You are an expert. Here’s why

Earlier this year, I decided to live off my hard earned savings-  slow down, meet great people, take some time off to restrategize- relax, be flexible, travel and drop all the things I was holding onto to actually take the risk of trying out the ideas in my head.

After I realized my savings were reducing (like duh!) I still didn’t want the rigidity of a full time job so I decided to take part time tutoring as a source of extra income. I ended up tutoring a lot of Chinese people who were learning English as a second language as well as college students and high school kids. It turned out to be a great experience.

Along the line I decided to try my hands out at making similar content so I put out my course (https://www.udemy.com/become-excellent-at-analytical-writing/ ) and now my students are in the hundreds. While I still have a lot of work to do in getting the course out there, it was so encouraging to see the numbers increase and see that truly what I thought would be useful to others was indeed useful.

So what do I know about you that you don’t know? It is that your life experiences have made you an expert at something and you probably don’t even realize it.

So many times we are waiting for something to happen before we can live life. We are waiting to be more educated, be more experienced (whatever that means), more confident, more beautiful, etc.

Truly, when it comes to it, we are probably just afraid that we are not really enough. We are afraid of failure&rejection. We think that maybe if we can find more titles to mask our insecurity then we will be more confident to proceed in the direction of our dreams.

What you don’t realize is that you already have something that people want to know. You are probably taking yourself for granted thinking you have no value to add.

I don’t mean this post to motivate you. I mean it to be factual. You are an expert at something that other people don’t know and you are hiding it because you think everyone knows it already, or that you need even more experience.

What have you picked from your life’s experiences? Struggles? Lessons? Relationships? Share your gift today. There is always time to refine it. You cannot get experience without putting yourself out there and experiencing all life has to offer anyways.

10 Characteristics of change makers. Are you one?

Change makers have similar characteristics- from social/civic entrepreneurs to small business owners or people running big organizations or programmes.

I was doing a reading on Public Health Business Planning and thought I should share the key points since they cut across the board. This also helps me remember for my discussion tomorrow afternoon:)

1. Entrepreneurs find out what’s needed

– This involves studying your groups’ needs closely + understanding how to communicate the same data differently to meet the needs of different audiences.

2. Entrepreneurs brainstorm 

– They dream crazy audacious wacky and unusual ideas

– Brainstorming is more about quantity than quality.

– Diverse teams create more diverse ideas and thus they win

-To win, generate more ideas.

– Its not just about creating new ideas but also possibly expanding or redesigning existing programmes to make them better.

3. Entrepreneurs analyze

– To balance their crazy ideas they also analyze them to figure which is worth it.

– The goal is to find a workable idea for a need that exists.

– Something to think about – how will you present the story in a compelling way to your audience?

– Also- How is your new story unique to other previously existing stories?

4. Entrepreneurs build teams

–  There is no such thing as a single great man. Its always about assembling the team to run with the idea

– The ability to create alliances is very important in the 21st century

– Diverse teams will be able to open up diverse networks so build diversity into your projects

– in the 21st century its no longer about people from a specific field, interdisciplinary learning is the way to go

5. Entrepreneurs are hardworking and flexible

The best teams end up with much different projects than they started with BUT they tend to- spend lots of time together

-share the responsibilities

– feed off one another’s positivity

– seek out leaders and make trips to benchmark progress. Think mentorship and goal setting retreats.

– get really into their projects

– spend much more time and energy than planned

… so its more about flexibility and hard work than a great first idea

6. Entrepreneurs find the money

Entrepreneurs are “ambitious for others” and find the resources to fuel this ambition

7. Entrepreneurs start it up 

Think risk taking. Failure is needed for success. Entrepreneurs are not averse to risk but rather show that they have analyzed the risk and that the pay off makes it worth it.

8. Entrepreneurs keep it going

Think sustainability

How will your idea fuel itself?

9. Entrepreneurs keep tabs

– Think evaluation

– How will you make sure that you are doing what you planned to do?

– How will you evaluate yourself?

– Have you planned for transitions possibly if you need to leave the programme to someone else?

– Do you have an exit plan if evaluation shows it is not working?

 10. Entrepreneurs get it down on paper

– If your ideas are not stated down, they will probably not become reality.

Write it all down and it will change later but you have a starting point.

So in conclusion, think analytical skill + heart + finance + creative leadership + passion + flexibility =  great change maker

Where are you here and where could you improve?

Personally I am learning so I can do better especially in the area of number 9.

Do share 🙂

Hope you enjoyed my tips.