Joel Kelly

One of the most important lessons I’ve learned is that, if you want to get a lot of things done quickly, you have to slow down. It feels counterintuitive. We can easily think that, in order to achieve a lot, we must do a lot—and fast.

Worrying can paralyze us. It can keep us from getting our marketing work done, from stretching ourselves beyond our current capabilities, and from experimenting with new strategies and techniques.

The future is a mystery to us all. And that means the greatest risk is in assuming it isn’t. In assuming our plans are perfect and won’t need adjustment.

Business owners usually want to know how to judge their market position before they make public moves to reinforce it. Beyond confirming it is within your current capabilities and that it has a credible opposite, how can you tell if you’ve come up with a good position?

When I talk to the owners of service businesses, I often encounter the same struggle. Phrases like, “I just need to get the meeting,” or “I can make the sale, I just need some more leads or opportunities,” or, “If I can just get some face-to-face time with the executive, I can close the deal.”

Isn’t it often true that when someone—whether a government official or a friend—is too eager to tell us what should have been assumed, we doubt them?