This is another book I found on Ali Abdaal’s YouTube channel, take a peek at his video summary for his in-depth review. I found this book very eye opening, in the sense that I now have a new perspective on business, specifically starting a business.
Before this book, I had never heard of MJ DeMarco before, but after this book, I was inspired to look up his history. He has a rag-to-riches story, where he outlines the path that he took to make his fortune and legacy. There are many paths to the end goal, and the method he outlines is not a “get rich quick/get rich easy” scheme, but a process to follow and a mindset to adapt.
Below are some of my notes and quotes from this read:
- p23 – Wealth eludes most people because they are preoccupied with events while disregarding the process. Without process, there is no event.
- p23 – The elevator to success is out of order – you will need to climb the stairs
- p50 – So how do you know if you can afford something? You can afford it if you pay cash and your lifestyle doesn’t change regardless of future circumstances.
- p50 – Wealth, like health, isn’t easy. Both are cut from the same fabric with identical process. They require discipline, sacrifice, persistence, commitment and delayed gratification.
- p58 – The law of Victims says “you cant be a victim if you don’t relinquish power to someone capable of making you a victim”
- p61 – Own your mistakes, failures and triumphs
- p77 – The problem with a specialized skill set is that it narrows your practical value to a confined set of marketplace needs. You become one of many cogs in a wheel
- p77 – Experience comes from what you do in life, not what you do in a job
- p144 – Impact millions: How many lives have you touched? Who has benefited from your work, your assets and your handiwork? What problems have you solved? What value are you to society?
- p156 – If you aren’t where you want to be, the problem is your choices
- p179 – Time isn’t a commodity, something you pass around like a cake. Time is the substance of life. When anyone asks you to give your time, they’re really asking for a chunk of your life – Antoinette Bosco
- p197 – The sweat of success is failure. You cant experience success without failure. Failure is simply a natural response to success. If you avoid failure, you will also avoid success.
- p200 – There is never a perfect time. Someday is today. Today is now, Today is you you’ve got! And if you wait, opportunities pass.
- p216 – In a gold rush, don’t dig for gold, sell shovels!
- p216 – When it comes to entry, your industry and your business should not be available to everyone because you need to be exceptional if it is.
- p220 – Stop chasing money and start chasing needs. consumers are selfish. They demand to know “what’s in it for me?” To succeed as a producer, surrender your own selfishness and address the selfishness of others
- p235 – It doesn’t matter how many times you strike out in business because you only must be right once and that “once” can set you up for life – Mark Cuban
- p237 – Scale: if you can’t server millions, you won’t make millions.
- p248 – Value skew is anything your business does better than the completion AND is discernable by your target audience, causing them to buy.
- p249 – You’ve got a great idea, but someone is already doing it? So what. Doe it better. Someone is always already doing it. The bigger questions is; how can you do it better?
- p256 – Execution is the great divider separating the winners and the losers from their ideas.
- p260 – The owner of an idea is not he who imagines it, but he who executes it.
- p272 – Complaints are a beautiful thing. They represent free feedback and expose unmet needs in your business. Complaints are the worlds whisperings hinting at the direction you should be moving.
- p275 – I don’t know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody.
- p279 – My repeated and often preached motto to my employees was “the customer pays your paycheck, not me – keep them happy”
- p285 – Make your trust an asset to be earned by others.
- p290 – If your preoccupation is with everything your competition does, you’re cheating your business and your customers.
One my of main views which has been altered is how to get out of the consumer mindset and into a producer mindset. One of my favorite quotes from MJ’s book is “In a gold rush, don’t dig for gold, sell shovels!”. This is a fundamental shift in a viewpoint for me. I hope you find my takeaways useful and prompt you to read his book.
If you have any suggestions on books which I can read to help me grow, please message me. Thanks for spending your time to read my post.
Perspective is key 