Have you reached it yet? That line in the sand when you stop owning your vision and your vision owns you? That impossible-to-define line where you become ‘public property’? 

As you grow your enterprise, be aware of the thin green line. Green stands for nature and growth. It stands for ‘go’ and ‘power on’. It also stands for money and envy and sickness! As your green grows, your attraction grows. Customers and partners become stakeholders. A community is created around the enterprise’s vision and values. Everyone feels like they belong. 

So far, so good! Until you cross the thin green line. Suddenly, the very same stakeholders who believed in your vision, now believe it is their vision. Suddenly, in their perception, your enterprise becomes their enterprise, not yours. It is their community, their products. In their eyes, they have a right – an entitlement – to everything you worked so hard to create. You are now a servant to their demands. You have crossed the line. 

This weekend I will be at the APEC Summit in Bali, with the likes of Barack Obama, Vladimir Putin, Tony Abbott, Xi Jinping, Shinzo Abe and another dozen world leaders. Presidents and Prime Ministers all walk the thin green line. Obama has been battling against a shut down of the US government this week. Each has their own internal challenges to handle by being a public person. 

By starting an enterprise, you too become a public person. You start to create public trust, with the aim that with this trust comes a sense of belonging. As you reach the line, things are at their best – you have customers, partners and team members who have a sense of belonging with gratitude! When you cross the line, everything changes. This belonging and gratitude turns to ownership and entitlement. The result is that great entrepreneurs, like Apple’s Steve Jobs and Starbucks’ Howard Schulz, become fair game for anyone to criticise or take down. 

I began the month at the Trust Conference in London, hosted by Michelle Clarke and Talent Dynamics. As the keynote speaker, Stephen MR Covey (who wrote “The Speed of Trust”) says, “Fish discover water last”. Humans take trust for granted just as fish take water for granted. It is only when the water gets polluted or disappears that the fish notices. How then, do you get everyone to remain collaborative and working together to keep the water clean? How do you stop short of the line? 

If the line is crossed, do you step back, or step away? Howard Schulz stepped out of running Starbucks for 8 years, and today Starbucks is stronger than ever. Steve Jobs was out of Apple for 13 years and Apple’s story is Legend. Others have stepped away with new leaders coming in to redraw the line. Jack Welch did it with General Electric. Marissa Mayer is doing it right now with Yahoo. 

How about you? How do you spot the line as you approach it? 

Here’s a line that’s easier to see. It’s called the thin blue line. This is the name given to our police force, the line that enforces our ‘social contract’. The idea of the ‘social contract’ was started by Jean-Jacques Rousseau in the age of enlightenment. It is the idea that as a society we all have rights and entitlements, and there is a thin blue line that protects us from those who abuse those rights. It is the foundation of our modern democracies today. 

What is different between your thin green line and the thin blue line? The thin blue line is there to protect your sense of safety. It is the basis for the Declaration of Independence. The thin green line, on the other hand, it there to project your sense of adventure. It needs a Declaration of Interdependence. As you grow, what can your customers, partners and team expect from you? What do you expect from them? What will things look if this interdependence is broken? 

The blue line is a social contract. The green line is a spiritual contract. It is the fine line at which we can remain at our best. It is the point at which we let go instead of holding on. Be prepared to let go of everything you are building, to stay true to your own vision and values. 

Define the water for what it is, and always go to where it is flowing. 

Keep Making Magic
Founder, Entrepreneurs Institute

Green School and Entrepreneurs Institute

As many of you know I have been involved with the Green School in Bali for the last three years, in the last two as Board Chairman. Last week I resigned as Chairman and our family have left the school. I was inspired by John Hardy’s Green School Dream, and wish him and Cynthia Hardy as the founders of the school all the very best with the future of Green School. As last week’s IPCC Report showed, the world is now in more need than ever for environmental education. 

In the coming months I will be putting more time into the growth of Entrepreneurs Institute, the growth of our entrepreneur resorts and our US launch. We also have our upcoming events in the coming months – including our Wealth Dynamics Masters and our first Women’s iLab (below) so if you’re ready for a trip to Bali, I look forward to connecting soon! 


Wealth Dynamics Masters

I invite you to the Wealth Dynamics Masters Program, which is one of our most popular programs and limited to only 12 select entrepreneurs. Me along with a panel of experienced mentors will work with you on a full and comprehensive business plan covering every element of your business concept, a priority plan and a step-by-step strategy to ensure your wealth is not an accident.
The Wealth Dynamics Masters Program will be held at Vision Villas, from 3rd to 9th November 2013. The setting is ideal for the exclusive nature of the program, with wireless access and Bali’s best reference library.
 

Once we realize what we have today is 100% the result of what we’ve designed – and will stick with us as long as we keep working within this design – at some point we need to take the time out to redesign to get the outcome we want. Whether it’s a bicycle, racing car or space ship, each is designed with different tolerances to create different performance levels. Businesses are the same.


First Women’s iLab Accelerator

Imagine you are living one month in a paradise…whilst growing your business, collaborating and creating synergy with other women around the world and being trained by world class industry experts and presenters.
You may have an existing business you are looking to manage remotely or grow globally, or you may be launching a new start-up.ILAB is the first Resort Entrepreneur Accelerator in Asia. Hosted by Entrepreneurs Institute, and in partnership with GIFEW and Woman Who Lead Australia, located at Vision Villas, Bali, the program includes one month accommodation, co-working, training and mentoring for woman entrepreneurs.Moreover, it’s all held in Bali in a resort-style working environment, so you can get a taste of work life balance in paradise.This in-take is limited to 15 women giving all participants of our woman only iLab a totally exclusive experience.


Represent Wealth Dynamics from Stage

Are you great at presenting from stage? Terrible at representing your own product, however you shine when presenting someone else’s program, especially when it’s something you truly love and believe in?
Then this is an opportunity for you.Entrepreneurs Institute is taking applications now for speakers and presenters across the globe for the opportunity to:
1.  Receive training directly from Roger Hamilton on exactly how he sets the stage and delivers every aspect of the content in a rhythm and flow that creates the results he does.
2.  Take the stage and represent Wealth Dynamics in your country and potentially across the globe.
3. Create an income and lifestyle that supports you being a global entrepreneur.For the first time ever, Roger will be presenting a Train the Trainers program, run in Bali at the end of October. Roger will be training just 8 participants to present one of his signature programs – the Wealth Dynamics Experience. The Wealth Dynamics Experience is a two and a half day program based on the Wealth Dynamics Profiling. Register your interest and application by emailing info@wealthdynamics.org

Power of you by Heather Yelland

My business partner for Green SuperCamp, the amazing Heather Yelland, holds a fundamental belief that all any of us really wants is to love and be loved, and to be known and loved for who we truly are and when we have that, anything is possible – in business and life!

So, Heather has created the Power Of You event (What I’m calling “SuperCamp for Grown Ups”) to give you a unique opportunity to step into a full expression of who you really are, so that you can move the obstacles to you loving yourself in a whole new way and sharing that with the important people in your life and world.

I believe this is a wonderful event because truly knowing YOURSELF is a journey worth taking. . .just as the children do at Green SuperCamp.

Let me tell you what you can expect to experience at this event.  In a

gentle, supportive and yet challenging way, Heather will support you to:

* Transform your confidence and change the way you step into life

* Learn the keys to being your own deeply contented self

* Uncover your true purpose and define your path in business and life

* Discover how amazing you really are and how it’s never too late to   achieve your dreams and goals

* Create a way of being that is bursting with more energy and vitality than

you’ve ever had before

 

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