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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

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here is only the name of the author on the cover, but there is a whole team behind her.

Deepest thanks go first with all my heart to my parents, Alfred and Tina Schaer, who brought me up peacefully and naturally. They allowed me to go out into the world where I then made my appearance as a female leader, and they would often say, “You are more in America than with us!”

The greatest respect to my mentors, Martin and Gigi Sage, who brought out my natural leadership. Together with them I was able to research, teach and pass on the principles of leadership for 12 years. As a special trio we have pushed the evolution of more peace and love in the world and united the best from the USA and Europe.

I go on my knees before my men: Uwe, Eckhard, Volker, Sebastian and Chéfe. Each of you with his love has stood at my side like a rock.

You love me and have always helped me, have accompanied me on my innovative road and have brought up and protected all the children, grandchildren, customers and the team.

It has never been easy, but it is and remains an adventure for us all!

I thank my 6 children, Sebastian, Anneli, Christian Cyrill, Benjamin Moses, Konstantin and Joy that they are as curious as their mother, who opened the family system to the world. You were ready to move at any time, and whoever brought you up is welcome.

Special deep admiration for my oldest daughter Anneli, who has always been there devotedly and has borne all the intensive phases.

Thanks to all the many clients I was allowed to wake and who trusted themselves to stand by their individual talent and thus achieved independence. The new entrepreneurship is the trend of our generation, and will have a great impact on Germany.

My very special acclamation for the united learning and building of the “most innovative company in Germany” goes to my Wailea team: Irene, Margit and Monika. You have worked so hard and have become women who are genuine role models for society.

FOREWORD

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acqueline Kennedy Onassis was a bright child. When she was only four she went off on her own during a walk in Central Park with her newborn baby sister Lee and the nanny. When Jackie lost her way, the little girl was found by a policeman. When she saw him, she said self-assuredly, “My sister and my nanny seem to have gotten lost.”

When Jackie Kennedy moved into the White House at the side of her husband, she resolved to renovate the building and turn it into a grand house. Unfortunately, there was no money for the project.

The First Lady decided to finance it through her own resources. And she had an idea: she would introduce her own love of beauty, art and history and show children a living White House. The boys would experience history through all the things from other times that they got to see there. The girls should find it beautiful and lived-in, so there always had to be flowers there and a real fire burning in the grate. The White House should have a purpose, and that should be restored. And all the visitors and children should feel and see this purpose. Jackie resisted merely decorating, stressing the difference from restoration, and she wanted all the previous Presidents to be tangible. She herself loved the Lincoln Room, which contains all Lincoln’s effects, things that he had handled; and the atmosphere was similar to that of a cathedral, the same sense of peace and meditation. Sometimes Jackie would sit alone in the room, and could genuinely feel Lincoln’s strength, as if she was communicating with him. She had the greatest affinity with Jefferson, but it was Lincoln she loved.

Then she realized that about two million visitors walked through the White House annually. And they were ultimately the “cause” of the rapid wear and tear of the building. In any case, she didn’t charge an entry fee. Instead she produced an illustrated guide to the building, which visitors could purchase for a dollar.

It was obvious to her that every visitor would as a matter of course wish to take home this one dollar guide as a souvenir. Within a very short time the money for an extensive and lasting renovation was raised. With the assistance of the National Geographic Society, over eight million copies of the guide have been sold since 1962. Jackie Kennedy was the editor.

INTRODUCTION

Companies and businesses are like human beings. They are born, they grow and they die. And in between are several ages: innocent, curious and playful childhood; the wild storm and stress of adolescence; the erotic 20s; the decisive 30s; the level-headed 40s, rocked by midlife crisis. And so on… to old age, wisdom and death.

Just as humans, trees or businesses grow physically and organically, so too is there a mental growth that is largely undervalued. For example, as children we are curious about everything. There is nothing around us that is not new. The more we learn, the more our curiosity abates. We become curious about other things: in puberty about the opposite sex, later about self-realization, about money, about success, or about fame. And in every life of every person there is one thing that will always concern them, which will always make them curious and absorb them: their special talents. By realizing and using them a person will celebrate the greatest successes and will get the greatest enjoyment out of life. Curiosity helps us to grow mentally. As long as secrets exist, we have to discover them.

Mental Development

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ehind, however, lies experience, the awareness of an intuitive truth. Through many experiences we become undeceived in the true sense of the word, disillusioned, perhaps even embittered, melancholy or depressed. Once we have won back curiosity we grow beyond ourselves. We discover pleasure in the things we do, and experience our mental development as a career.

Curiosity is the mainspring of mental development. Our “performance scale” is based on this approach, which shows the different stages in mental growth. Whether individuals, families, enterprises or organizations –they all stand at a particular stage of development. You can frequently tell from the faces of individuals, of employees in a firm or members of a football team which stage they are at as soon as they perform: are they sad, worried, tense, or passionate, self-confident, full of enthusiasm? Once we have awakened curiosity in people, they will develop mentally. And our success grows at the same time.

The same type of growth exists in the economy. Without an awareness of the mental condition of a company or its undertakings nothing can grow further. Without knowing what doesn’t work you will not get any further towards being in the black. And that applies as much to a company team as it does to a football team.

Businesses are alive – and grow

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n any company, you only have to see how much time people spend coming to an agreement, what the mood is and how individuals behave towards one another and communicate. This is of almost more concern to the manager today that the turnover figures. It’s not surprising: everyone knows that they can only succeed as long as there is a good team. And that is why there is a demand for female bosses, with their clear-eyed perception of everything that passes between people.

If you decide today to live your own life and go into action, at certain times things will rain down on you that you can only partially explain without the concept of mental development. We will explain these things to you and show you how to go forward. This should arouse your curiosity. In his book “Live your Dream”, Martin Sage has demonstrated how to live a life that leads to our true talent. The “female leader” is meant here – the woman who embraces her natural talent in order to make herself independent and to make a career out of her life. The time is ripe. It has never been easier for women to have the self-confidence to found their own organization and do business than today. Programs like the series “Sex and the City” have contributed considerably to a paradigm shift. Suddenly women have stopped focusing on men, and prefer to turn on their own axis. What happens next when the compass is pointed in a new direction cannot be predicted – only experienced. That is curiosity.

During the course of life curiosity is mostly repressed. Disillusionment, disappointment and above all the need for security dissuade the majority of people from putting their “calling” in the foreground or from making it the goal of their lives. If you are doing what you have always wanted to do, or if you have now decided to do it - congratulations! This book is a manual for all those who dare to take the step out into the wide prairie of independent entrepreneurship. And their numbers are increasing - especially among women.

Liberty, otherness, fraternity

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an’t live with you, can’t live without you: Relationships are indicators of human energy. Love is the highest form of energy – what doesn’t one do out of love? The powerful energy that love unleashes may indicate the strength of that. This can be introduced as the curiosity factor, which will continually drive us on the way through this book, before everything becomes familiar.

Men and women often cannot live together and under no circumstances without each other. Their differences are their capital. That has always been case throughout evolution. Only the roles were divided differently.

In business the formula for a successful future lies in different qualities. Our thesis is that the most successful teams are those with an equal number of men and women with the capability of celebrating their differences, and using them for a common strategy.

Men and women meet on the same level in business and management. After the end of “battle of the sexes” and the entry of women into business they are genuinely emancipated and bring a breath of fresh air into entrepreneurship.

There is a new energy between man and woman. For the first time they are forgetting their preconceived notions of the opposite sex. They are becoming curious about one another. Countless books have been written in the last few years about the charming differences between the perspectives of men and of women – and celebrated. Daily business included.

In fact there is little that women don’t do or look at completely differently from men. The “little differences” is one of the most exciting and entertaining themes of our time. Women are no longer “on the advance”. They have arrived. On the boardroom floor in business, as the head of a company as well as in politics, female influence is highly valued.

The integrating capabilities of women, in areas such as relationship management for example, are decisive elements in an economy in which service plays the most important part.

Never before has it been possible for women to combine their careers with standard family life to that degree. Whereas in former times the woman found herself in a dilemma between the kitchen, children and career, now she can combine all the things that are dear and precious to her owing to the phenomenal amenities of telecommunication through the cell phone or the internet. This is the first generation for which the type of “Womanagement” is possible. Men and women are no longer fixed in their gender roles. Now things are shared in a brotherly and sisterly manner.

Service - why right now?

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he information and media age lies just as far behind us as the industrial age. Since the beginning of the new millennium and its historical beginning on September 11, 2001, the service economy has superseded the old capitalist power structure, as it served capital more than people.

While the old economic tanker grindingly held its course, purging itself through redundancies, so that no employee could be sure of keeping their position, a parallel economy developed which was based on self-employment and which produced new answers, new capital and new careers with brilliant ideas and innovations in the service sector.

In Germany, the “desert of service”, especially, many a stretch of waste land has yet to be turned into an oasis. Parallel to this is the drive towards self-determination, freedom and the development of personal interests and capabilities. Even the government tends to encourage people to pursue their own interests and to develop their own business ideas and become self-employed. More and more people are discovering that the greatest potential lies in themselves: their entire personal talent lies there to be capitalized on. When women found and lead a business, they can for the first time employ their feminine talents within this service economy.

In a ten year study Danish researchers discovered that businesses which had more women in management worked more profitably. “In fact women manage differently”, commentated the “Frankfurter Allgemeine Sonntagszeitung” (5. June 1005, p. 39), “Although women lull their male competitors into a sense of security through their calmness and reticence in the beginning, when it comes down to it they negotiate tenaciously and ruthlessly with their eye on the goal. (…) The management techniques of women, who on the whole rely on intuition rather than reflection, also go far beyond seemingly friendly listening.

“In contrast to all the traditional management tools women create a closer relationship with their employees though their prevailingly highly intuitive way of leadership,” says Lammers, a female headhunter. “They create bonds which makes the employees obliged to them. (…) That is why they are so valuable.”

A further study in England compared masculine and feminine styles of leadership and came to the conclusion that, “Women managed in a much more informal way, involved employees more in decision-making and inspired them. Moreover, women in management positions forgot less quickly what it feels like to be an employee.” “The employees admired their female bosses for it,” summed up Inge Kloepfer of the FAS. “This type of bonding is a much subtler way of exercising power and influence than the pressure of hierarchies.”

The old and the new service economy

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ervice has a new definition. “Service” does not simply mean provision of services. The German postal service, the Deutsche Post, is a classic example of a company that provides a service. But what would happen if in the near future it lost its monopoly on the delivery of letters?

They would have competition that would terrify them: perhaps postal workers who would not only deliver letters, but collect the post, sell stamps and through other services save the trip to the increasingly meager post office and replace postboxes – to mention only a few ideas that the Deutsche Post won’t look at. It is a service-impeder, a service provider that no longer provides a service, or a logistics enterprise that no longer cares about private communication - whichever way you want to look at it. In any case nothing is more tedious and cumbersome than sending a letter in the age of the email. Before the long march to the post box there are stamps to obtain, the five digit post code that nobody can remember to be looked up, and paper and envelopes to be procured.

A recent development: if the envelope does not stick properly, or if the seal of the package doesn’t hold, one is politely enforced to purchase string or adhesive tape in the local “Shop” to do what the post office worker used to do as a matter of course. Good luck to anyone who looks for redress.

The “new service” means: to put yourself completely in the situation of others and to recognize their requirements and their sources of curiosity, in order to create a product and offer it to the right people.

Women are better suited to this service economy than men, because they are better trained for historical and cultural reasons. In the history of evolution, men’s hands were full with hunting and gathering, while women concerned themselves with order in the domestic and familial structure. Apart from the Amazons and the female Pharaohs, in the history of mankind they were rarely the “rulers” who reigned over the private court, the people and the empire. Men were the hunters, the warriors, protectors and proprietors; women the ones who kept everything together. But this “deprivation” was compensated for by other capabilities. Women are better at every type of game, whether social games, power games or erotic games.

The entry of female paradigms in business

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hat is more promising for success today – showing off or team spirit? Dominance or empathy? To command or to entice? Power or networking? How do you get further in the long term: with marching orders or through knowledge of people?

During evolution particular capabilities have been gradually developed by each respective sex. Evolution has trained men to win and to display strength because they had to be responsible for protecting their existence through war, reproduction or the husbandry of the farm, the Greek “oikos”, from which the earliest “economy” sprang. Men were automatically the “rulers”, and had to live up to this role, for which they were accepted by both men and women. Likewise women wanted to be “understood”.

Today we benefit from both male and female capabilities: understanding, discretion and sexual intelligence on the female part; approval, dealing with problems, and assertion on the male.

“Children, church and kitchen” was significantly the domain for women’s self-development in earlier times. “Clothes, cosmetics and chatter” mocked a political satirist later. The truth lies in between: women can do two things at the same time. They can manage children as well as a career. Therefore they earn their own money and can spend it on what they want: clothes, cosmetics… and they are unbeatable in the art of communication.

Power and success is no longer the domain of men. The myth of the Porsche driving “top dog” who is in control of everything and everybody is over - now that women can afford and drive one themselves.

That goes for industry too. “Images” enhance the status of products artificially, and often without legitimacy. Companies “cut into” the market with new products, stage “hostile takeovers” and lose their position within the social situation or social responsibility through unrealistic and no longer comprehensible strategies of acquisition of capital.

Men have learned to assert themselves. Women look for consensus. Men know what they want. Women also know what others want. Men wield power. Women have power – often more than they show. And sometimes it is the other way round.

There are women who gain power by using men’s weapons: Angela Merkel, for example. Conversely men want to “conquer” women, and sometimes that doesn’t work at all. At least, not with the means they commonly use. They will conquer the market of the future when they are able to bring their laboriously learned arts of seduction to the business world. They will have to be able to arouse women’s curiosity. If you can make it there, you can make it anywhere.

Men and women are a magnet for each other. Every time they meet, a game begins. They ensnare one another. They are always discovering new perspectives. They are always open to new things. They can continually surprise one another. They are curious about each other. And not only in a sexual way. In business too. Because, for the first time in the history of the human race, women have the chance of winning, the modern business game is definitely one of the phenomena of our time. The new economy no longer follows the rules of war. Increasingly the rules of a free game are dominating: the business game.

In this game, certain capabilities are required, such as being able to put oneself in the position of others and to recognize their desires and needs.

This is the idea of the new “service economy”. It works not only through tactics but also through charm. Entertainment rather than dictatorship dominates: you can no longer “conquer” the public, for example; you can only “win them over” – through entertainment, not propaganda. A product sells increasingly badly through advertising and brainwashing, through the pressures of boosted value and status symbols.

Enticement is a better means. A service is most convincing when personal recognition or satisfaction, if not complete satisfaction, can be expected of it. Entertainment, appreciation and sex are the insignia of the new service economy. And the difference lies in the fact that women are able to participate on the same level. They don’t have to adapt male strengths, in which they appear as an example of the dominant “career woman”, but can use their own.

Cooperation with men brings out a new, unexpected energy. We can see that in our daily work, especially of course in our businesswomen’s and power couples’ seminars. Often it even happens that couples who have discovered their strengths during training hit upon the idea of capitalizing on them and go on to found a successful business together.

Before, a model. Now, a role model.

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hereas before women were assigned careers which were confined to the domestic sphere, today every women can do want she wants. Where women decide, the “feminine” principles are more sought after and more successful.

Their historical roles as muse or geisha, who serves men while influencing them, are still to be seen in politics for example. Behind successful men often stand thoughtful and guiding women like Napoleon’s Josephine or Jackie Kennedy. Increasingly they are coming out from under the shadow of great men to hold high office themselves: Condoleezza Rice or Angela Merkel. Whether through more masculine means or through feminine intuition, cunning and malice. But in the end with success. And that also provides an incentive for women.

Female leaders are examples. If successful women were before almost exclusively “models”, today they are “role models”. They wield influence over methods, approaches and ways of doing business, and are turning businesses and branches of trade inside out. Women can achieve great success in business through their personality. From Anita Roddick (The Body Shop) to Carly Fiorino (HP) there are more and more women who don’t pretend to be men but are successful women as women: Christiane zu Salm, who turned the “women’s channel” TM3 into the despised game channel 9Live, in which nobody invested a cent, and out of which she made millions. She became successful and rich. Or there is Friede Springer, formerly a nanny in Axel Springer’s household, who led his financially stricken concern back to being one of the biggest publishing houses in Europe.

Or Joanne K. Rowling, who before “Harry Potter”, lived on welfare. And many other women whom we would like to introduce to you.

What applies to individuals also applies to organizations. The teams that have the greatest energy have the greatest success. Infinitely more energy is let loose through emotional intelligence, empathy, love and other “feminine” characteristics than through authority, pressure, and commands. “Male” bosses are affected by methods of dominance. They are calibrated to gain respect by authoritarian means. They make sure that they are unbearable. Which “boss” really wants to be like that?

Female bosses in the modern sense are people whom one simply doesn’t want to let down: more coach than manager. Their goals are defined more through satisfaction than through numbers.

Then the numbers will add up by themselves. Coaches approach their goal with humility, gratitude and a sense of responsibility, and set the team a good example. The female boss is in business what the trainer is in sport: the leader and the mover and shaker.

She is respected and loved and as a result has paved the way to success. “Power requires natural authority,” says Christiane zu Salm. “Women know that. And because they know that, power is in good hands when it is in their hands.”

This book shows you how to become a female leader and how to use your abilities to deal with the business of tomorrow. Never in the history of evolution has it been possible for women to achieve success, lead teams and build a successful career to such an extent as it is today.

What happens when business is no longer war, but play? It is the beginning of your career. From the beginnings, the vision and the ideas, to the daily grind, up to the highest level of inspiration, innovation and creativity. This is what this book is about: a handbook for “the female leader”. For you.

MAY THE FORCE BE WITH YOU.

Sources:

Pease, Allan & Barbara. Why Men Don’t Listen & Women Can’t Read Maps.

Pease, Allan & Barbara. Why Men Don’t have a clue & Women Always Need More Shoes.

YOUR ROAD

“A lot of people don’t get what they want because they don’t say what they want.“

Madonna, in: “SEX”

What shall I do?

So, what is your goal? What does your career look like? Is it your passion? Your life? These are not easy questions. But the right way. There is no happiness: as soon as you have obtained it, you become unhappy. But there is satisfaction. If you can answer these questions easily, you can be satisfied.

You don’t just “acquire” satisfaction. A lot of people follow whatever undertaking and believe that one day they will achieve happiness. Others believe that one day the meaning of their lives will become clear. One day? Why not now? It is essential to be satisfied here and now.

True happiness consists in following your passion. In one moment you live in every moment.

Satisfaction doesn’t consist in finding the meaning of life, but in feeling alive. Here and now.

You have two means: time and money. Forget the idea that you don’t have time.

Forget the saying that money can’t buy happiness. You have all the time in the world when you follow your own goal. That means making your passion your life. And then you will get all the money in the world. It is that simple. And that hard.

We all have a task: to make the best out of our lives. Each of us has something unique within us: our individual brilliance. Both of these ideas were formulated by Immanuel Kant in the sentence: “Every human being is his/her own purpose”. By “purpose” he meant “goal”. Every human being is therefore a goal. “His/her own” because it is unique and inviolate. For no one can make others his or her purpose, but they may use other people as a means to an end. That is the basic idea behind the Enlightenment, the “emergence of mankind from his self-inflicted immaturity” (Kant). Whoever reaches this point, where the goal is clear, has decided to lead his own life. Then new questions arise. And here, too, Kant has the basic question formulated: “What should I do?” It is the basic question in ethics. “Ethos” means “attitude”.

The first small steps

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e all work in order to live. But what kind of work? The time we spend earning our money determines the quality of our lives. Those who can follow their favorite occupation and earn money from it have a sense of having found themselves.

These people can count themselves as the being among the happiest. It is evident from their energy and liveliness. Not even the most wonderful and long holiday, not even a trip round the world produces such a kick as a calling to a career. Connect your dream with your career, and you will enjoy the road towards your goal as well as the goal itself. Just imagine if you could spend the rest of your life only doing what you like doing best. A life of action, on cloud nine – and according to Kant, your sacred duty!

Many people know what their goals are, but don’t know how to go about reaching them. They are too far off, and before lies nothing but stumbling blocks and obstacles that keep you from it. First you have to do something. You don’t see your goal for the problems and the humdrum of everyday life. You lose sight of it. But what you don’t see is what is right in front of your nose: the first step. In order to take it, you have to trace the path all the way back from the goal.

You have to get moving. The Greek word for “way” is “method”. And there is only one right way: your own. To follow it, the point of departure must be clearly defined. For this we have developed a unique road map: the “performance scale”. We start from the premise that a person can only achieve exactly as much as his or her stage of mental development will allow. How to find out and know where you stand as an individual and how to continue on the way up has been shown in Gigi Sage’s excellent book “Hello, Tarzan”. And so you can understand how your career will be an enormous success, the performance scale is graded in the order of the following chapters. And even if you want to defend yourself tooth and nail against earning a lot of money…if you follow your path, it will come almost automatically.

With the descriptions of scenarios you can discover if this stage in the development of your business sounds familiar and find out in each case where you should go from here: from the values you set up for yourself to the service you provide for others. In any case there is no escape: every single phenomenon is experienced in the growth of a business, every career is built on these steps, and every development is a rung on this ladder. And every time you reach a new stage it gets better and will become more difficult. And it doesn’t matter whether you are dealing with the daily organization, finding customers, building up teams into self-organizing units or serving humanity.

Entrepreneurship is living your dream. It means that your aims are in tune with your heart. You always work in principle in a tight unit in which you take over the role of leader, whether as a free agent, a lady of leisure, or an executive in a large company. Our society doesn’t make it easy for anyone to realize their dream. It values the mediocre. Our most important influences come from our parents and teachers. And they all praise security to the skies. They expect you to fit in with a system and to become “a useful member of society”. And that you will become – but at the end, not at the beginning. First you will become wild and unruly, you will recover your own curiosity, and with it your lust for life.

So entrepreneurship is a stony and exhausting path. But there are no easy paths. Either you fight it out or fight for all of your life against the tedium of a life of security and without passion. In Germany we still live in luxury that we can barely afford: provided or subsidized by the state. The result is not only a certain laziness, but also a lack of passion amounting to lethargy. And a poor quality.

The somewhat anarchic but lively and passionate filmmaker Klaus Lemke believes that Germany would be Europe’s number one film making country if films weren’t subsidized. Not only because you get the money in advance, but also chiefly because a crowd of investors and skeptics incessantly point to the script, demand that the characters be explained to them, and so subsequently everything has to be rewritten. “Everything has already been explained to death before the shooting, so nothing happens in the film anymore”, said Lemke. “I would like to say to filmmakers, do your own, small thing without money. At least it’s your own then!”

We are all colleagues, fathers, mothers, sons, grandchildren. Even if we play the role expected of us perfectly, we will always lose something. We are not in the world to play out roles or to give in to the pressure of custom. Our bodies are aware of that. They send out signals of our condition: aches and pains, illnesses, feelings of hopelessness, despair, disappointment. You can read disappointment in particular in many faces, because the great dream of their lives has at some time been put aside and they have then found themselves somewhere where they didn’t want to be. No problem. Today is the first day of the rest of your life. Many people are suddenly a lot happier when they take the first step towards becoming completely free in order to live their dream and pursue their goals. Often illness, redundancy, divorce or bankruptcy open people’s eyes to recognizing the value of their lives and to pay heed to the time that is left to them to do the right thing. We teach this awakening experience in our self-awareness seminars. We research the curiosity in people, delve into the sources and recommend to them projects, out of which small and then large companies grow.

You can create a life that is based round your personal interests and whatever is close to your heart. “The female leader” shows you your career and shows you that the road is worth it. If you turn things which you love the most into products and services that benefit others, you will soon discover what it feels like to be genuinely financially independent. And you will have found the inner peace that goes with it. Yes, money does bring happiness. And a career brings satisfaction.

“The female leader” is not a “how-to-” book. It tells you the rules of the game of entrepreneurship and when to change gear so that you can move forward. Business is not simple, and so we don’t simplify it by giving you helpful hints that you can’t use in everyday life. If you want to live your life, we will show you how you can use your own sense of curiosity to do it. It is like the scout on the path. Follow your sense of curiosity and you will always see a light in front of you, regardless of whether you are still contemplating a product or have already placed it on the market. Wherever you are, there is always a step in front of you. You will find it difficult, but there is no going back. Real success is complicated. “She is a Natural Leader” is written for intelligent and motivated individuals who regard their careers as a game. Not a game of chance, but a sport, which they learn, train for and during which they continually encounter new challenges their whole life long. They know what they want to achieve. We show how it can be achieved.

Most people don’t lack courage for a career; they lack the footing and the attitude. If you don’t have the orientation, you will change direction more often. Every time that costs a lot of time and money. Because we show you the way, you learn how to place time and money respectively in relation to your plan and thereby learn how to use them as instruments for yourself effectively and successfully. This is the right way. For while the number of steady jobs is rapidly sinking and the number of unemployed drastically increasing, the number of people become self-employed is growing – and not only since the government scheme supporting the self-employed. People who are waiting for changes can wait a long time. If you want security, you make your fate dependent on others. If you follow your sense of curiosity, you will radiate joy and will arouse the curiosity of others. And perhaps their greed, too.

Go another way. Find your own. Drop out of the statistic. Become self-employed. Offer a service that is near to your heart and you will find millions of people who have been waiting for it. They will be infected by your enthusiasm. You career will have its ups and downs and smiles and frowns. But with this book you always know what you can do for or against them.

This book is the outcome of experience with thousands of clients that I have had since 1993. We have learned from these countless training sessions. And we are still learning. And out of this has arisen the model of the “performance scale”, which will stand you in good stead as a personal career road map. But something has to be clear from the start: what type of businesswoman are you? Do the following quiz. The result may possibly surprise you.

WHICH KIND OF LEADER ARE YOU?

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EN NOT VERY SERIOUS QUESTIONS WHICH WILL REVEAL YOUR ATTITUDE AND CLEAR THE WAY FOR YOU.

Satisfaction depends on whether we know who we are and what we want. Then we can do things which correspond to our talents and temperament. We all know that leaders are very different in character.

We have taken three types that we have come across again and again and who had blazed a trail. And one of them will most resemble you.

For your business to be successful you need all three. You have aspects of all three in you. At first you have to play all three roles. But a leading role is designed for you.

However we should be honest. There are no right answers and wrong answers. Have fun with the “She is the Natural Leader” personality test – and especially with the results.

1.At the moment you are reading:

a.The Little Prince. Againandagain. Really from another planet.

b.Harry Potter. I want to know what people find so fascinating about it. And if you can keep a secret: I can’t stop any more.

c.Machiavelli for Women. Simple,effective, efficacious.

2.What is your house like?

a.A sexy apartment in Bauhaus style with a lot of room for meditation.

b.Trendy, colorful and lively. No need to change it round for a party.

c.Classical with a hint of country style. Another world where you can wind down and feel comfortable.

3.What did you want to be as a child?

a.A diva

b.A Nobel Prize winner

c.Chancellor

4.Which of these things would be the most desirable?

a.A silver wedding

b.Multiple orgasms

c.A meteoric career

5.You are sitting in your favorite bar with a glass of Bailey’s in front of you, when your dream man walks in and gives you a cheeky grin. What happens next?

a.I can already see us waking up together the next morning. I play the siren and get him to come over and sit with me.

b.I buy him a Bailey’s before he does.

I teach him some manners. If he behaves, he will pay my check. Otherwise he gets what he deserves.

6.Your worst vice is?

a.Nice shoes

b.Soft drugs (nicotine, alcohol)

c.Men

7.What do you like to wear best?

a.Prada, Etro, Chanel. Esprit in your free time.

b.Jennifer Lopez style tasty butt jeans, a scanty blouse by Helmut Lang: it’s always free time.

c.Jil Sander, Calvin Klein. Elegant and practical for every occasion.

8.Your ideal first date looks like this:

a.He appears like a prince on a white horse to save me. And next time he’ll bring a picnic basket with him.

b.During happy hour he is suddenly standing next to me, and we both sense something between us.

c.Brahms by candlelight, and then he even conjures a soufflé out of the oven.

9.How do you end it?

a.The “man of my life” turns out to be a complete idiot. But after the game is before the game. I have already found a replacement.

b.I flirt with his best friend. In his face of course.

c.I throw his drink in his face and turn on my heels. In the case of betrayal I turn my heel on his breastbone.

10.On whom or what would you rely when it comes to the question of whether he is Mr. Right?

a.On the question whether we discover new and wonderful things together, and how many minutes, hours, months or years it would take before we got bored with each other. Or never…

b.On my intuition and on my best friends.

c.On precedence and the color of his tie.

11.Which adjective describes you best?

a.Romantic

b.Passionate

c.Self-confident

Results

Count up the number of letters in your answers. The letter with the highest count corresponds closest to your type. And now read through all three “types”.

TYPE A: THE VISIONARY

You are an artist who makes what she wants of the world. Your visions and your illusions are your capital. You are a bit of a Pippi Longstocking and a bit of a Sleeping Beauty who has yet to be kissed. In case of emergency the right shoe will do: preferably by Manolo Blahnik, for your ideas enable you to be richly rewarded. Once you have been awakened by a kiss, you see more things than others and are able to create something which others turn into a product, a service or a business.

You live in the future. You can inspire other people to do what you want by your visionary power. Admittedly the daily grind and reality can cause this power to decrease. But in the long term you will always find a perfect solution, because your cheerful nature and your inspired soul keep you alert. And hopefully you will find the perfect partner. But be on your guard against fair weather friends.

Visionaries love adventure. They really do let themselves be led by their sense of curiosity.

Because “everything begins with curiosity”, as the writer Gary Hoover said. Heidi Klum is an example of this type. A genuine mountain girl without being born with a silver spoon in her mouth, she had the idea of making something of herself in New York after winning a model competition. Today she is one of the most sought-after women in the world: a supermodel, a multi-millionairess and married to a pop star. She has also published a book. And among the rules you have to follow on the way to becoming a world star is her motto: “Follow your sense of curiosity.”

Visionaries like entering unknown territory for their life. They discover the possibilities. They never ask “why?” but “why not?” They love the chaos that often accompanies the start up of a company. Every company starts with a vision. Behind every logo of a famous brand name lies a big idea of an individual person, who has realized this vision.

Like Steve Jobs, who has rescued his own former company Apple thanks to unbelievable ideas. Once the computers were perfect child’s play to operate, he saw what was missing: sex. The apple is after all the symbol of temptation. Meanwhile the new sexy Apple machines have become status symbols. In addition, Apple’s “iPod” has revolutionized the whole music industry because it recognized the market potential of digital music which was seen as being half criminal by the complaining industry and made mp3 downloads respectable. Jobs didn’t invent it, but he could see it.

Visionaries play an important role in the start-up phase of a business in particular. They are the captains of the ship and see the new continent over the horizon. They set the course even if there is no navigation chart. They see more than others. Imagination and artistic talent are the midwives of a new business idea.

And these qualities lie in the very nature of visionaries. But when they have to manage complex projects, the ship begins to veer off course. In the worst case the captain’s name is Ahab, and the crew jump overboard. Because visionaries are good at dealing with contradictions their method of working often produces witty results. Consistency they hold to be a sign of mediocrity. Instead they use their breadth of vision to change the direction of thought.

Most visionaries are driven by the ideal of a wonderful new world. They want to go into the service industry for humanity to become more just or more humane as much as for their personal aims. Often they are regarded as mad. Just as once there were machine wreckers who held the sowing machine to be an affront in the eyes of God, or who railed against washing machines in the past, there was hardly anyone thirty years ago who could imagine that computers would be affordable for everyone, that they could be so large or so small, could fit comfortably on a table, and be so simple that children could use them, or that as much data as was stored on those funny winding machines of a size to fit a skyscraper could be stored on a microchip. Even the founder of IBM estimated at the time that the number of computers needed in the world would be between five and ten.

Vision is a form of creative destruction. It opens up doors into new worlds, whereby it mutates into other systems, as the example of Apple shows. Views of the world disintegrate, things change fundamentally, familiar patterns break up, and new realities emerge.

When a culture protects itself against visionary ideas – which is entirely natural – visionaries run the danger of losing the thread. When visionaries are prevented from doing their own thing, they are quick to regard other people as obstacles, or they give in to lazy compromises in order to achieve their aim. Of the three types, the visionary is the most vulnerable, standing at the end with empty hands because she has fallen in love with her ideas or with herself too much. She can be so idealistic that she scares other people away.

Visionaries in the positive sense are extremely curious about what concerns others and infect them with their creativity. Economic visionaries can recognize patterns and requirements in the market that others can’t. Their ideas are as clear as they are mad. This arouses sympathy in many, while others laugh at it. As revenge they roll up their sleeves and turn their ideas into reality. They are entrancing in the true sense of the word, and are able to influence a lot of people and carry them along by their enthusiasm. Only they need people who can bring them down to earth: promoters and managers above all.

TYPE B: THE PROMOTER

In the Trinity you would be the “Holy Ghost”. You are one of those who believe both in vision and in people and therefore want to do something for both. You know what you need for that: people who are enthusiastic about new ideas both within the company and out there in the market. For this you take the initiative yourself.

When you are inspired you immediately start up a campaign and find people who are also enthusiastic. You are able to bond with people, and do it with a feeling for the little delicate things in life and an empathy that often astonishes your fellow human beings. You are able to head teams because you like to set a good example.

Promoters are gregarious animals and geniuses at getting other people interested in something, establishing contacts and building networks. The world gets wind of an idea or a product through them alone. They are comparatively extrovert, like people, are charming, witty and have star qualities as entertainers.

You have a fine sense of what is appropriate: the right design, the people who understand the product or the service and fit into the company. You attract others magnetically. And once you believe in something, you can present it creditably. Your passion is to be the bringer of good news. Just as in sales. Thanks to your empathy and human warmth you deliver the right product to the right man or the right woman. You don’t put pressure on people who don’t need the product, but find the people for whom the product is suitable. You do the same in the office. Your inspiration keeps the team in good shape. Your firm belief in people is the energy which keeps the business machine running, because you enjoy doing things for others.

Promoters are movers and shakers. They turn dreams into deeds. They act first and think later. While visionaries are dreaming of what the human race needs, they are already on the phone, and are totally committed.

Where others are regularly shy, they first begin to glow, and so does the email box, the telephone and the fax machine. They want to reach people and sell. That is their sense of achievement. Contact with other people is their universe. If there are only genuine promoters in the marketing department the firm makes a profit and has fun doing it.

Promoters are curious about people, are born communicators, and are always on top of things. They know exactly when to put pressure on others or how to give them space to develop. Where many of us fail in personal affairs, they have the right touch for diplomacy, know how to resolve conflicts; and thanks to their knowledge of people also know exactly which candidate would be best for the company. Women are often exceptional promoters, because their ability to communicate and create social order is stamped by evolution.

When it comes to details, however, promoter types switch off. They leave it to the manager to supervise what works and what doesn’t. But their directness is refreshing and always an enrichment fort he human race. But they would sell their own grandmother once they get going. Their power rides roughshod over every problem and every objection. Many promoters come to recognize at the end of their career that they would have been considerably more successful if they hadn’t changed horses so often. Apart from this handicap, promoters have the greatest career chances. When they spearhead a company it can explode with success.

The symbiosis of visionaries and promoters often brings astronomical success with it, as for example when brothers are business partners. Just imagine: one discovers, the other sells, all day long, side by side. Most companies have been founded by visionaries. But the world can only be conquered with a promoter. One has a dream and the other believes in the dream. When the ship is ready to be launched, the manager comes on board.

TYPE C: THE MANAGER

We have been pulling your leg a bit. In the long run, relaxing and romance can also be a substitute for the stress and strain of your daily life. For most types of manager repress their power because it doesn’t make them popular: they are generals. They create order, and clear the way. That’s realistic, not bad. A team is lucky to have someone like you.

You have excellent organizational skills and are able to inspire people to carry out tasks with care and on time. You will even conquer men in accordance with your personal needs. In business and accountancy your experience and your analytic way of thinking is indispensable. You have the numbers in your head, the goal before your eyes and your heart in the right place.

Many visionaries need this type, who can pull in the reins and kick ass until they begin to make something of their talent. A company founded by a visionary and a manager doesn’t necessarily lie under a good star. One is from Mars, the other from Pluto. The visionary has scarcely had the idea, when the manager comes along with the objections. That sucks up energy. When manager types start up a business one often feels from the beginning like being in the tax office. What is lacking is the mediating unit of the promoter type.

The manager type has many personalities. After all, she has to tame the temperamental visionary and put the breaks on the promoter pushing ahead, and harness them both. That takes a lot of courage and assertiveness. The manager type has to bring ideas and strengths into a system, which means drawing up rules, directing the course of action, and seeing that goals are achieved and pay off. And that they are realistic.

Managers are the champions who do all the dirty work. The have to protect the business from the competition as well as securing it from the inside. They lead battles, develop strategy and win victories for the company. They are among the rarer species among the leaders. Where the promoter sees opportunities, the manager sees problems. And so it is not by chance that Steve Job’s counterpart is Bill Gates. He is the perfect organizer, the powerful coordinator and the field marshal. His genius lies in his strong will, and his power to fight for his system. His courage and his brilliance in thinking strategically have made him the richest man on earth. This brilliance has enabled him to take on challenges which would send most of us fleeing in panic. It was he who ensured that his computer system was used by IBM and would thereby become the world’s leading software.

Managers are strategists. They know how to delegate and how to build teams which can carry out their mandate. They are the hardliners, who get the best out of their teams and demand that they exceed their limits. Hence the word“generalissimo”. Generals are managers.

They don’t wage war, but deal with the details and the victorious outcome. They don’t shrink from attacking others, although they take pains to stop it from coming to that. They make great sacrifices when they have to. They know how high the price they have to pay is in order to achieve success. All genuine managers are hard-bitten realists who accept reality as it is - in complete contrast to the great illusionist the visionary and his idealist in the shape of the promoter.

Products and goods have to be sold, delivered and stored. Someone has to do the accounts. At the end of the day the books have to be balanced. Has anyone thought of that? Exactly. That’s why the manager type is indispensable. The number of idealistic businesses taking off and followed by a rapid decline is legion. Pure management consists in keeping track of numbers and goals. Things such as logistics or accountancy are often the domain of managers.

Managers are responsible for the complete organization. They are born supervisors, helmsmen, tax advisors or lawyers. They set up the rules of the business game and ensure that everyone sticks to them. They are often the spoilsports in an organization.

But they are the ones who are responsible for success. Adventures are not their thing.

Franchises are made for them. When they bump into a visionary/promoter team however, the latter can be thankful that they put the shop in order. They draw up the handbooks and instructions for success – which will happen if everyone keeps to them. It isn’t exciting. But Murphy’s Law applies just as much today as it ever did: everything that can go wrong will go wrong.

Make sure that the manager has checked everything before you start your business. Visionaries like to evade problems and objections. Promoters run a mile from them. Managers confront them directly. Be thankful for these brakemen.

On the other hand of course a manager knows that his true capital lies in the two other types. Pure “manager firms” are ones that at some stage run themselves. It’s not a good sign when the rules are more important than the people. Their system becomes too inflexible and sooner or later will collapse like scaffolding without a wall.

Leadership: the power of three hearts

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o say it again: you have something of each type within you. And that’s good. For in thebeginning you are on your own. And you need all three figures to create a successful business.

Whichever type corresponds most to you, you will have to deal with the other two later on. It will be wonderful when you can get out of this and finally only have to do what you want to. Logically this relief will have a great effect on your career. But all three elements are integral leadership qualities. The synergy between them brings out that energy that customers trust. If they are united in one person right from the start, so much the better! One day your business will grow so large that it functions without you and you only have to draw the profits. The conditions are: that you see your business as an organization which is a permanent learning process which means that you share your sense of curiosity and master all the abilities that lead to success, and creates new leaders alongside you.

Believe us, this way of learning is fun. While you learn what works and what doesn’t, you get to know yourself and your team better and better. It’s wonderful to work with other people. Getting to know other people on your journey through the business world broadens your perspective and brings more and more people into play with curiosity of their own. This is not about business but about an adventure. And it’s not called “going on an adventure” for nothing. Find your role and find the language for it.

Visionaries like to talk about their ideas and plans in the grand manner. Promoters use words as stepping stones for action. Managers like to discuss and “review” every possible thing to focus as exactly as possible on results and goals. Whatever your role is, you will give your best performance in it.

Your business project starts with you alone. And, alas, there are only three hearts beating in your breast. If you can balance these three powers perfectly you can only win. Once your inner visionary, promoter or manager is awakened and steadily comes to fruition, you learn to control yourself, to find your balance and to navigate your business in a straight line. Thus your project becomes the springboard for a successful career. Your competence in this area will automatically attract specialists from every single field. Note down their telephone numbers. Employ them as soon as success comes and you can pay them. It pays off. You will have more time than before and earn more money than you would have thought.

If your business grows, you have to realize quickly where your strengths lie and which people you need. Look back at your projects in the past. Ask friends and trustworthy acquaintances how they see you. Note, which jobs were the easiest, and which brought in cash the quickest…and which was the most fun. Your business is like a game. Soon you will need a player for every position, an ideal team. There is no doubt such people exist. And you will find the right people for the right team. If your staff is all doing what they like doing best, your workplace will be bursting at the seams with harmony and energy. The main thing is that the three types understand, complement and overlap each other in their spheres of competence. And then you have a team of leaders. Then others can only step aside when you come rolling.

The mental strengths and weaknesses in companies are always underestimated. Relationship complications are the dream killer number one in firms. In the mid-term they lead to disaster. In such cases many entrepreneurs draw back because they are disappointed that they haven’t communicated their energy to the others. Your dreams will only come true if you establish an energetic social network in your company. The challenge is to create an organization that works for you, not you for it.

A too dominant visionary will steamroll promoters and managers with muddleheaded concepts that aren’t from this planet. A promoter on her own will push her employees in a vague direction that will lead to disaster. A manager on her own will create a bureaucracy that will collapse under its own weight. Success comes from team players who know their place

and their function in the organization and have the necessary respect for one another. But we have not got that far yet. You are still on your own. Your curiosity and your desires should be your stimulation. The maverick and pop star Madonna who is dedicated to music (her own label is called “Maverick”) was right in the quotation above when she said that most people don’t say what they want. Even if it was in another context. Next to the text she is portrayed nude carrying a whip.

YOUR VALUES

„Live your life, as if you’re gonna die.“

William Shatner

(singer, actor („Star Track“)

What are values?

A woman is sitting with a cup of coffee in front of her and has nothing more to lose. She is divorced, a single mother, has no job, gets no support from her ex-husband and no child care. She gets 69 pounds a week from welfare. She looks at her sleeping daughter. She can’t give her anything. She can barely pay for the cup of coffee.

It was the beginning of a unique career. Today she is one of the richest women in the world.

This has nothing to do with blood sugar or with your value as a “useful member of society”. “Values” in the sense used here are the motives for our actions. We all live in a system of values that we are more or less conscious of. Our parents and teachers, as well as our ancestors and the culture in which we live, have created values out of which our way of life has arisen. Cultures are complex systems of values that first make an action possible within a social space. Everything that lies outside this framework is the atavistic and the bestial in us.

There are absolute values and personal values. Absolute values are those which last through generations. Personal values are the principles which make your life worth living. They are the foundation of our actions. You have to dig very deep to be aware of these personal values. Or you have to fall far.

This is where we have got to: in the eye of a maelstrom that rages around you while within everything appears placid as you are pulled under remorselessly by an unseen power. Personal values are not to be found outside you, but deep within you. Whoever has discovered the values that move them to the depths of their being, has secured the instructions by which they can attain the greatest satisfaction.

As the above example shows, there is frequently a great crisis at the beginning of a discovery of values. Only through it are our deepest interests revealed to us. But then we find the principles that will guide us for the rest of our lives.

Whenever the old fears and worries appear, we can rely on our values. This is why values are the first step into action and into the beginning of what can be called a career.

Personal values are the signposts of your career

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nyone who passes general values off as personal ones is a hypocrite. Of course we all want peace, think war is evil and famine dreadful. Of course we want everything to be all right in the world and for everyone to get along with each other. There is nothing worse and more hypocritical than someone who passes these values off as their own – as if they were the pope.

Death is a good yardstick to get to know your personal values. Not just any death - but your own. The philosopher Martin Heidegger once pointed out that we never experience our own death, only those of others. If we envision our death, we move into another sphere.

We leave everyday life and its commonality with its rituals, conventions and clichés – what Heidegger calls the “inessential core of being” - completely behind and encounter the essence of our character and recognize what is real and what we live for: our values

It is not by chance that a deep personal experience is often at the beginning of a thorough reflection on the value of life. A heavy illness, a sudden redundancy, a difficult break up with a partner or bankruptcy can lead to you thinking for the first time about the real values in life. Possibly you feel disappointed, conned, abandoned, and punished. But why this whining? This is the beginning of the rest of your life. And possibly the real beginning of your success. What will people say about me at my graveside? The answer is synonymous with the contribution you made to the human race: your worth, your values, those attributes for which you want to have the thanks and recognition of your fellow human beings.

It is only recently, possibly since the end of the industrial age and the beginning of the service age, that work can even be fun. We don’t have to work as hard as before. And we can choose for ourselves what we want to do. If you follow your own way, you don’t have the feeling of working. You feel led on by your sense of curiosity. You aren’t dealing with something, something is dealing with you. If the “background program” consists of your own values, you have your model. Tie this model to your curiosity and your life will pay out in cash. It is not normal in our latitudes to connect economic success with these values. No, it is even considered reprehensible to want to earn money from your personal and social interests. According to the protestant ethic – one of the founding tenets of western civilization – hard work is the only way of being redeemed after death and received into eternal life. Work in this sense is more of a punishment or probation: the exile from paradise is the beginning of the necessity of working, and work is the only way back to heaven. “First comes work and then pleasure” is the well known formula of our social system of values, which vulgarizes this principle. Or: “work is work, beer is beer”. Work in its classic meaning is martyrdom: it causes pain. And it should cause pain. Work, as Karl Marx had already concluded in the 19th century, is alienation from oneself.

The question is not how you live, but why.

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or the first time it is possible to abolish the historical separation of “work” and “pleasure”, “9 to 5” and “5 to 9”, working hours and holidays in our modern economy. There are more and more people who are actually able to make use of the German shop opening hours because they are no longer forced to work during this time.

But you enjoy “working” whenever you want to, including weekends or in the night, if you go your own way. You do what nourishes you, permanently and gladly. Someone who is comfortable with himself knows his worth, his values and the price at which he can sell himself.

To reach that stage we must go back to death again. How do I feel about the thought of it? Am I frightened of it? What stops me from dying? Is there anything for which I would give my life? To answer such questions to yourself is anything but deadly. It enables you to think about life and its value. If there is anything worth dying for, then it is also worth living for.

What obsesses you so much that you would dedicate your whole life to it? And why aren’t you doing it? Because we all prefer to play it safe.

In the classical division between job and pleasure we land in a job after our training that we like more or less, receive compensation for the time we spend there, instead of uniting work and pleasure. We would have to suffer less and would not abandon ourselves to partially senseless occupations, hobbies or chronic partying. What are you waiting for? Your old age pension?

Use questions about death to discover possibilities. Devote some time to it, a little solitude, and pen and paper. No distractions, no email nearby, no cell phone, not even a normal phone. Rent a hut on an alpine meadow. Do not take your partner with you. If I had only a year to live, what would I do in the time remaining? What should take priority? If the doctor told you that you had only thirty days to live, what would you concentrate on? And what if it were only a day, an hour? And how much time would you spend in self-pity?

The answers to these questions are the beginning of a lifelong search for the really important things in your life – the much quoted “meaning of life”. Your meaning, your values.

The secret is this. If there were no death we would not think about our lives. Death is there to make sense of our lives. A rich, meaningful life therefore entails coming to terms with our own death.

Then we see ourselves as we really are. The closer we get to our own real values, the more alive we feel. You can judge your values by the vitality and energy within you. They will be carried over into everything around you, including employees and customers, once these values become “lived”.

They are deep and therefore longer lasting than everything else. One of the largest and most successful hotel chains in the world is the Hyatt Regency Hotel. In his autobiography the heir to the chain explains the fundamental principle of its long term success. The “core values” of the founder have been passed on from generation to generation and taken up by all employees. It doesn’t have anything to do with visions on the drawing board during weekend conferences, but with deep human values that are according to the Hyatt family genuine and long lasting. Above all “the spirit to serve”.

The possibility of always being able to perceive what guests lack and what they expect, to put oneself in their place or their character and their demands, automatically raises the quality and promotes progress, so that there is hardly one stone left upon another in spite of the lasting values in the over 70 year old history of the Hyatt chain.

Its reputation as one of the leading international hotel chains justifies these “core values”, in accordance with the Lampedusa motto: “Everything has to be changed so that everything can stay the same.”

Paradigm of values: “the performance scale”

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he following seven chapters describe all the stages in the development of a business up to the moment when the original occupation becomes a business. You have to cross these “seven bridges”-there is no way round.

The only alternative is to stand still or to go back. There is no compulsion: you will find yourself automatically on a higher level. That can be recognized from the mental development of the company, its state and your own state of mind. However once you have adopted the road to a self-employed career, it would be sad to back down.

Look at it as your preparatory phase before your personal big bang, after which you will get in on the act in the world of business and thereby realize your personal goals and become increasingly fulfilled.

The performance scale (see Fig. 1) outlines your business activities. The subsequent development up to the launch is not only intended for the planning phase, but for you to discover your mission, to set goals, to learn how to sell and to try out a succession of projects in order to test whether your dreams can be realized out there in the real world.

The lower half of the performance scale can be called the theoretical, the upper the practical. We prefer to talk about the conception and the action phases.

Our approach has nothing to do with numbers. If you are looking for a business plan you won’t find one here. Although we strongly advise you to make one.

A large misunderstanding in our modern discourse is that for example artists and other “woolly-headed idealists” in our society are prevented from doing business. In the case of artists, writers or theatre people, commercial success through entertainment, for example, makes them downright questionable. At the same time good artists have always been interested in money. Andy Warhol painted dollar bills and maintained that he had portrayed what he loved the most.

Fortunately today the paradigm is changing: you have to link your ideas to business or you won’t be taken seriously in the market. Your ideas, plans and dreams end up as a “hobby” in your back room, or your relations support you, “the great artist”, so that you can pay at least a part of the rent and the grocery bills? Can that be satisfying? Not just that.

Figure 1: Performance Scale no. 7 – Sage Learning Method ©

The old paradigm follows this very curious idea in our culture that creative people and everyone who follows their dreams and their sense of curiosity should have the grace to starve to appear credible. You can prove that you are not a “woolly-headed idealist” through projects. It would be fatal to let everything be driven in support of your dreams and dedicate yourself exclusively to this ideal. You turn your ideas into projects which will show how much energy is really invested and how many consequences this idea really has. Through projects you come into contact with reality. They are limited by time and yield a concrete result - possibly even real money without substantial investment.

These projects are genuine experiences and give you feedback whether your idea or your business is going in the right direction.

The “performance scale” doesn’t have dark and light sides. Imagine it as a tree. Every plant grows downward as well as upward. The roots which suck up the minerals are just as important as the leaves and branches. From the roots you can see how the tree thrives and prospers on all sides.

It is the same with the performance stages. They are the indicators of growth and health.

The “performance scale” illustrates the paths of individuals, organizations, models and systems along which it sketches the phenomena that have arisen. Before you begin you have to look deep into yourself in order to understand the reasons why you want to take this path.

These reasons are your values. All further stages are affected by them. We will start from the bottom. Every concept can be found in the subheadings to follow. Every chapter is devoted to a special stage. You will recognize yourself in these stages: possibly in the first, but it could be another much further ahead if you have already developed your business idea. Then it is amusing to read what you have already achieved - and stimulating for what lies ahead.

Because this is a book we have to portray the business stages in a straightforward linear manner. This doesn’t correspond to the “truth” of these individual stages – in fact they don’t exist separately but are linked together. All the things that you have “behind you” don’t disappear. Many moments of disappointment will resurface. You often forget why you undertook this long journey in the first place. Moments of surprise, small successes and large obstacles overcome enable you to recognize the goal once more and take you a step further, where you will have to reorganize things completely and change your system.

Imagine the “performance scale” as a hologram within whose deeper dimensions other processes shimmer which are the individual stages above and below.

Values are the basis of clear perceptions and decisions

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alues indicate the direction of your creative and emotional intelligence. “Know thyself!” is written above the oracle at Delphi. “Be yourself! You are not what you do, think, desire!” is a famous quotation from Friedrich Nietzsche, who offers a helpful yardstick if you want to break free of the fetters of your illusions.

By what yardstick, from which perspective do you act and decide? To know yourself is not so much to know who you are. That is the province of psychoanalysis. To recognize and to know yourself means to know what really matters to you and what you really want to do.

You are exactly to the same degree happy and contented as you are in tune with your values. People who are fulfilled within themselves and live with their values don’t experience disappointments and are the happiest on earth, regardless of how much money they have.

If you can be in perfect harmony with your own inner truth – i.e. do what you are – your mood will become light and joyful. Nietzsche called this state “exhilaration”, which arises not out of pure naivety but out of conquering dogmas and dictates.

To break another taboo: a lot of modern neuro-scientific research has come to the conclusion that most decisions are made on the basis of emotion. Your feelings decide for you.

Then a mental process starts up which looks for logical reasons for your decision. That is the inner dialogue that you conduct with yourself: often you hear an inner voice that approves or disapproves. Plato spoke in this context of thinking, the “silent dialogue of the soul with itself”; Sigmund Freud spoke of the “super-ego”, Adam Smith of the “impartial spectator”. If you are not clear about your values, unforeseen feelings accompany your life.

If you draw up clear, lasting values for yourself you are capable of perceiving and deciding. Your actions are in tune with your being. Success always arises out of the basis of clarity. As long as you have no clear perception of reality, your business will remain stuck in fantasy or pessimism.

But whoever discovers their own true values has already found on the conception side of the performance scale what they find on top of the action side: the motives for going into service for other people and finding complete self-fulfillment. That is why the overlap between total collapse and enlarged self-perception is a terrific experience – and often the beginning of a unique and true life.

How do you find values?

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e develop tactics with which we deceive ourselves a little to survive everyday life. We find compromises or white lies. We play for time, pretend to be stupid, although we could do better. On holiday, in a lonely cottage, or after a disastrous business experience, there are often moments when it is too late to fool yourself, when you are led or forced into clarity.

The reasons why you do this or that or want to do this or that appear again from behind the grey wallpaper of everyday life. In the morning everything often appears so clear and simple. A few minutes later the motives of your actions are swallowed by the duties of everyday life. You need absolute peace in order to contemplate your values.

What is the most important thing in life? What do you want most? Why do you live and what makes life worth living? What is most desirable? The easiest answers come first: money or love, a fulfilling sex life, fame and honor etc. These are abstract values without content. They have nothing to do with your real life. If you decide on money, you should marry into a rich family or play the lottery. Is that your life? Recognizing your values means to think beyond costs and returns on investments. Many middle class people regard prosperity as a genuine value in their lives, only to discover that it has nothing to do with their own lives once they have earned their money through a huge investment of time and sacrifices. There is little time left to enjoy life. Values are the measure of things that are more important to you than money. Which values are important to you?

How much value do you place on your health? When you are sick you suddenly discover the values on which you depend. Then all the money in the world becomes of matter of indifference: the main thing is to get well again. People are not cars on a production line. Each person has his integral temperament. There are great differences in sensibility, character and in the level of activity. Active people find their salvation in movement; passive people love peace and contemplation. But common to both is their disposition. Hopes and fears form our characters. Our need to grow and interact with other people is a fixed integral part of our system. Unconscious feelings steer our consciousness. Many people who have grown up in poverty for example never lose their fear of losing everything, regardless of how much money they have.

Personal values are the secret spices in the recipe for prosperity. If you can train yourself to develop courage, humility and awareness, you will be in a position to change to the winning side.

Many people who have grown up in a successful business family imbibe certain values with their mother’s milk. Others – most of us – look for models that can help us to develop perspectives. But the majority of people train their brains to find excuses for their existence or put the blame on others, such as politicians or their boss, for their situation. If they spent only half the time they spend in regret and finding out where they went wrong on producing results they would be rich.

Every time you obtain personal success a blemish in your personal system always threatens to bring your best plans to nothing: vanity, pride, arrogance, presumptuousness and haughtiness arise. Your faults appear as soon as you come into close contact with other people. Life is simply too short to iron out all your faults. It doesn’t matter. The main thing is to know the advantages and defects of your character. It concerns your positive as well as your negative values. The outcome of this is your talent. You can integrate them into the structure of your character as you earn money.

Often it can even be the negative influences that lead to a business. One of our clients was a loser in private, but a winner in public. Wherever he went he opened his big mouth to show that he was the greatest – to the distress of his fellow human beings who knew him better.

As far as they were concerned he was a pure exhibitionist who by any means and with a lot of shamming annoyed everyone so much until all eyes were fixed up on him. He failed interviews regularly because he made requests and demands that bore no relation to his actual accomplishments.

Of course the coaches didn’t know anything about this. It came out during the session that he was on the wrong side in his chosen profession, the media. He was a complete actor, who belonged in front of rather than behind the camera: a limelight hogger! No sooner had he discovered this for himself when he found an honest and deep relationship. Now he is working on a personal project which he will stage one day; and he works willingly and hard on it, so he can get his well-earned applause.

Character, persona, personality

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our talent determines your personal success. The personality determines the goal. The personality often changes when you undergo a deep crisis – as the example above shows.

During a crisis you encounter your self-deception and discover what you believe to be right in the innermost part of your unconsciousness. Many people have a dichotomy inside themselves that they carry for all of their life, and are too occupied to notice it. There is the type who always questions others, criticizing and commenting on their actions – without ever giving himself away. That is to say he knows like no other of the danger and must have had bitter experiences with it. Now he is paying the others back by pumping them for information and questioning the reasons for their doings and not doings - without noticing it himself. He has a special talent for looking for mistakes and rubbing more salt into the wounds. The interlocutors in his life are constantly forced to give an account of themselves, and it seems that they are living their lives the wrong and he the right way. Many avoid him – not least because he never opens up to them, and doesn’t do himself what he demands from his fellow human beings.

A client of ours told us about one of his own clients, who cultivated a very serious and correct business jargon, only to fall into the wildest linguistic excesses outside working hours: he couldn’t be foul-mouthed enough. When after a drunken, backslapping, all mates together evening he introduced this vocabulary into an email his client was stunned by his sleaziness and found his personal style vulgar and obsequious. And that was the last he heard from him.

This is the pathological side of values. Such people have genuinely not found their inner self. They combine contradictions without noticing it. The inner divisions in human beings first have to be discovered both in order to analyze them and eliminate them (the job of the psychoanalyst), or to push them open without realizing it and to make them as fruitful as possible (the job of the coach). Normally one always assumes that one is right and everyone else wrong. This is a very costly argument. There is a saying in America that “you can be right or you can be rich”.

Personality values are mostly especially intractable because our pig-headedness prefers us to appear as we would wish to be. You are convinced that you are a nice person and put great trust in your own press. Unconsciously you expect that other people will like you and treat you well because of it. But you don’t know what other people think and say about you. Very few people take the trouble to find out and prefer to fall in love with their reflection. It would be unpleasant if a “personality” who acts like Louis XIV, but in reality is totally unpopular had to lead his team out of a crisis. Only then do the true values that are hiding behind the mask of the ego appear.

“Public virtue, private vice” is what the 18th century doctor and philosopher Bernhard Mandeville called the phenomenon whereby even the greatest criminals want to appear as good men in society. These ego values glitter on the surface and hide the inner being of a person. They are based on vanity, on false pride or false self-estimation. Of course it’s fun to dress up and go out and turn men’s heads, or to tell stories where we come across quite by chance as high principled heroes. But other ego values are simply vitriolic. Basically the ego always strives to bring together people who think like us, gets them to follow us and at the same time excludes people who don’t think as we do. This way of thinking can lead to the end of a career.

The ancient Greeks called the masks that they used in tragedy “persona”. They represent a character that can’t be found in the original face. Many cultures have believed in such masks. There are the Melanesian peoples for whom there is no death, as their dead live on in demons: small carved figures who lie in the demon house. They don’t just represent the ancestors, they are the ancestors.

In our culture it only depends on whether we see through the masquerade or not. We all bring forward superficial values in society and project ourselves, as we would like to be: great guys, good human beings, the social mask, our image. Many people use the laws of marketing and develop another character to become someone by ham acting an artificial figure that is constantly onstage. If the “persona” is the mask that we show in society, the ego is the make-up. We paint nice colors on our faces to appear more interesting and more important and to hide our true face. It is a childish way of drawing attention to yourself. To develop into a person you only need to wipe the character cosmetics off your cheeks and just lower your guard to see yourself as others see you. The mirror that shows you how you really are is society.

You need courage to find and develop your own values. For often other values determine our lives. Possibly we have pursued a course of studies which our parents are proud of, not us. Perhaps we have shone in a subject so that we were forced into it rather than choosing it ourselves. At the moment when you come out with your real values and goals – often after a tragedy – people around you will be shocked. But when the puzzle stage is over your dream begins. You have established the first roots of the performance scale tree. Now strictly speaking it can only lead upwards.

Partners worth their weight in gold

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hen you build up a network of people, you look around for people who have the same values as yourself – which is not to be confused with a peer group which takes everything you say as gospel and excludes everything else. Sharing the same values means having the same desires and perceptions.

This is how you can recognize the compatibility between people. If their values, desires and perceptions don’t correspond to those of their potential partners, they will not be suited fundamentally. Sympathy has more power than you think. As a rule cooperation doesn’t last long if you are not on the same wavelength.

To find the right people you have to communicate your real values – the values of your personality! Explain what is important to you without pretending. Let everyone know where you stand or you risk deeply disappointing others. Surrounded by the wrong people, people who have other values than you, you can’t build a successful career or live a satisfying life.

A good way of finding out what kind of person a business partner or a new member of the team is is through the proverbial bottom line: money. The way people handle money shows a great deal about their character. Business conduct, payment practice and generosity are indicators of the culture of the firm, and you will either have a bad time with customers and colleagues or will surf with them on the same wave, as the case may be.

As soon as a new player joins the team his character is crucial for the setup. Someone comes along who is supposed to take over the sales department and is at the same of the opinion that you have to drive up in front of customers in a BMW Model 7 to make an impression – long before you have earned enough money for such a car. He has to have the smart suit because it’s essential for winning over customers. In a restaurant he goes to the toilet just before the bill arrives and only resurfaces when it has been paid. Others keep money back until it no longer works, to the chagrin of their suppliers.

Others on the other hand are so generous that they don’t notice that they are ruining themselves…Frequently this is a result of a way of winning others over. So there are countless possibilities of inferring the inner worth of a person from the palpable worth of money. Test it out.

Protect yourself from great disappointment in this manner. And also from yourself. With the right people at your side you automatically build a protective shield around you that defends you from threats from within and without.

If you like being generous, you can be happy that you have a treasurer who can tell you what you can and can’t write off against tax. Other team players tell you when a business partner is being airy-fairy. If your greatest value is your family for whom you exhaust yourself day after day so that you are too tired in the evening to play with your children, you must delegate the job onto reliable shoulders. If you know your priorities consciously and early enough you will develop a lifestyle that suits you and that protects what is important to you.

Universal values: trust and sympathy

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wo values stand right at the beginning of a successful career: trust and sympathy. You have to gain the trust of your customers before you can earn money. Trust in business means reliability.

No one gives money to someone they don’t trust. Every customer has to feel right from the start that they can rely on you.

As soon as money starts flowing someone is investing trust in you. Sincerity and reliability are the bases of integrity. Corrupt or dishonest enterprises are considerably more threatened with going to hell in a handcart.

A devious person in his private life will also run a devious company. Whoever fails to stick to certain rules which have developed in markets, villages, tribes, bazaars and stock exchanges over millennia holds bad cards. “Business is sympathy” is one rule which unfortunately is increasingly ignored. Sympathy means to put yourself in the place of another.

The vulgar neo-liberal thesis that the accumulation of capital by any means is right because the complete earning population gives back to benefit others through taxation is all too enthusiastically followed. But no one who only knows Adam Smith’s “The Wealth of Nations” from a distance believes that. In reality you have to look at the market with the eyes of an “impartial observer” who represents exactly the same morals that society maintains. They function according to the good old golden rule: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”

Treating your fellow human beings as you would like to be treated is not only a good philosophy but also makes a good company. How people perceive your company and your team is decisive for whether your product or service will be in demand. Never before has the sympathy factor been so decisive for commercial success.

No one in modern business has to give money to someone he cannot stand. That goes for the greengrocer on the corner as much as for the car manufacturer. Both are only attractive to people who hold the same values. We all want good products and a measure of sympathy.

When our basic needs are satisfied, the soul comes into play. We become like babies: we need recognition, devotion and tender loving care. Humans are through and through social beings, after all. Unpleasant people get what they deserve, standing on their own at the end – the greatest punishment there is.

People who can stand on their own without having to assert themselves go into the service industry for others and are richly rewarded.

People need tangible presents and heart-felt reality as much as they need air to breathe. That is why there are so many Hollywood films. They are based solely on sympathy. And entertainment is always good for the soul.

Higher values: quality and service

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ur modern culture is at last no longer based on the idea of exploitation, but on the idea of quality and service: the entrepreneurs of today think about the question of what people lack and which service they can establish to fill their needs day in and day out. Instead of telling others what we want, we learn to create greater values for others.

A better quality of life raises the value of our lives. We lead a healthier, more conscious and more dignified life than our forefathers. Once you have established your values, you will know what service or product to offer. It is what people and the human race in general have been waiting for.

To arrive at this point you have to face up to a couple of hard questions: what people will say about you after your death and how you deal with your real and not your constructed reality.

We strive after perfection in this new, positive environment. We expect perfect service everywhere, or we go somewhere else. We look for quality and are prepared to pay a higher price for it. Humanity in the sense of putting yourself in the place of others sets a new standard of excellence.

Only the best service counts. In Japan for example the level of service is considerably higher than in the “service desert Germany”. Japanese or Americans feel among us as we do in Bulgaria. The service ideas are lying in the street. There is a lot to do. Pick them up.

A person who lives according to his highest values knows no fear. Of course you will experience moments of fear, but you can look them in the eye. You aren’t standing in front of a gaping hole.

Values are the wires along which you can pass over the conflicts, dangers and obstacles in life with the sureness of a sleepwalker. It is said that when we are at the threshold of death an inner film of our lives passes before us. You can be the director. It doesn’t even have to be death. Fear of losing your livelihood is enough. Short term hardships like cash flow problems are sufficient. They are resolved by interim solutions and don’t challenge you to reflect on which point in your life you have arrived at.

Necessity creates discovery. Our mother at the beginning of the chapter is at the end: at the same moment she is standing at the beginning. The moment she began to tell a story, she discovered the greatest talent that life has given her. She has continued the story up to this very day and she has become one of the richest women in the world. She is Joanne K. Rowling. Apparently she still likes to write in cafes.

Sources:

Marriott, J.W. Jr. & Brown, Kathi Ann. The Spirit to Serve: Marriott’s Way.

Smith, Adam. The Wealth of Nations.

Smith, Adam. The Theory of Moral Sentiments. Mandeville, Bernard de. The Parable of the Bees.

YOUR MISSION

„Roll out your guns, let’s pretend, it’s fun to lose.“

(Nirvana, „Smells like teen spirit“)

Ladies, if there is one thing that we can do it is talk. Whereas men waste about 2000 words every day and try to keep it short, we easily, fluently and chattily raise the number to roughly 9000. Further evolutionary and biological reasons can no doubt be found for the fact.

But we find that we should enjoy and capitalize on this ability and a few others as well. What was it that Lisa Stansfield sang so cutely? “I’m no classy lady, but I’m all woman.” In modern business you can be both lady and all woman. Why that is the case and how it functions emerges during this somewhat pragmatic phase when you find your mission.

What is a mission? The Englishwoman Anita Roddick also probably didn’t know exactly at the beginning of her career. But she had a sweet little idea that had amusing consequences at first: she had scarcely opened her first shop when she drew down on herself the energetic protests of the countless funeral homes on the same street.

Her shop had absolutely nothing to do with funeral homes. On the contrary, she had called it “The Body Shop” because of living bodies. But that alone would be nothing new. She brought two things together: her idea of the world harmonized completely with nature (which was very revolutionary and avant garde at that time) combined with products made from natural ingredients that enhance the lives of human beings, who are part of nature, after all.

That’s what we call a mission. And, as is well known, Ms. Roddick has not only achieved it: it has made her one of the richest women in Britain.

Why mission? No sooner have the values which are personally decisive been ascertained when you should accomplish a “mission”? And…isn’t that a little too much pathos? Ask someone who knows what he is talking about: the missionary Albert Schweitzer.

In his opinion you lead a happy life if you want to pursue a specific objective in your life. If you direct and concentrate your values towards a challenging objective, your mission will appear. And then you are happy while you are accomplishing it.

Mission and melancholia

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ut like most people, we often renounce what we would really like to have. The “I want that”

of our childhood is forced out of us, though it would make decisions for example much easier.

If you can’t recognize your fundamental impulses, you can’t join the game. But it would be tedious if you attempted to fight against these human impulses.

Instead try to get them under control. Ambition is the impulse that determines the size of your goal. False humility restrains this ambition. If you duck out of the way of these challenges you will notice how the senses become dulled and you fall into a peculiar form of lethargy – the melancholy that arises when you regret in your inmost being not having tackled a goal, and you mooch around more or less aimlessly because of it.

It looks something like this. After getting up you don’t know what to do. But you get by. Every distraction, even including breakfast television, comes to the fore. You arrange to have breakfast with like-minded friends in order to talk yourself into the vale of tears. It is not long in the conversation before there is no way out of it. Then, first a prosecco to it. A small one. Thus weakened, and also to avoid being reminded of past glorious times, you lie down briefly after lunch for starters. In the end it was three “small” proseccos.

Afterwards you drag yourself over to the computer to check your email. And even if the guy you met recently has sent you an enthusiastic email you will never be satisfied with your mail. If anything, you are an email junkie. In the evening a couple of great ideas, especially ones which make sense of your life, occur to you. You make some notes and already your energy has gone. Your energy only stemmed from the guilty feeling that you haven’t done anything else sensible all day in the first place. But the first beer of the evening tastes great again. You meet up with your peers again, because you can be sure that with they will go along with anything you say. What a taxing, tiring day! Although you haven’t done anything. In his thesis on “Melancholia and Society”, Wolf Lepenies describes the phenomenon of melancholia as coming not from inside but out: forms of melancholia, such as lovesickness or other mental symptoms which were treated (mostly by blood-letting) up to the nineteenth century, are indicators of a society which has outlived its time, with failed revolutionaries, bankrupt noblemen and others who lounged about uselessly in the salons of the late nineteenth century without really having anything to do. For they had literally given up their job - or it had been taken from them.

In the modern sense this type of melancholia is of a different nature: an event in your life that continues to have an effect on you such as a separation or a divorce and makes you feel that you have been badly or unjustly treated by someone or, worse, by a man. This feeling dominates you and robs you of the power of looking ahead. You have to get out of this dark corner of the soporific salon.

Charisma: the power of women

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omen have one big advantage over men in their careers. At the end of the performance scale, that is to say at the summit of satisfaction, you find yourself in a Buddha-like state: things happen simply because you want them to. You don’t do anything any more, you have an effect. Your magical magnetic power of attraction, the spell of your charisma alone ensures that everything you want comes true. You know this situation. You only have to be standing on your own at a party and send out a couple of signals, play with your feminine charm so that men sniff around out like Pavlovian dogs and, yes, sit up and beg. As is well known, men can always do that. But if the woman isn’t interested they don’t have a chance. And everything that men do, they do only to win women, even if they aren’t aware of it. And if that isn’t an incentive to use this wonderful feminine quality in your career, we don’t know what is. At last that is the aim of this chapter: to show how women can determine their goals.

What would happen to these wonderful values if you didn’t use them? Of course you need a target before you can hit the bull’s eye. And a target needs a playing field, a system of coordinates in which the time span and the challenge are plotted. Then your values will turn into a mission. For one thing has been missing in our notes up to now. And this factor comes into play in this chapter: other people. Your mission is your personal vision of how to use your values in reality. This vision can be brilliant, bombastic, challenging or simply sweet, humane and tender: there is no difference in principle between Joanne K. Rowling with her empire and Mother Theresa. Some people want to change the world, others to have a good life and raise a family. And some want both.

Your mission is a game for life, a strategy which will in every case even fascinate and attract like-minded people. If you ply them with what arouses your curiosity and bring out what is within you, you will not be alone for long. As soon as you channel your values into a coherent mission, your life takes on a sense of direction. You will have comrades-in-arms who love you and want to put the same values into practice with you. Only: the others have to realize that these values can be implemented together.

Up to now we have talked about general values that are important for you. These are abstract values that you have taken for your personal ones. But up to now we haven’t been dealing with concrete things, personal goals, content. Life isn’t a church synod. It is great to be for peace, but it won’t bring you any closer to your goals. Think more individually, more egoistically, more materially: what can I do for peace? What are my intentions? What do I want to be successful at? Not what do I want to be, but what do I want to achieve. This is nothing to do with thanks and recognition for great human endeavors, but with success. Enough of petting, what you need is a brilliant idea, which however you have to be completely convinced by. Then, and only then, will your success be unstoppable.

What arouses my curiosity?

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he fundamental question of your mission is: what arouses my curiosity?

What is it that keeps me going, what theme can I play upside down on the keys like Mozart, for what do I have the right touch, will I appear genuine to people, what drives me, what things that others don’t see can I paint in oil if I have to, curiously enough? What devolves on me, what is so easy for me that I am amazed that others don’t find it so?

The answer is very simple: your genius. And your genius consists in exactly those things for which others admire you, even if it is that you are the only one around who can open every kind of tin can. And that’s why missions develop out of things that can be seen. Your mission is no longer an abstract mental picture, but an ability to attract the attention of others in the real, physical world. You often do something that arouses your curiosity and combines two of your basic interests in a strange way – look at Anita Roddick – and suddenly everything revolves around you. It is decisive that you see these things in all clarity. Don’t think too much about what you would like to be or to have, or about false compliments, or your career will take completely the wrong direction. You discover two things: that your road will cost you trouble and pain, and that your efforts are not fully recognized. A genuine mission comes true when people come to you in droves by word of mouth and enthusiasm, because they can see that you are the best at what you do!

You have one major talent in your own right: you can see the truth. In the end you are a professional in your chosen field. Like a premiere league football coach you know every move, every trick inside out from your own experience. No one can fool you. And so you can look on with partial amusement when others in your own field make the most stupid mistakes. You are professional and realistic, and see things as they are, so you also know your limitations. There is little point in projecting yourself as Marlene Dietrich when you aren’t. What one person can do others can do better.

Find out exactly what specific field you can be the best at, even if it’s a self-organized world championship in female can opening in which possibly thousands world wide would take part.

If you regard yourself as a small player in a big game, you will not only disappoint yourself, but won’t be able to entice anyone out from behind the oven because you don’t appear credible or fascinating enough. So, Ms. Cobbler – stick to your last, and go for quantity. Aim for high goals. Really make something of your mission. How? By visualizing it. That’s enough of theory.

Anybody who has a vision can see something: the goal. It becomes visualized. You see a million human beings all over the world sitting in front of the TV or the internet to watch the world championship in tin can opening which you as former champion organized! You see how you are acclaimed, carried on people’s hands, honored, valued…and loved by millions.

This is what a vision looks like. Three dimensional. It can be grasped in the hand. Not something far away. If that is the case, Helmut Schmidt is right. Anybody who has visions should go to the doctor. And so don’t ever give in to small, realistic, attainable short-term goals. There aren’t any. Instead live your life as a series of astonishing incidents and take care of the surprises yourself: throw parties, go on exciting journeys. Take the bull by the horns:

meet the people you have always wanted to meet, for example.

A journalist we knew always had a list of prominent people whom he would most like to meet – particularly architects, musicians, philosophers, futurologists and visionaries. But how? Simple: he founded a magazine dealing with the subject. Not financed by himself. Instead he convinced the boss of a PR agency of the idea of starting a customer magazine through which the company could make a name of itself as cutting edge. It worked. He was even astounded how easy it was to get an agreement from these people as soon as he became a representative of the press. For the next few years he traveled all round the world, met everyone he wanted to meet and a few more, and was paid a princely sum for his interest.

It is very simple: become a person whom others admire and the person you have always dreamed of being…Close your eyes and envision yourself in your wildest dream. That is your mission.

Comments are killers

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f course the road to success, your “Road to Mandalay”, isn’t always visible as far as the horizon. There are often obstacles in the way. There are well-meaning friends, who comment on your project to death, who want to demonstrate that they are leading the right life and you the wrong. And they are not in the least malicious: but being frustrated themselves, they don’t see that others might fare differently. Because they have accepted their lot.

This is the negative side of the mission: melancholia. When you look back on your life high spots appear which are irretrievable. They move further and further away from you. As long as you fail to embark on your mission, these images will remain present. There are people who live entirely in the past. You can recognize them by the fact that they are always telling anecdotes and “stories from my life” that begin with, “Do you remember…?” They are satisfied getting old with a partner and a pension. Hello? “I want to live while I’m alive” is a wonderful and simple lyric and very close to reality. How many people can honestly say that they are in fact alive during their lives? Instead they have given up at some time in their lives. They lay most of the blame on others without realizing it. They can least stand it when others dash ahead. They prefer to be mired in mutual misery.

Germany is a very melancholy country. It can be seen from the peculiar unanimity in grumbling. It is simply alien to most Germans to be greeted in a friendly way by someone in the street. On the other hand it is completely acceptable to get volubly excited over some nuisance, and a whole chorus of dissatisfied people can be found to agree with it, whether it is delays on the railroad or some failure on the part of the government. They lay the blame on higher powers instead of taking responsibility for themselves.

Simply don’t be taken in by such things. It is better to keep your mission to yourself or to choose the people you tell it to carefully. Comments that call your pictures, visions, intentions into question are killers, as for example, “Yes, but that has certainly already been done”, or, “Great, and where will you get the money for it from?” These are valid questions, but one the whole they are not meant constructively. Don’t let yourself be deflected from your path by obstinate needling. For as soon as you do it will be painful, and you will feel it physically. On the other hand it is a sign that you are on the right path. Imagine you had an excellent plan for becoming self-employed, and then found yourself back in a stifling insurance agency office. This is the kind of pain we mean.

As long as you stay on your path you will have many good experiences, even if it is often stony. The more you can convince, the more pleasant impulses come from without that justify your activities. And that’s a damn good feeling. What is convincing is your sense of curiosity and your self-confidence in everything you do.

What you can do like no other inspires you and you can talk about it frankly, freely and with absolute enthusiasm. You become your own PR machine. This charisma attracts more and more people.

Your mission is to live up to your values

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f you have your main focus on your mission you won’t have much time for doubts and conflicts, fortunately. You are bright, awake and always in top form. These attributes, namely your character, makes you a better person. Your commitment inspires other people. You become so alive when you suddenly live up to your values and take your purpose seriously that you even give wings to other people’s careers. Because you are suddenly alive yourself, and become adorable and intoxicating in a refreshing way! This way, your charisma, your personal magnetism increases in proportion to the scope that you give your mission.

A mission that sparks produces action and attraction. Your intentions determine your lifestyle both qualitatively and quantitatively. You define a game that more and more people join and which encourages them to tell others about your business. But this depends solely on you communicating your ideas with complete conviction without leaving any question marks. The further the scope of your mission is stretched the more fame you will reap. “Fame” means immortality. Your aims could well be designed to outlast your death, and you will enrich your life and make yourself alive even more. In a certain sense a family is such a mission: you pass on offspring to the future with commitment, responsibility and love. In your lifetime this love will already be returned ten times over in a wonderful way.

Visionaries see far and clearly. People who follow their path can be recognized by their external appearance. They move as if they were approaching something. They walk upright and look clearly ahead as if they had a map to show them the way. Other people for example always look at the ground or slouch. They meander through life like that. And then of course there are people who can laugh and those who pull a face. If you are seized by a great idea and are prepared to pursue it, you will have glowing cheeks.

On the springboard to the goal in a few leaps

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ou begin your business journey best by envisioning your own intentions or invoking the picture you have of yourself and which others should have of you. How should others see me and my business? What should someone else say about me? You have to answer these questions to give your business a structure. Try to put your mission into a couple of concise sentences such as a private business plan. Your mission, mind you, is not the artificial credo of collective companies. These sentences should arouse all your passion every time you read them. Just thinking about what you see before you makes your heart beat faster and turns your day into pure pleasure. If you formulate this mission it has nothing to do with your “funeral eulogy” any more, but with something that you can freely and frankly share with others. It is so to speak the “Holy Ghost” of your business religion: “Go and tell it on the mountains”. You should inspire others when you express what is important to you in your career. Write down your goal in a couple of short, clear, terse and purely positive sentences. What should your business project do for other people? How do you want to achieve your aim? Why should others be inspired to work with you?

Nevertheless it is advisable to involve only trustworthy people in your mission statement at first, people who also have your respect. These people are there for the test. If your mission has a meaning it will spark off others. This mission concerns what is most important to you, what you do, love and enjoy most in life. You can therefore grasp and feel it. The more defined your mission is, the happier your life will be.

A successful mission is based on ambition. It requires a strong ego. You want to be a business leader, and such people are driven by three factors: affluence, fame and profit. Imagine that you had not exhausted your life, that there is more – that is the profit, the surplus value that your life has through the fulfillment of a mission. Imagine that your values outlast your life - that is fame. Imagine being unconstrained and untroubled by money matters and therefore being free to deal with things beyond your business – that is affluence, and it doesn’t sound bad. Entrepreneurs are not better human beings because of it. But they go their own way, like happy children who demand a lot in their innocent way.

Which of these three factors fires you the most – affluence, fame or winning? Which thought drives you the most? Do you dream of fame? Does financial independence appear the most important to you? Do you simply want to emerge as a winner? It is generally considered taboo to answer these questions in the affirmative. Do it. Look yourself in the face to find your values. See yourself in your dreams to have a clear mission in front of your eyes. There are no taboos. Logic doesn’t come into it. Look for something that really turns you on. It will cause you a bit of fear, as it is so far from reality. Don’t be fooled. If you look these positive fears directly in the face, energy is the result. After that comes the work, ten per cent inspiration, ninety per cent perspiration. But you’re happy to sweat for the right goal.

Your style is your image

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s soon as you walk out onto the business playing field, you lose your diffidence. As soon as you stand up for your mission, other people will regard you in a new light.

Listen to how others regard you, what they say about you. That is your personal image. Make it into a distinct brand before others label you with it. What character do you want to play? What costume goes with it? And what part do you want to play on the business stage? You still have freedom of choice. Your image is the one thing by which other people can read your intention. One can tell from your clothes whether you are going to get milk or going to a business meeting – at least, hopefully. Your style, and we are not just talking about your clothes, has to correspond to your advised target group, to your customers and business partners. This style (not style in the sense of fashion, thank you) is your manner, your native wit, your sense of humor, your character – whatever makes you unique. You discover your own nature when you let yourself be who you are. Only when all affectation is put aside and you are completely relaxed (without prosecco) can you look at yourself calmly in the mirror. There you are. With a bit of luck you are the person that you know rather than the stranger who greets you with, “Hello, do we know each other?”

You radiate the image that you have. It is the direct projection of your intentions or un-intentions. If you want to be successful, this image will galvanize others to work with you.

That doesn’t mean that your present image is already the appropriate one. Find it by trial and error, and don’t play the prima donna, an unrecognized goddess on earth, at whose feet everything should lie. The more natural and relaxed you become the more honest and stable your business will be. You notice this from the magnetism you have. You radiate energy from which others can create. And that will pay off when you are dealing with selling. So cultivate an image that you want to live and that is you. If you are not yourself, you attract the wrong people. If you have customers whom you can’t stand, who are not “your type” at all, you can feel how much effort and nerves it costs.

Pretending is the wrong way. And everything that you do will not only grow stunted, but also go in the wrong direction.

Career barriers: Bustle, panic and tactics

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mission is a good reason why you do something and which direction you work towards.

You unleash an unbelievable amount of energy and drive. You suddenly feel power. And that’s good: you will need all your convictions to overcome obstacles that inevitably lie in the way. Among them for example might be your own shortcomings. One of the main reasons for passive melancholia lies in the belief that you won’t do anything wrong if you don’t do anything – a wildly inaccurate assumption, but that need not interest us here. It is a matter of course that you make mistakes as soon as you start on something. Good trainers allow mistakes in order to study them. For then they can be dealt with as soon as they arise – otherwise not. The second reason is that your image is almost never congruent to your character. You can change, while others still have the same picture of you. You will often experience this when you deal with people whom you haven’t seen for a long time. On these occasions you are still in the old condition, which you have long left behind. For one is always in a position to correct oneself on the road to success.

Every contact, every conversation brings an experience with it which you build into your business strategy for the next time. Therefore your performance becomes more and more perfect. If there were no tactics, there is the third reason. Your desire to get on with everyone and simply to do nothing wrong can lead to you losing sight of your mission: you are everything under the sun, but no longer yourself.

It is better to lose a client than to lose your character. For if no one can classify you correctly – if, for example, you present yourself as the well-known “jack of all trades” – they will not take you seriously any more. The market shows that you are more successful if you specialize in something. For you have exactly the right, loyal customers for your service. Still of course it doesn’t do any harm to update yourself regularly to show who you are.

Every human being is in a state of permanent growth, and it’s fun to demonstrate this growth. Nothing is sadder than the inclination to press people into clichés. On the other hand it is a means of giving a basis to a relationship with someone, just like remembering somebody’s name. But everyone likes to be surprised, above all when it is something to do with “the latest state of affairs” with regard to you. Produce regular updates about yourself, as in the form of circulars, newsletters, updates, Christmas letters and New Year greetings. If someone still sees you as a grown-up little girl, that’s your fault. You see reality more clearly if you are in tune with your image. But be prepared for the fact that not everything you see is wonderful. For one thing, some of your abilities will not survive the ordeal. For another the decision to follow a course will perhaps force you into realizing that it is the wrong one – but that is much better than not even starting. Perhaps you have too little patience. Or you give in too easily. Perhaps you are even at the point where you begrudge other people what they have. Without realizing it, you are always finding the fly in the ointment; you question everything, and only look at the negative sides. If you diagnose these symptoms, you are still in the dark salon of melancholia: unconsciously you have the feeling that others must be responsible for your fate. However, you are not responsible, not responsible at all. Don’t look for reasons any further but go into action. As soon as you start up your business you will be faced with the problem of having to suppress your appearing mistakes and characteristics in flux, so to speak. In every business meeting other people will pose questions by which you can measure and recognize yourself. That is wonderful. If everything were so simple and static the whole business wouldn’t be any fun. Everything is in flux, and you permanently work on a traveling ship. Every step takes you further. Instead of sitting around and holding conversations about yourself and your self-awareness, throw off this melancholia and learn about yourself through action.

A further important step in getting to know your strengths and weaknesses of your activities is the help of people whom you like and value. Ask them to be honest with you. Politeness is out of place here. The nice friends with the prosecco are drinking only to your misery which drags you down further. We mean the people with good intentions whose views don’t correspond to yours, and on account of which you always try to pretend something else which they see through: your mother, your ex-friend, your brother. Simple feedback – instead of criticism, pieces of advice or formulas – will already help you to jump onto the path that is the only right one – your own. Ask them if there are things that don’t agree with your real intentions: if you are pretending to be somebody other than you are. Perhaps it is only about the correct presentation of patterns of behavior, ways of presenting yourself which don’t suit you according to their opinion. For example: “As soon as you are in company of people who can be useful to you, you play up like a superstar who expects to be paid for their appearance. The first goes down well, the second doesn’t.” Draw up appropriate rules in order to play a part that pays off: your own. Everything else is a waste of energy. Quite a few things that you read here give you a light sting. Just take time to go through them one after the other and to observe your perceptions after a few days. How did I get here? What is right about it and what not? Where am I? Where do I want to go?

The human brain is happy to remain on the subjective side, and so it is incredibly difficult to look at yourself from an objective perspective without other people’s help. Other people always have a certain impression of you. Those who know you well give you exactly the feedback on what suits you and what doesn’t. Try it. Let people who have no vested interest tell you who you are and how you present yourself, and how, where and why these two things differ from each other. That is not necessarily to say that you are intrinsically a self-obsessed, arrogant person. Perhaps you even underestimate yourself, hide your light under a bushel too much, and in fact have more greatness and beauty in you than you admit to. Whatever: if you go along with your personality you will be unbeatable.

At this point in your career you simply have to think about yourself as objectively as you can. You are at the point when your calling card coincides with your personality. If so far you have only been doing things for fun you have not been taking yourself seriously. Then why should others take you seriously?

When you have jumped this hurdle other perspectives open up. Suddenly you can tell what is and what isn’t okay. You stop being ironic. You mean what you say. You are listened to. You are accepted and respected. Such a realistic perception will arise at every threshold of a new level of business. In the course of time the fog of routine will always lie over your doings, and when you wake, it will only happen through your fundamental awareness of yourself and your situation.

With a clear, realistic and completely critical view of yourself, you can learn a lot from other people. For example, people who think completely differently from yourself. It is unbelievable what dimensions other points of view have, and not only through encounters with other cultures. Even an insight into the world of your neighbor can have many new things in store for you. Furthermore you now have the ability to think about scenarios in which you yourself take part in. You will inevitably feel whether you are comfortable in the role in which you find yourself. Your reason will in turn tell you what lies in your path and what doesn’t. As soon as you tread a path there will be bandits. If you have a realistic view of yourself and your aims your reason will tell you what and who is good for you and what not. Your logical understanding quickly grasps the problems. It is the bulwark against the mental inclination to jump between options, to acknowledge your point of view as the only valid one and not allow other interpretations.

Stand by yourself. Feedback from others is control enough. Stop making excuses and justifying yourself. Don’t be continually asking why you did this or that. You can quietly throw the things you have concocted out of doubt into a pot. The main point is that you accept these things. The results speak for themselves, even if you are trailing 2:3 at halftime. Congratulate yourself on your realistic view of things. Only then can you think about what to do in the second half.

Bonding is everything in our increasingly productless service economy. In order to fulfill your mission you work daily in close contact with your fellow human beings: partners, friends, colleagues, employees, bosses, service providers etc.

And your cash flow. The quality of both constitutes the barometer of your vitality. If you work without these fundamental qualities, you are possibly frozen solid in your interpretation of life.

You will gain clarity when you see what results from your activities. Every experience will either enrich or diminish you. The rest is explanation and vindication. If you really learn something from it your vitality will increase. Your mind will sometimes be confused. That means that you are entering new mental territory. Your mission can be realized when you step out from under the shadow of melancholia and exchange it for the great game of life. Then get to it.

Often when your plans threaten to break down or when your life takes a turn to the negative side, you will be able to recognize whether you have measured up to these challenges and can pull yourself out of this mire with the help of your own personality by looking in the mirror. Once your mission is clear, nothing can drag you down.

YOUR GOALS

“The North Sea will sooner look for water than a woman be lost for words.“

(Jutland saying)

Values give a vision a basis. And missions give values a system of coordinates. Goals are the definition of your intentions in concrete, measurable results. The verb “to define” comes from the Latin “finis” (“end” or “goal”). A de-finition is a predestination of an ultimate plan.

As your mission develops, your business game will become immensely exciting and attractive for others as well as for yourself. Your company is an exclusive party, and “parties are meant to last”, as Prince already pointed out in his song “1999”. Even this once utopian year is some time ago, and we must honestly and sincerely realize that there is nothing more dreadful than a never ending party. Not only because we are getting older, not on account of the effort connected with it, but because we get lost in it and don’t get any further. It has no prospect and “lasts” without changing itself or anything else. Fortunately every party eventually reaches a certain stage of exhaustion. The same goes for your business party, as it lacks something crucial: energy reserves.

If your mission progressively comes true your business game will take on bigger and bigger dimensions along with it. It depends above all on the zeal with which you pursue it. Your enthusiasm is the magnet of your business. Your new-found charisma and your interest will connect the interest of other people to your activities. If you stand behind what you do your efforts will automatically be linked to the right people.

You set goals as soon as you resolve to do your own thing. But sometimes you are not at all conscious of them. The problem is the party. It goes on, but it has no goal, no end, and no definition. If no idea dominates what should come of your intentions, there is gaping emptiness. Is your business also woven like that?

Business and relationships

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e can now quite simply ask, what is your goal? This is one of the elementary questions in coaching, and of course it can be answered in different ways. But first let’s bear in mind what it means to have no goal.

The average German “relationship”, an invention of the problem orientated and freedom seeking eighties when marriage was out of favor, is generally distinguished by its lack of commitment and aimlessness. Language and phrases reveal this wonderfully: “Since I’ve been in a new relationship, we solve mutual problems that I never had before.” Standard expressions are, “Give me time”, or, “We have to talk”. Talk? Try loving!

A prescribed terminology that can nip any kind of passion in the bud. One imagines a young, yearning love other than unhappy evenings drowned in red wine that you don’t want to end in which misunderstandings are cleared up, things that were said are analyzed and commented on, where once again something is said that wasn’t meant like that, what has to be explained once more, and so on. To quote Prince again: “revolving every word that is being spoken”.

Or the actor Vincent Gallo, who once defined a relationship in three phases: “hysteria, self-abandonment, exhaustion.”

Or let’s take the satirist Wiglaf Droste, whose characterization of a relationship is reflected in the functional word “Versöhnungsvögeln”or “VV” (“the forgive-me-fuck”), which often follows a bitter argument. We don’t really want to go through all the psycho-games and bizarre ,patterns of behavior in a difficult relationship again. A passionate and sincere “pardon, honey” looks somewhat different anyway. How quickly can it be discussed to death. Such a constellation, sinking in mediocrity and artificiality, has come to such a desperate state because it has no purpose, no aim.

Immanuel Kant defined the human being as “its own purpose”, which underlies what distinguishes each individual, who has hidden within himself his own unique, large, distinctive goal, the pursuit of which lasts his lifetime.

Nobody else has this one goal, for everyone has a different one. According to Kant, to discover it and cultivate it defines individual life. When a relationship has a goal - and many people resist this idea, because it supposedly doesn’t involve emotions any more – or when both partners complement each other in their aims, then you have a “power couple”, an unbeatable team, that nourishes itself on the greatest source of human energy that there is: love, which is different from a mediocre “relationship” that is always dependent on moods.

Whatever you undertake, i.e. really go for, you do it because you want to reach a goal. Sometimes it isn’t so completely clear. The party mood you are in betrays plenty of emotionality. Christopher Columbus didn’t just set to sea to have a look around a bit. He wanted to find the sea route to India. This idea gave him strength.