The Math Behind Success

The mathematics behind success can be quite simple really. I define it as “clearly understanding what you have to do; and, when you need to do it; whether you want to do it or not, and then doing it!”

What is it that you absolutely must, cannot avoid doing to be successful? Most people are not committed to a vision or dream, enough to have ever spent the time to understand the answer to this question. But to those who are super committed to being something better, who have a vision that others don’t or can’t see; these are the wild and crazy people that will do whatever is necessary and the math will always be a bit different.

I always recommend to clients to start by finding people in their industry that are the superstars and then do whatever you have to, in order to learn exactly what it is that they are doing to be successful and then copy it and exceed it by 10x. Yes, it can be that simple.

Many success experts will tell you that 85% of success happens with 60 hours a week or more. You work 40 hours a week just for survival. Anything over that is for success. So, how do you define success? That answer is different with every business coaching client that I work with, but it is within this answer that you will get the math necessary to reach your success goal.

In sales, of any kind, you must work to establish what the baselines are. How many phone calls must you make to get how many appointments? How many appointments must you go on to be able to find an interested prospect? How many interested prospects do you need to identify to find one buyer? You had better know these numbers so you can work and focus on beating and improving the odds.

I once had a professional athlete tell me that people only saw him as a millionaire superstar athlete, making millions, on national television every week and on the cover of magazines. Yet, no one ever has seen him at 5:00 am on a Sunday morning, in the off season lifting weights and running. His math is that he knows that no matter how much he wants to stay in bed, that he must put in a very specific amount of time lifting weights, running, doing drills and sweating, in order to command the spotlight. There is no way around it.

In every phase of life, in all job categories, if you want to be the one leading the field you must understand the requirements of work and effort and practice in order to get what you want. Once you understand the numbers, then you just have to do it. Over and over again. Whether you want to or not!

I’ve been blessed with much success in my career and I get calls all the time from people wanting to know what my secrets are. They want to be extremely successful and they wanted to know what I did. I explained to a caller recently the math around what I do, and after taking some time to explain the caller got very quiet and softly said, “I don’t think I want to work that hard!” The rule is this, you must understand what you’re willing to give up to get what you want! Then establish what it is that you must do everyday, without fail everyday, whether you want to or not. Then, discipline yourself to get it done, no matter what.

And that, my friend is how you become successful.