Small Victiories

I've decided I need to celebrate these to keep me motivated. I'm so used to a world of % of quota met and forecasted revenue $$ that now when all I get after months of work is one client I just feel like that isn't enough! One well that's great but where are the other 50 I'm used to balancing.

It's a different type of beast you wrestle when starting your own business. Today is the battle with whither or not I turn off the email notification, yesterday was getting the fax machine working and tomorrow I'm sure it will be, do I wear my hair curly or straight to a business owners networking event. (Curly implies unruly and wild while straight exudes sophistication and elegance)- Or so I tell myself since I hate my curly hair.

These small details that seem like nonsense are actually things that take up time in my day and I HATE IT. I want to negotiate deals, plan huge events, help people solve problems...But I have to start somewhere. So today I guess that place is researching Linked IN groups and emailing past clients.

Once client is great news. So is having a working fax AND meeting 10 new people who could be potential business relationships. I'm good enough, I'm smart enough and doggonet people like me.

Sorry WB but I saw a picture of Bill and Melinda Gates in People as I was stair stepping at the gym and I thought to myself, He's 53 and I'm 26. Plenty of time Mollie. Plenty of time.

Nice Save

Today I arose to an interesting problem. My V-fax was not working. (email faxing program) So rather than stay on the phone for hours I decided to email Vonage customer service. They surprisingly did respond in a timely manner (last time I tried emailing they never responded).
Nonetheless even though they responded it wasn’t too helpful. It was basically a mass email that did not really address my problem whatsoever.

So braced myself for the automated answering machine and called into the 800 number. After I gave my account #, favorite food, last 5 addresses and middle name of my second cousin I was finally put through to a person. When I asked her about the problems with my V-Fax she told me that was because they had canceled the program. DUH... WHAAAAaaaaaaaaT!!!!!!!!!

How can you cancel a service and not let someone know? Her response was that V-Fax was only a "test market" and with so many competitors in the game they decided not to pursue that line of services.

Translation: We kept screwing up people's faxes and we don't know how to fix it so we stopped trying.

Although she did tell me not to worry my fax # will still work with a traditional fax machine. Well that's good cause I would assume the least it should do is work with an actual machine since it is supposed to be a fax#?!??!

Here's where the nice job comes in. She was shockingly understanding and apologetic. (Not the case when calling into customer service at most companies.) She then credited me the 5 months of service so that I would have $$ to go buy a fax machine.

I must say I was impressed. It's been awhile since I've seen a company take that much responsibility. Then came the clincher, she asked what time next week she should call me to get the fax connected.

It's really a small thing, to give me back $65.00, talk in a soothing voice and offer to help. That is what a customer service person is for right? Too bad most of them have no idea that this is their job.

What to do when you don't know what to do?????

That's not really a title. It's an actual question. What do I do when I don't know what to do? I mean I'm done. My checklist of activities is complete. Good, right? Not really since it's 10:29 am on Thursday. That means I have another 1.75 days worth of activity to razzel up. That's only if I abide by traditional M-F 9-5 rules.

Normally I get energized by crossing items of my daily lists. Now I actually dread project completion because then I have to think up another project. This is quite disheartening! It's as if the entire structure of my task/completion/self fulfillment system is failing. This anxiety has now plagued me with the fear that my entire life's basis of productivity is flawed.

OK maybe that's a bit dramatic BUT I've already racked my brain of ways to gain exposure, groups to join, potential clients to call, possible blogs to post...I can only read so many articles on social media, books about going from Good To Great or Making It Stick... So now I'm back to blank. That's right blank. My mind is blank. I can't even come up with another way to say blank.

When will my next flash of genius come? So far my 3rd cup morning of coffee is not jump starting any brain activity. How do I constantly keep active? I know that busy work is bad but profitable work is good.

WB: How did you know what to do to keep yourself busy? How did you know what activities would be beneficial? Were you ever blank?

So Many Options!!!

It used to be you woke up, read the paper with your morning coffee maybe watched a little AM news then off to work you go equipped with the appropriate amount of information to make you aware of the world. (I mean I never did this but I'm pretty sure my Dad did...)

Nowadays it just isn't so. Morning paper? Only if I pick up the reader on my way to the El. News of today is online and if you want to know; Who accosted who at the MTV Music awards, How to renovate your office for under $500.00; or Why Michael Jordan's hall of Fame speech was controversial then you'll surely find that in minutes. BUT if you want to know what's going on in the real world you have to dig further.

And boy do I mean DIG! How many news sources can there be? I'm totally lost in information overload. There are so many different sources, online newspapers, business journals, e-newsletters, of course all the industry publications, or the publications of industries that your clients are in, updates of discussion boards on Linked in, twitter... then there are the ones that tell you what's going on in the city, new spots to check out, events OMG!!!!!!!

I spend the first hour of my day combing through all these thing, then I look at the clock and freak out that I've been browsing the Internet when I should have been finding a person to give me money!!! To make matters worse, these people have the audacity to add new information the next day forcing me to participate again in this chastising morning ritual I've developed.

Not only is this confusing, overwhelming, a bit rude (most of these emails come between the hours of 3:34am- 5:47am) but it's also extremely necessary. If I didn't check all the different sources I'm sure I'd just walk into the next networking event and say something extremely stupid like "Oh really I had no idea there was going to be a 2010 world expo???" Great event planner I would be!

So Big W: Which ones do I read? Which ones do you read? And more importantly is there a Blackberry function that automatically turns off my email notification for the hours of 2-6am daily?

Sick Days

Do I get them? Is it fair to take one, especially after a long weekend of no work activity?

When I work up yesterday morning my head was stuffed with so much pressure I felt it would spontaneously combust. Today was much the same. My dizzy swollen head makes me think President Obama made a speech today in Afghanistan about Health Care; Ron Blagojevich is now proclaiming socialism and school children outside Dallas are learning the top 5 fat busting gimmicks. I may have my headlines confused....

With my acute sense of discernment at the top of its game today I feel completely prepared to make all sorts of important decisions. Today is a great day for meeting with clients, calling new prospects and researching potential revenue sources right???

Probably not since every 15 min I check the clock and wonder at what point is it acceptable to take a nap. More importantly at what point is it acceptable to stop working and lay on the couch, have chicken soup and drift in and out of consciousness to some terrible lifetime movie? How many days of "Closed for repairs" is OK? Remember if I'm not working, NOTHING is happening.

WB Question: How far do I push it? Do I sleep? Take it easy? Forgo 2-3 days of work which could put me weeks behind? OR do I trudge along with droopy eyes, voice of Darth Vader and common sense of a chimpanzee hoping I don't screw anything up too bad and eventually I'll feel better?


I may sleep on this one for an hr...