Randy Cantrell

Randy Cantrell is the founder of Bula Network, LLC - an executive leadership advisory company helping leaders leverage the power of others through peer advantage, online peer advisory groups. Interested in joining us? Visit ThePeerAdvantage.com

Episode 157 – Act Like A Kid: Turning Dreams Into Reality Through Pilfering And Cleverness

Piney woods, a childhood haven for imagination
Piney woods, my childhood haven for imagination*

Pine needles still provoke calm and creativity. I spent hours laying on the floor of piney woods, clearly away the pine cones to make a soft spot where I could just lay on my back and gaze up into the trees. The trees were usually too thick to see the sky. I had another spot or two where the pine trees were enormous, but not nearly as close together. I’d go to those spots if I wanted to look at the clouds drift by.

As kids we were either working to build a fort, a cart to roll down the hill or some other medieval-inspired project or we were playing hard. It didn’t seem we spent much time doing anything else, but there was a third thing we often did. It was a vital part of doing those first two things. Thinking. Dreaming. Conjuring up ideas. Being creative.

Every fort I ever built, every cart I ever dared drive (after helping build it), every tree house…they all began in my head and in the heads of my friends.

Nobody talked to us about that stuff. Parents didn’t talk about it. Teachers sure didn’t. We didn’t read books.

Adults read books about creativity, passion and doing cool things. Kids just think them up, then do them. And if our ideas didn’t work, the fun was in figuring out how to make it work!

It’s sorta sad to think of how many books on creativity I’ve read since I’ve been grown. And you know what? I needed to read them, and that makes it even sadder. As adults we analyze things. As kids, we just do them.

Maybe it’s time for us to be more like kids. I’m going to take a drive to the east Texas piney woods and go lay down for awhile.

Randy

* Photo courtesy of Bruce Crooks via Flickr

Podcast Options:

• Subscribe via the iTunes store
• Android, Blackberry & other listeners can listen on Stitcher Radio
• Right-click here to download this episode to your computer
• Click here to playback in a new window

Episode 157 – Act Like A Kid: Turning Dreams Into Reality Through Pilfering And Cleverness Read More »

Episode 156 – If Business Was Easy, Everybody Would Do It (Increased Sales Won’t Fix Everything)

If Business Was Easy, Everybody Would Do It
If Business Was Easy, Everybody Would Do It

Increased sales won’t cure everything. It’s fool’s gold to think you can sell your way out of every problem.

My work focuses only on 3 things:

• helping my clients get new customers

• helping my clients serve customers better

• helping my clients not go crazy in the process

But…

Not every business problem can addressed by these 3 things. Business can be stressful.

Sometimes we encounter product or inventory problems. Sometimes we may encounter a legal problem, or an HR problem. We can have a major computer problem. Or an accounting problem. Businesses have lots of moving parts so there’s always something that can break.

When your computer system is down, increased sales won’t help. Well, it may help you throw more money at the problem to get it fixed, but you still have to get the computer system back up.

Many business stresses can be solved by correctly addressing the 3 things I focus on, but not all of them.

Randy

Podcast Options:

• Subscribe via the iTunes store
• Android, Blackberry & other listeners can listen on Stitcher Radio
• Right-click here to download this episode to your computer
• Click here to playback in a new window

Episode 156 – If Business Was Easy, Everybody Would Do It (Increased Sales Won’t Fix Everything) Read More »

Special Episode – Whether You Want It Or Not, You Have A Lifestyle Business

Why do most people think of beach life? Beats me.
Why do most people think of beach life when the term “lifestyle” comes up?

Today’s episode was a video, but the transcoding (or some gremlin) messed it up. Thankfully, given the redundancy here in The Yellow Studio, I did capture the audio…so today’s episode is audio only.

Not long ago a friendly debate broke out about the terms, “lifestyle business” and “lifestyle design.” I took the position that every business, every career is a lifestyle business. My logic was – and still is – fairly obvious, or so I thought. Our careers or businesses determine our income. They also determine our schedule. As a result, our time and our income are determined by them. They set in motion the kind of neighborhood where we live, the kind of cars we drive, the stuff we purchase and to a certain degree, the way we spend our free time. Our lifestyle.

My opponent didn’t buy any of that. He maintained that lifestyle businesses are those that afford people the freedom and flexibility to do what they most want. Clearly, he’s not known very many extremely success people who earn crazy money doing what they love. Celebrities and rock stars who are quite often kept on tight schedules. Industry leaders who are shuttled from one meeting to another with little tolerance for deviations from the schedule. Surgeons who can often enjoy scenes like the one depicted in that photograph, but most often are on call, waking up in the wee hours of the morning to perform emergency surgery.

What if a person loves winter sports? What if a person can’t imagine living without snow? They’d be miserable looking at that ocean view every day.

Just because my opponent had a certain view of “lifestyle” he had a hard time considering that others might have a different perspective. And he certainly couldn’t understand how a person with a JOB could possibly be considered to have a “lifestyle business.” I was irritated that anybody with a JOB was viewed as being less ambitious or less serious about designing their life. Thankfully, the conversation remained civil. I could have whipped him with my arm tied behind my back. 😀

Well, what if you do want to consider doing something different? How can you go about thinking about what you might like to do – something that thrills you? That’s what today’s show is all about.

Randy

Podcast Options:

• Subscribe via the iTunes store
• Android, Blackberry & other listeners can listen on Stitcher Radio
• Right-click here to download this episode to your computer
• Click here to playback in a new window

Special Episode – Whether You Want It Or Not, You Have A Lifestyle Business Read More »

Scroll to Top