairman.

In other words, if comic makers thought he was impressive for his leadership a decade ago, the fact that he now steers 3 international car companies, in 3 different languages, responsible for 10% of all cars sold and grossing an expected $140+ billion in 2014 sales should practically guarantee Ghosn an Avengers movie by now (in which, of course, he’d play every role).

But that would assume that Ghosn (pronounced like “phone”) is a larger-than-life, Elon Musk-like character. He’s not. Ghosn lives his life — as he says — “almost like a monk:" everything is planned and everything is telegraphed. (Even our interview ran with precision: He walked in, went over the time constraints, answered the questions and left — in the exact window he had laid out.)

That’s because the discipline of running 3 companies in 3 far-flung countries requires exactly that: insane amounts of discipline. Want to know where Ghosn is going to be next year this week? Ask his staff. His schedule is mapped out 15 months ahead and distributed widely. His plane flights are reserved for sleeping since he knows that as soon as he touches down, he’s going to get hit with questions from the local staff who now have an audience with the CEO. And when he’s in each of those countries, he focuses only on the company whose name is on the local headquarters.

“I start with the principle that when I'm in Japan, I'm making decisions for Nissan,” says Ghosn. “When I'm in Paris, I'm making decisions for Renault. And when I am in Russia, I'm making decisions, eventually, for AvtoVAZ. I don't mix the different responsibilities because I just want to make sure the different teams in charge feel responsible and there is no confusion between the different companies. So, a lot of pragmatism, some basic rules, professional people around you and, at the end of the day, it's possible."

Why 'Stupid' Startups Do So Well During Seed Funding Rounds

Buzzfeed a website filled with animated gifs, listicles and quizzes, just raised $50 million dollars, valuing the company at a reported $850 million. Scoopwhoop which is the indian version of Buzzfeed raised Rs10 crore (1.6 million) from Bharti Softbank (BSB), which has taken a 25% equity stake in the company. The deal gives the 15-month-old website an enterprise valuation of Rs40 crore at this stage. Snapchat, the messaging app known for helping teenagers sext one another, reportedly recevieved a $10 billion valuation from its investors.

I am sure you are wondering why and if the world has gone mad.

Some industry watchers see the recent boom in seemingly trivial apps and websites as foretelling tech bubble 2.0. However, there’s much more to the story.

Our knee-jerk reaction to classify innovation as either important or frivolous is exactly why many are left agast when previously dismissed companies reveal shocking valuations in ridiculous investment rounds.

Vitamins and Painkillers

Most people, including many professional investors, tend to put new products into one of two categories: vitamins or painkillers.

Painkillers tackle important problems. They solve an obvious need, relieving a customer’s specific pain and address a quantifiable markets. Think Tylenol, the brand name version of acetaminophen, and the product’s promise of reliable relief. It’s the kind of ready-made solution for which people are happy to pay.

Innovators in companies big and small are constantly asked to prove their idea is important enough to merit the time and money needed to build it. Gatekeepers such as division heads and managers want to invest in solving real problems — or, meeting immediate needs — by backing painkillers.

In contrast, vitamins do not necessarily solve an obvious pain-point. Instead they appeal to users’ emotional rather than functional needs. When we take our multivitamin each morning, we don't really know if it is actually making us healthier. Efficacy is not why we take vitamins. Taking a vitamin is a "check it off your list" behavior we measure in terms of psychological, rather than physical, relief. We feel satisfied that we are doing something good for our bodies — even if we can’t tell how much good it is actually doing us.

Unlike a painkiller, which we can not function without, missing a few days of vitamin popping, say while on vacation, is no big deal. Likewise, people tend to dismiss innovations like Buzzfeed as vitamins believing it’s a nice-to-have product, not a must-have -- and for the most part, they’re right.

Like a Toy

However, what we often fail to realize is that over time, vitamins can become painkillers. As Buzzfeed investor Chris Dixon wrote, “the next big thing will start out looking like a toy.”

Let’s consider a few of today’s hottest consumer technology products — say Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest. What are they selling — vitamins or painkillers?

Most people would guess vitamins, thinking users aren’t doing much of anything important other than perhaps seeking a quick boost of social validation. Before making up your mind on the vitamin or painkiller debate for some of the world’s most successful tech companies, consider this idea: A habit is when not doing an action causes a bit of pain.

Think back to before you first started using these services. No one ever woke up in the middle of the night screaming, “I need something to help me update my status!” Like so many innovations, people did not know they needed Facebook until it became part of their everyday lives -- until it became a habit.

From Vitamin to Painkiller

It is important to clarify that the term “painpoint,” as it is frequently used in business school and marketing books, is somewhat hyperbolic. In reality, the experience we are talking about is more similar to an “itch,” a feeling that manifests within the mind and causes discomfort until it is satisfied. The habit-forming products we use are simply there to provide some sort of relief. Using a technology or product to scratch the itch provides faster satisfaction than ignoring it. Once we come to depend on a tool, nothing else will do.

Seeking pleasure and avoiding pain are two key motivators in all species. When we feel discomfort, we seek to escape the uncomfortable sensation. Over time, the solution to the user’s pain is found in the product’s use.

Habit-forming technologies seem, at first, to be offering nice-to-have vitamins, but once the habit is established, they provide an ongoing pain remedy. It is easy to dismiss these seemingly "stupid" technologies as frivolous when we don’t understand the deeper psychology compelling users to come back again and again.

This essay is an adapted excerpt from Hooked: How to Build Habit-Forming Products by Nir Eyal. Nir blogs about the psychology of products at NirAndFar.com.

Author: Nir is a consultant at Nirandfar, and has lead two former companies to acquisitions.

Blogging? 4 Important Tips That Guarantees Your Success As a Blogger

It’s very true that you can make up to a six figure income from your blog. But don’t get it twisted; it’s not always as easy as it sounds. Like every other business, you have to pay your dues. What I mean is this, “there is a growing and nurturing period”. During this period, you have to be patient and “feed your blog”, by feeding I mean giving valuable FREE content to your blog readers. This will certainly help you to build trust. Blogging is time consuming, but if you get it right you can command cash whenever, wherever, howeverJ. I mean you could be playing PS4 and receiving payment alerts on your phone. Don’t get all excited too soon lol. Read on!

So, so… I just wanted to prepare your mind again with these 4 great tips that will help you develop the right mindset for your blogging career. You shouldn’t start blogging without putting these things in check! If you are blogging already, you could also learn a thing or two from this tutorial.

So Here Goes!

1.     You Need To Break Out Off The“ Get Rich Quick Mentality”

It’s understandable that you want to make money. I mean, everyone wants to make money and even more… Right now, I need you to slow down and reflect. Most of the guys on the Forbes list probably started from somewhere and then over time, they grew their businesses to their present level. When Mark Zuckerberg started Facebook, he wasn’t as rich as he is now, was he?

Today, every blogger wants to start a blog, throw up some posts and start making money immediately. Hold on bud… It doesn’t work like that. I need you to rid your mind off the “Get Rich Quick Mentality”. As a blogger, when you have that kind of mindset, it will show in your quality of work. You might be forced to start doing the copy and paste method (duplicate content) from other sites and honestly, that isn’t way to go. As a blogger, you need to think about your business for the long term and not short term. Think about it, one year from now how credible would your blog be. I am not saying you have to wait one year to start making money off your blog, but blogging is all about building trust. Can you focus on writing one high quality article everyday for the next one year?

2.    Prepare to Write At Least 100 Quality Articles

If you can write a 100 quality articles without quitting on blogging, then your success is guaranteed! Most bloggers don’t have the persistence to get to that point. I hope you read the lines clearly… I meant “Quality Articles” and not some crappy or copy and paste shit. It’s unlikely that those that give up before they get to the 100^th post would not experience the “Ultimate Blogging Success”

The reason why I am using the 100 article benchmark is this:

If you get to a 100 quality articles; then chances are you enjoy writing! For me, writing comes naturally and I could do this over and again even though sometimes I hit a writer’s block J that shit happens sometimes lol. I always feel fulfilled when my blog post is being read by a stranger who commends my writing either via the comment box, email or phone call. I feel blessed!

If you are considering blogging as a career and don’t enjoy writing, I suggest you think about it over and again. Also, the love of writing can be developed over time… Still talking about a 100 posts; on the long run, you find out that you get better by the day. You don’t have to be an English tutor to write meaningful content for your blog; I mean you don’t need to ACE a TOEFL or something. Just write in such a way that people would feel your personality by more reading your blog posts.

3.    Don’t Burn Yourself Out Focusing on Google Ranking and All That Alexa Stuff…

Until last week, I used to bother my head about ranking on the search engines, checking my Alexa stats and stuffs like that. When my rank goes down, I feel real bad! Truthfully, it doesn’t have to be that way. When you read through a blog that tries to rank certain keywords for the search engines, it becomes obvious that the writing is unnatural.

Of the truth, if your site happens to rank high then that’s fabulous but if not, do not fret over it. All the keyword stuffing in between sentences and things like that doesn’t make your writing feel nice. I advice that you write as naturally as you can, the search engines tends to pick up some long term keywords even when you write naturally.

4.    Build a List and Focus on Your Subscribers

I don’t know if you ever heard of money being in the list. Building an email list is “What’s Up” in the blogging business. I call my list members “My Loyalist”. If you have ever entered your email address on a website to receive something free, I am quite sure you know what happens next! You receive updates from the list owner; sometimes FREE content and other times PROMOTIONAL stuffs.

If you have a list of 10,000 subscribers then it means that whenever you post on your blog, you can send the link to 10,000 people. Even if you get a 1% open rate, you still have 1000 people reading your blog posts and offers. Do you understand?

You need to focus on writing for your subscribers and not for the search engines. When you write knowing that you got 10,000 people waiting to hear from you, it makes you want to write better stuffs. Lastly, It’s not all about building the list; you should also learn to build a good relationship with them. By relationship, I mean putting their problems first before yours. What this does is to build trust. When they find out that you sincerely care about them, they will buy products from you.

Thinking about starting a blog? Or started one already, I am very sure these tips would help you in building your blog business and making you money.

I hope this helps.

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UNDERSTANDIGN THE DYNAMICS OF GROWTH AND CHANGE 2

The other basis for business success is change, in other to effectively drive home idea behind the word I would like to use the hermetic word Transmutation instead of the word change for the simple reason that I feel that the spirit of the word which gives it its meaning is lost on many which is partly because the word is used loosely. According to ancient alchemical/hermetic philosophy, the term transmute implies to change condition. Ancient alchemical thought still holds that you can transmute one thing to another thus changing its condition/nature; this is what change really means. It means to transmute conditions from one thing to the next so much so that the thing transmuted takes on a new characteristic that was absent in it prior to when it was transmuted.

They say the only constant thing in life is change which is an absolute truth. Change itself is a product of motion. It is most unfortunate that when most people think of change what comes to mind is growth. Also there is great resistance by many people to change even when what comes to mind when they think of change is growth. As shown above growth implies steady increase while change going by the word transmutation implies a change in condition. While growth may birth change but it doesn’t necessarily leads to change the same way expansion doesn’t necessarily results to growth. Change is peculiar to the nature of idea the same way two legs are peculiar to man and wings to birds. 

If we pay close attention to our idea(s) we would realize that besides growing it always seek a higher expression of itself.  When we understand this fact we are able to easily make the mental and organizational adjustment necessary when the time comes to change. Another example of change is what is called the convergence of technology in the world today, i.e; Smartphones as we have them today are made of different technologies – the telephone, the camera, video, internet and a semi computer et al. 

A few years down the line these were very different technologies, each worth its own salt but today put all of them together to the telephone and we have a smartphone. The truth is the smartphone is quite different from the traditional phone. This time around the phone didn’t grow but change its function and characteristics (it was transmuted to higher from) and with change came something new altogether which we now call smartphone. When we put the smartphone side by side with the traditional telephone we see that the nature of the two are so different it’s hard to comes to terms with the fact that one originated from.

When it comes to business we must realize that our business cannot stay the same forever regardless of may wish it to be so and the business that succeed on the long run are those that understand the primary nature of the ideas and then consciously engineer and drive the growth and change process which is one thing lacking in this part of the world.

UNDERSTANDIGN THE DYNAMICS OF GROWTH AND CHANGE 1

The landscape of business is rapidly changing so much so that it is perceived by many that prerequisite for business success be you as an entrepreneur or a multinational conglomerate is somewhat changing as the dynamics of life and business of the 21^st century is somewhat different from those of eras past.

In an articles I wrote in the beginning of the year titled “The nature and potentiality of business”, one thing I was trying to drive home amongst other is the fact that at the crux of every business is an idea/ideas and as such it is pertinent that we understand the nature of ideas and the rules governing them as this will help us take our business ventures further and faster and with little resistance. As far as I am concerned I am of the opinion that business primarily is about two things; Ideas and People (and both of these things are principally mental). The nature of ideas dictates that it like everything else must obey the unerring laws of nature, the same way a bird in flight must obey the law of gravity if it desires to continue to fly. One law that governs ideas the same way it governs the movement of molecules and even the giant sun is the law of perpetual motion. In a world of perpetual motion (a philosophical idea now proven by science), nothing stands still as everything must obey the call of motion even the idea which forms the crux of your business venture.

It is this law of perpetual motion that serves as an overall basis and an essential factor that defines success both in life and business. In business, the law of perpetual motion shows itself first as Growth. An idea that doesn’t grow cannot be a true idea in the real sense of the word and as such it is only a matter of time before it withers off and die. Growth shouldn’t not be mistaken for expansion, while on the one the hand, expansion maybe regarded as an indication of growth because truthful speaking, a growing business is one which will not suffer from stagnation, however on the other hand, expansion by itself is no true measure of  growth because in this present age of multinational companies and growing international business presence partly due to the fact that factors of production are cheaper in some parts of the world than in other including some business incentives, we cannot truly say that expansion by itself is a vindication of growth. 

Growth would imply as steady and consistent increase and nobody better exemplifies this better than the technology sector. When we look at the smart phone industry or the computers we see a steady increase in the products been pushed out, Samsung galaxy S2 is different from S3 while S3 is quite different from S4. This difference isn’t in their primary function as the nature of the product must remain the same however the difference lays in their secondary function, such as camera, clarity, OS updates and all. 

Hence if we were to put all the above mentioned phones side by side judging them by their primary essence which is the ability to carry your phone everywhere with you and still enjoy seamless calls. However when we look at the functionality of the phones we see a good different, the same way a man is different from the teenager who in turn is different from a baby not in essence because they are all humans but in functionality. 

What the man can do and the easy and expertise at which he brings to bear is quite different from that which a teenager can do which also differs from that which a baby can do. When we look at this analogy we get a clear distinction of what growth is. And like I said earlier because ideas which are at the crux of every business must obey the law of life which is that of perpetual motion which equals growth on the one hand, the question I will like to put forth is this, is there anything in life that doesn’t grow? Even the mountains and crystals experience some form of growth.