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High Payoff Lessons from Delos, The Captain and Art

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Published: 20Aug2008
Word count: 651
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Taking a long cruise can shift it all!

On day ten of a 12-day sweep around the Mediterranean, I was reminded of one of the critical success factors behind creating High Payoff Results in business and in life.

I passed a woman in the corridor one morning who was doing the 'pivot dance.' You know the one. You have the ball of one foot anchored to the ground as the other foot circles around it. You start to step forward, pause, turn back, pause, waver back and forth as you try to decide where you meant to go. Competing thoughts overload your brain until you have to stand still and laugh!

The Mediterranean civilizations of the past 3,500 years knew their stability would be undermined by that dance. Leader after leader knew their success depended on one core factor: Have a Crystal Clear Goal.

For example, the city leaders of the Island of Delos reinforced their goal generation after generation - their cities' commercial successes depended on it. Delos was known to all the citizens of the major and minor civilizations of its day, decade, centuries as a result of their goal: Be known as "The Place to Come to Make Tributes to Your Gods."

Civilization after civilization built their branding stories around the temples, which drew pilgrims, which required the infrastructures of city planning, tourism management, shipping, construction, entertainment, and so on. A thousand and one activities taking place daily to deliver on the services needed by the pilgrims resulted in centuries of millionaires before the dollar was imagined.

Delos could have been any island in the ring of Cyclades islands, with sheep on its hills. Instead it sustained itself as the "Venice" of 40 generations.

The captain of that Princess Cruises ship knows his ship's voyages success depend on meeting one goal: satisfy each 'vacation pilgrims' dreams. And those dreams are varied. I went to bingo every time it was offered. My niece was looking for safe places to talk and dance with her newfound friends. Art, the businessman sitting next to me at an internet terminal, brought his teenaged son to experience a way of life different than the sleepy town they live in before his son heads off to college.

The captain knew his guests' experiences depend upon every crew member's understanding those dreams and managing the floating business's activities to deliver on them.

Art knew it too. He intends to give his son a chance to see the range of opportunities for what he could build with his life while he keeps his internet based business moving and his email cleared out so he can return from vacation without 1,000 email messages waiting for his attention. He manages his time and activities accordingly. Art has sold one successful business and launched five new ones.

And Me? My goal is a day of variety and activity while we're at sea so I don't pass it reading a book. I can do that any day of my life at home. I'm using the ship's list of programs to plan for today's "At Sea" activities to stick with my goal to 'play' throughout the day: sunning before 10 when the burning rays strike, bingo at 11:15 so I can laugh and hiss when the numbers are called, take a salsa lesson and sample the chef's fare.... All before 2 p.m.

Delos was the center of trade for the ocean routes for eight hundred years. That's 800! Its leaders had to know their goal and reinforce it with every daily activity in their city for 40 generations,

Success depends on knowing your goals so that your time energy and efforts are all aligned to accomplish them.

Are you doing the 'pivot dance with your business? Delos, Art and I invite you to set your goals today.

Management expert, consultant, and coach Linda Feinholz is "Your High payoff Catalyst." Linda publishes the free weekly newsletter The Spark! to subscribers world-wide and delivers targeted solutions, practical skills and simple ways to build your business. If you're ready to focus on your High Payoff activities, accelerate your results and have more fun at it, get your FREE tips like these visit her site at www.YourHighPayoffCatalyst.com

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