Competition
Good morning!
Tuesday soon comes around, thank you for the responses to last week's blog, I’m always a little apprehensive writing about my personal views.
I mentioned last week about competition, this is something people talk to me a lot about. What do I think about XYZ distillery, or have I heard about what XYZ is doing? The answer is always no, or I have no idea what they are doing and to be brutally honest I have no interest.
This doesn’t come from an arrogant place, far from it, there are several reasons why I have no interest…
I am far too busy trying to get through the work that I need to get done. I don't have the time to look and follow what other companies are doing.
If I spent my time following similar companies, even just following them on social media and seeing the odd post etc I would then even on a subconscious level start comparing what I am doing with what they are doing and that is not a good thing. It will seep into your thoughts and alter the way that you do things and then you become less authentic. When this happens you start comparing yourself and what you are doing and then you will never be happy. So I don’t do it, I operate in my own little world doing my own thing and have found the more authentic I am the better I do.
It's not always easy and takes discipline and self control to do this, but that's something to work on daily.
I have read a lot about very successful people and some of the ones that I look up to and admire not only their success but their ethos, they all do it. The marketplace is big enough for everyone so they don’t consider that they have competition, they are simply focused on doing their thing and their thing only.
I do this in my personal life, my next door neighbour got a new car and I didn’t notice for about 6 months which is just an example. When I do finally notice something then I am genuinely pleased for them, whoever or whatever it is. Therefore I don’t walk around comparing myself to other people, the things they have or the things they are doing, instead I walk around happy with the things I have and the things I’m doing, which I am. I live in my own bubble.
Now when it comes to friendly competition between friends etc that's a totally different story, if someone sets a challenge, working out etc I’m totally into that and that is great fun. Unless I lose then its toys out the pram time…
You might think that I’m blinkered because of this approach, but I'm not, I look and learn from other companies in other industries and that's where my inspiration comes from, I’ll write about that next week.
Have a good day
Ant x