You will learn the seven most important business skills behind some of the world's top-performing entrepreneurs and business owners, these skills are also shared by some of the world's top-performing entrepreneurs and business owners.
You see, one of my favorites sayings in business and in life, in general, is that success leaves clues, so it simply doesn't make sense to not learn from those who've gone before us, trying to model, and emulate, and learn from them and what they've done along the way, both good and bad.
Now, the beauty behind the skills we are going to cover in this article is that very few of them were what any successful entrepreneur was born with. Rather, they are acquired, learned, and developed over time, which means you can do the exact same thing, or maybe the exact same, or even better results than you expected, to get very similar. And that is why, in this article, I am going to share with you the seven most important business skills to be successful in today's wild and wonderful world of business.
Skill #1. Communication.
It's hard to succeed alone, which is why the first and maybe even the most important skill we're gonna be covering here is communication, and mastering the art of it, specifically, three key areas are at play when we're talking about business. Copywriting, speaking and conversing. Let's dive into each one now. Copywriting comes first, and it's all about your ability to clearly articulate and essentially communicate what it is that you're trying to do, and essentially, trying to sell.
Now, an important differentiation here is we're talking about copywriting, essentially the marketing communication that you'd see in emails, on websites, or in direct mail pieces, and not copyrighting, or copyright, which is the legal term for protecting trademarked and intellectual property. Essentially, copywriting, this guy here, is super important, because what it allows you to do is reach a lot more people by effectively persuading them through the content that you create.
Now, when we're talking about speaking, essentially what we're talking about is the ability to reach more people, whether we're speaking to a group, whether we're speaking on video, even giving a group presentation or in front of a live audience. Speaking is a really powerful business skill, because, again, we need to be able to clearly communicate our message and what we're trying to get across. Now, very few people are born competent and confident public speakers.
This is a skill that takes a bit of time to practice, and definitely, a lot of time to master, especially if your goal is to appear calm, cool, and collected, because, as we all know, public speaking is one of the people's single greatest fears, so the more that you're able to address this and essentially build up some experience, the better off you're gonna be.
The last form of communication that I wanna cover here is conversing, and I know conversing sounds really similar to speaking, but essentially, when we're talking about speaking, we're talking about one-to-many. In other words, you talk to a group, or a number of different people, and when we're talking about conversing, we're talking about one-to-one or more intimate conversations.
Now, these could be conversations with a friend, or a colleague, or at a networking event, or dinner party, or gala, black-tie event, you never know. Now, you don't need to be a master of small talk, and we all know that cliche, "So, how's the weather?" And we can avoid that if you like. Really, the key here is to appear curious about the other person, and the best way to appear curious about the other person is to be genuinely curious about the other person.
Shocker, right? Fortunately, this is relatively easy to do. After all, all you have to do is care, and a good way to communicate that you care is by asking a lot more questions and really trying to learn about them and what they're up to. Not too many questions, though, don't be creepy. Now the reason mastering communication is such an integral part of the business is that they really lend themselves to two of the main pillars of business, both sales, and marketing, which are essentially not much else than clearly communicating your message, and trying to influence and persuade the other person to see your point of view, and essentially, do business with you. Now, I know, it's a lot to take in, and a lot more to master, but that's why it's number one, so it's definitely worth spending some time on really refining your communication abilities.
Skill #2. Prioritization.
Now, in order to properly prioritize, you first need to be properly organized, because a messy mind leads to messy desks, messy work, and messy everything, and you're not gonna be able to clearly articulate and define what's most important so, you can tackle that first. This is why the very first step of prioritization is organization. Next up, you really wanna step back and take a 30,000-foot, or high-level overview of the entire situation. You wanna see what's going on and really view the overall strategy and then formulate a plan from there.
Now, once all that's done, it's probably time to simplify your business, and maybe even the number of product offers or services that your business offers. Far too many businesses are doing way too many things, and many of them unprofitably, when they'd be much better off by simply doubling down on their highest margin, the highest leverage activities, but we'll get to that in a minute. Now, the key to prioritization is to properly identify exactly what needs to be done, so you can do that first. Then, it also allows you to identify the things that don't need to be done, so you can ignore them, and find the things that need to be done, but maybe not by you, so you can delegate them, which leads us to
Skill #3. Delegation.
Skill #1. No one succeeds alone, and one of the biggest mistakes I see a lot of business owners and entrepreneurs make is trying to do absolutely everything themselves. Much of this stems from perfectionism and an inability to let go. Most business owners are perfectionists, but it won't be until they start letting go. Anyone who did this in their business really began to grow and reach the next level. No one can do everything alone, not with only 24 hours a day, and seven days a week. Everyone needs some help.
Now the key here, much like prioritization, is to 80/20 everything, or apply Pareto's principle, essentially identifying the 20% of things that you're amazing at, and delegating the rest. Now, fortunately, thanks to the 80/20 principle, 20% of things that you're amazing at are probably gonna be responsible for 80% of the results, if not more, especially if you stay true to yourself, and really understand your unique ability or special zone of genius.
See, we all have one or two areas that we're just absolutely amazing at, and then a whole slew of areas that we're not so good at. You want to identify the areas that you're not good at, don't enjoy doing, and really don't progress your business, and delegate them as quickly as possible. Now, proper delegation is obviously all about building a team, but this doesn't mean going out and hiring a ton of in-house employees.
It could simply mean outsourcing some simple admin tasks, or maybe hiring a contractor to take some of the work off your plate. Start small, and build from there. I think you'll find it's very addictive over time, and you're gonna become infinitely more productive the more that you scale up, and the more that you outsource and delegate. Essentially, every time you delegate a task or hire someone to work, say, 40 hours a week, well, you're getting an extra 40 hours of productivity to your business without you needing to do it yourself, it's pretty amazing.
Skill #4. Action-based identity.
Opposed to a results-based identity. Here's the deal, if you've been in business for any length of time, then you know that you're gonna win some, and you're gonna lose some. The key is to not tie your identity directly to the results that you're achieving, but rather to the process, or the actions that you take in order to get there. The entrepreneurs and business owners that get ahead, in the long run, are the ones that have learned not to associate failures with being a failure themselves, and the same thing goes for their successes, understanding that failure isn't fatal, and success isn't permanent, so every time they get success, they celebrate, and enjoy it, of course, but they understand that they have to keep working and progressing towards their goal.
To paraphrase Earl Nightingale, they understand that success is a journey, and the progressive realization of a worthy goal is that progressive realization and constant action that really leads to their success. The takeaway point here is to base your identity on what you do on a day-to-day basis, and the actions that you take, rather than the outcome, which may contain some variables, and some elements that are a bit outside your control, but the main things you do on a day-to-day basis and the actions that you take, well, most of them are directly in your control, which is why it's so important to form that action-based identity. You're successful because you act successful and do successful things, that's the point.
Skill #5. Empathy and Understanding.
Now, some people are naturally more inclined to be empathetic and understanding than others, but this does not mean that you can't learn and develop this incredibly valuable business skill, and as we've touched on numerous times already, no one succeeds alone, which means you're going to need other people on your journey, and on your rise to the top, so it's gonna be a lot easier, and a lot more enjoyable if you learn to develop that empathy and understanding so you can really form meaningful connections with other people.
Now, if there's a word that I could suggest to you here to help you further and deepen your level of empathy and understanding, that word would be curiosity, because there's no greater way than to develop empathy and understanding, and to be genuinely curious, and interested in the other person that you're trying to talk to. As the saying goes, "Before you judge someone, walk a mile in their shoes", and that's not just so you're a mile away and you have their shoes, but rather so you can really understand where they're coming from, what they've been through, and really try to listen, and understand about them, about their pains, and problems, and frustrations, and really just lend an ear, and the better you understand them, the better off you're gonna be in business.
You see, people don't buy when they understand, but rather when they feel understood, and empathy, understanding, and really listening and feeling cared for, well, those are at an all-time low in the customer viewpoint, especially when it comes to bigger businesses today, so if you're able to develop and essentially hone these skills, you're really gonna stand out in the crowd. Now here's the kicker, you really can't fake this, so the best way to seem like you actually care about people is to really care about them, and if you don't, you may be in the wrong business.
Skill #6. Energy conservation.
I'm not talking about turning off the lights and making sure the air conditioning's set on low when you leave the house. Rather, I'm talking about the ability to protect yourself in order to be able to deliver the absolute best business performance possible. You see, when you're flying on a plane, there's a reason that they tell you to put on your own oxygen mask before assisting someone else in the event of depressurization.
This is because if you pass out first, you're not really any good to anyone else. We call this protecting the mothership, because if you're tired, sick, beat-down, or simply burned out, well, all the skills in the world aren't gonna really help you perform your best. Fortunately, there are some pretty simple things you can do in order to operate at peak efficiency.
The first of these is avoiding the negative. We're talking about people like time vampires, you know the ones I'm talkin' about. The ones that stop by and chat endlessly, really seem to have absolutely nothing to do other than waste your time, obviously, you want to avoid these. The same goes for negative people. Again, you know what I'm talkin' about, the people that gossip, and always complain, and really criticize, and essentially just bring down the energy in the room. You gotta get rid of these people, and as much as possible.
The same goes for negative situations, if there's a place or situation that makes you uneasy or uncomfortable, not in the good kind of way of uncomfortable when you're pushing yourself and really trying to achieve more, but the bad kind of uncomfortable, where you really just feel bad, well, you want to avoid those because it's draining your energy and your ability to operate at your highest level. On the flip side, you want to surround yourself with positive people, uplifting people, and people that are going places and have similar goals, or at the very least, support you and your goals. To sum up energy conservation, basically just means avoiding the things that really drain you and make you feel beat up and beat down, and doing more of the things that make you feel good, and give you more energy. It's as simple as that, and all successful people know this.
Skill #7. Being responsive, not reactive.
One of the most common and damaging themes in business is seeing the entrepreneur or business owner who runs from crisis to crisis, putting out fire after fire, and really never getting any positive, solid work done. They seem to live in this constant state of chaos, constantly reacting to things, and putting out fires rather than slowing down, taking a deep breath, and responding to things in order to correct them now, and maybe even forever. Now, I appreciate if you're living in a reactive state, this might seem like a bit of a stretch.
It's gonna be hard to kinda wrap your head around and really see how you could implement this yourself, but I assure you, it is possible, so here are a few quick tips to really help move you in the right direction, away from reactive, and towards responsive. The very first thing you need to do is ensure you have systems and standard operating procedures in place. This can help to eliminate a lot of the headaches and a lot of the recurring things that kinda seem to come up again and again and again, well, handle them once, put a system in place, and you should never have to deal with it again.
Next, take a look at all the objections you seem to get on a regular basis, and start to come up with educational content ahead of time, and it's gonna answer these objections before they even arise. An educated customer is the best customer. Next, just like we already covered, understand that failure isn't fatal, and success isn't permanent, so you're gonna wanna prepare for the bad times and the good times. Don't push them off, pretending they're never gonna happen. Be prepared, make sure you've got a plan in place.
Another way to look at this is to really know your numbers. Understand what's going on inside your business and outside your business. Know what things cost, know where the money's going, know how your lead flow and customer acquisition is coming. Again, this is gonna allow you to see trends, and forecast any problems that might arise in the future. Are your marketing campaigns working? Are your customers happy? Are you on track for a profitable quarter? All of these questions need answers, which will allow you to operate from a position of confidence, and allow you to respond in the event of an emergency rather than react. And lastly, we have a bonus tip: an action bias.
You see, a bias for action is one of the most valuable skills that a business owner or entrepreneur can have. Time and time again, studies have shown that the ability to make decisions quickly, and then, most importantly, to actually act on them is really what differentiates successful from unsuccessful people. Don't get stuck in analysis paralysis, don't put off tomorrow what you should be doing today, and don't wait to act on that next great idea, because you never know what tomorrow's gonna hold, and fortune favors the bold.
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