The “3-word secret” to goal accomplishment.

Episode Transcription

 

Den Lennie (1s):
Hey guys. It’s Den here with another episode of the, How to Scale a Video Business podcast. We are up to gosh, November. Isn’t it crazy? What a year. Today we’re going to talk about, well, something that’s a little story, actually. I thought we’d start with a story about the whales that migrate past our virtually our front door every year here in Australia. And it’s become quite normalized to us, but there’s a great lesson in this. So here we are with episodes 2, 3, 4.

Den Lennie (47s):
So every year the whales, somewhere in the region of 17 to 20,000 humpback whales basically pass by our front door here on the sunny coast on a 5,000-kilometer migration from the freezing winter and Antarctica to the warmer waters of the Pacific. And it happens between June and September with a little bit of leeway, either side. So we saw some whales just last week here, and we’re almost into November. So few stragglers, but what’s really cool is you can literally walk down the beach and see four-ton whales thrashing around having fun in the water.

Den Lennie (1m 27s):
And it’s an annual event. So they move from Antarctica sail up these coasts of Australia heading for the warmer waters of foreign off Queensland, up past Tonga and the one water Pacific, where they may have fun, give birth to the calves and stuff. Now the young whales wouldn’t survive in the freezing Antarctic. So the younger bond and much warmer waters to one can feed them up until they’ve mastered enough blubber to get in the safe and they migrate back south. Apparently, the milk mum creates a soar thick it’s like toothpaste. And so she squirts out and the young calves simply hoover up, mixing it with water as they swim up beside her. And we were out on a trip recently, I was asking the skipper how they know where to go.

Den Lennie (2m 10s):
And he told me that whales have a very advanced thermostat that can sense subtle temperature changes in the water. And so navigate north to the warmer waters intuitively, which is a lot like business. I think you’ve got to have a certain sense of intuitive awareness in business and know what those micro changes look like in your business. So back to the whales, once the calves are born, mum feeds and for a short time, until they have enough blubber to begin the long journey back south, and they head back south. So to the Antarctic, so they can feed upon krill in the warmer, summer months. So the Antarctic is still pretty chilly.

Den Lennie (2m 50s):
Now, not only are the site of whales up close, quite inspiring for us, not least of all because my uncle Don was a whaler back in the fifties. And when most of the world is hunting whales for the blubber and oil on an industrial scale, and it virtually wiped out the species, I think numbers deplete is less than two and a half thousand. Thankfully their numbers are solid between 17 and 20,000 in the wild, but what’s more interesting is whales have a cycle that works like clockwork. And so, as I said before, there is a lot of interesting parallels to the whale migration and business.

Den Lennie (3m 30s):
And so every year, like clockwork around mid-June, the first whales are spotted heading north and the tail off late July, mid-August. And he started heading back south in mid-September again. And the few stragglers always along the way with teenagers that are not yet old enough to breed being the first to head back south followed by the mothers and the new calves. It’s just fascinating how these 40-ton mammals instinctively have nowhere to go on a 5,000-kilometer journey. So are you clear on your direction? I think the whales serve as a great metaphor for our own business lives. They have a clear purpose, which is to get north so they can breed and give birth. The whales fill up on krill in the summer months, which is stored as blubber.

Den Lennie (4m 11s):
And they use that stored food to feed off while this was not off. If you think about your, your year in business, you know, we’re coming into the latter part of 2021. Video businesses on the hall typically start to slow down in December, January, February and depending on where you are in the world. Now, it’s not always the case, but it’s quite common that there can be a slowdown and it’s something that happens every year, pretty much in all sectors, at least for a period over Christmas. So, it’s not like you don’t know this is happening, but how prepared are you for when that happens? I’ve been saying to my VBA members for some time, this is the time to start really making sure you’re digging back into your marketing.

Den Lennie (4m 55s):
If you’ve fallen off the wagon with it, make sure you’re reaching out on LinkedIn, make sure you’re connecting with people, make sure you’re having conversations. And, it has been a very unusual year because of all the lockdowns and varying degrees of disruption around the world. But nonetheless, a lot of my guys are telling me, what they did during the lockdown, maintaining relationships is really serving them well now. But back to the whales and how it relates to business., once you have a clear destination in mind, then you can focus all your energy on getting there. I’ve come across the number of people in my role leading this coaching video business owners that I see a distinct difference between those who succeed in those that don’t.

Den Lennie (5m 49s):
I’ve seen this happen in our life here in Australia. Some people have commented in the past of us living in Austin said things like, oh, you’re so lucky. And, the truth is while their sentiment is well-intentioned in reality luck has virtually nothing to do with it. We set a very clear intention in November of 2013 to move to Australia before I hit 45, which is in February 2016. And so with that very specific goal in mind and a deadline, we set about writing a massive list of all the steps required to make it a reality. And it was simply a matter of taking one priority at a time and doing whatever tasks were required until it was completed.

Den Lennie (6m 33s):
And once it was completed, we moved to the next priority and repeated it until we’re all complete. No accident, not lucky but measured planned, and strategic. And most importantly, it was tracked with measurable objectives along the way to ensure that we remained on course. So are you on course with your business goals or are you burying your head in the sand hoping it will just come in then it’ll all work itself out? You gotta be very careful with how you spend your time and what you do with the time that you have. It reminds me of a great lesson. One of my favorite books of all time is great by choice by Jim Collins.

Den Lennie (7m 16s):
And in that book, he talks about the concept of firing bullets then cannonballs. So when you’re looking for new business opportunities and markets, it’s important not to throw all, you’ve got at a shiny object on a whim. Let’s imagine that you think there might be an opportunity to create content for manufacturing, business, or sector. Well, fire bullets first. So what do I mean by that? Well, imagine you were at sea and you’re in a combat situation. You have only one Cannonball left, but we have a bunch of rifles. If you fire your only cannonball at a moving target, then there’s a high probability that you’re gonna miss.

Den Lennie (7m 58s):
So if you instead shoot a bullet, the risk is lower. So fire bullet, get nothing, adjust 10 degrees and try again. Still not closer? Adjust another 10 degrees and keep going until you hit. Now, once you’ve nailed the target with a bullet, then bring in the big guns and fire the cannonball, knowing it’s going to strike the target. And the same thing rings true in business. The most systematic way to test a market is to test small. If you have an idea, then try it first. See if there is sufficient demand before going all in. So once you’ve done a few jobs in that sector and made some money, then you can scale up.

Den Lennie (8m 42s):
Whatever you do, don’t buy the camera first thinking is best to be future proof. You’re just deluding yourself. I can see 100 is still a very capable camera. The Fs 5 is a very capable camera and you pick them up cheap. Let me say it again. Very few clients are insisting on 4k. And for most corporate online content, 1080P is more than good enough. Now I’m not saying that there aren’t benefits to acquiring 4k, but if we take it today, there’s no reason to have 8k or 12k. Absolutely not at all. You’re just going to create more work for yourself and you might disagree with me and that is okay. But for the majority of the corporate world, if you want to make money, 4k even 6k is plenty.

Den Lennie (9m 28s):
Most of what you’re delivering is 10mbp. So be aware of that and focus on what the client needs, not what you want to do. If you focus on identifying a target market who needs something you are selling, you focus on delivering for them. You focus on giving them the best possible service, focus on being the best provider of that service in the market and everything else will come. So I want to just shift gears slightly and talk about something that is an absolute core theme if you would like, in the work that we do inside the video business accelerator.

Den Lennie (10m 10s):
It’s about the fact that nothing that’s worthwhile happens quickly. Everything that’s worthwhile takes time. And, so I want to refer again to something called the 21 March, which I talked about in the past on the show. And I’ve been talking about the importance of planning and quite a number of episodes recently. And that’s because it’s so important. I see a bunch of adverts on Facebook. It seems that everyone and his wife is now an expert in how to build a video business and they’re often portraying very significant results in very short periods of time.

Den Lennie (10m 50s):
And you only have to dig a little bit deeper to find it. Some of these guys are still studying at film school and they’ve got some great marketing strategies and a lot of case studies of people having great success and that may be the case. But what I know from the companies that I worked for, sustained the upper six-figure bracket is that they’re building businesses that aren’t reliant on tactics. They’re not relying on the kind of trying to sell in a new idea to someone. Their businesses maintain high six-figures producing great video content for a broad range of markets.

Den Lennie (11m 31s):
And so, there aren’t any shortcuts to success. And if you believe that there are, you’re just deluding yourself. Business takes time. It takes 7 to 10 years to build a business. It’s going to give you sustained income over 20 or 30 years. Sometimes you’re doing it quicker than that, but it’s about understanding you have to have a strategic plan that is aligned with your purpose and mission, and it can be a life or death decision. And I’ll tell you more about that in a little bit. Now, thankfully making films and producing videos for corporates and agencies, isn’t actually going to be life-threatening to you, but the severity of a negative outcome that could arise, if you don’t set time aside to create a strategic plan for your business will be directly proportional to the amount of prep you invest at the beginning of your journey.

Den Lennie (12m 23s):
Now, the good news is it’s never too late to start planning. Whether you’ve been running your business in excess of a decade or just starting, planning works for every business. And I’m talking about strategic planning with a very, very laser focus on the outcomes you want to achieve. The one thing focus I frequently refer to is so important because that one thing when broken down becomes priorities and they can be anywhere from 30 to 50 priorities that contribute to a 12 month period of you achieving your mission. Now, our mission is to help video producers succeed in business. It’s clear, succinct, it’s concise, and is not something we have plastered on our website.

Den Lennie (13m 8s):
That is our internal clock. And, we want to build the most committed tribe of conscious video production business owners serving the UK, Australia, North America, with 50 members of our video business accelerator mastermind by the end of next year. And, we have a very tight group. I’m not looking to create hundreds of members. I want the quality of the group to be there. It’s more important to me to recruit to quality. And I have members who’ve been with me for two and a half years, and there’s nothing keeping them there every month, other than the fact that what they invest, they meet back many times over and we’ve created an incredible community and act as an insurance policy.

Den Lennie (13m 56s):
We’ve got a board of directors of businesses around the world that are driving consistently towards great results in their video businesses. So you need to be clear on who you want to work with, what you want to achieve, and then actually working out what that looks like. So I want to talk a bit more about the importance of planning and talk about a case study. And this is Amundsen versus Scott, Antarctic expeditions of 1911. So back in the early 20th century, there was a race between nations to reach the south pole.

Den Lennie (14m 37s):
A British team led by Robert Scott set off on one route and another Norwegian team led by Roald Amundsen. Now what’s really fascinating is it’s 1911. So there wasn’t any real kind of technology. So the road trip trek was roughly 1400 miles. The equivalent of the distance from New York, Chicago, and back. The environment was uncertain and unforgiving with temperatures could easily reach 20 degrees below zero Fahrenheit even during the summer. They had no means of modern communication, no cell phones, no satellite links, no radio or rescue would have been improbable if they were to get stuck.

Den Lennie (15m 20s):
One leader led his team to victory and safety. The other led his team to defeat and death. Now, Amundsen, Norwegian prepared rigorously for years in advance of the journey. He learned what worked well in polar conditions going as far as to live with the Eskimos. To learn how they moved in the sub-zero temperatures, what they wore, and reviewed every conceivable situation that his team might encounter on route to the pole. He trained his body and mind with fanatic discipline and that’s key fanatical discipline Scott on the other hand represents quite a contrast to Amundsen. His preparation was limited. And what plans he made were based on his own intuitive conclusions, rather than that direct research of the environment he was entering.

Den Lennie (16m 5s):
And if you think about how you’re growing your video business, some of you might be listening to the show thinking, well, I’ll just take what Den tells me and I’ll have a crack. And that is awesome. But if you really want certainty, there is an opportunity to work with us more closely in a very tight group of people who are absolutely smashing goals. Even during the pandemic. I had a call with someone a few weeks ago. Literally, I tried to call four times. He kept canceling for various reasons. Probably against my own judgment and I probably just should have said, look, this is not clear for you, what you’re after. And we had a call and then after the call, he just ghosted me.

Den Lennie (16m 45s):
But what was interesting was first of all, that behavior that I’m not worried about, it says a lot more about that person that does about me and clearly this stuff going on. And I hope they’re okay, but he said, oh, we’ve had a really rough year because of COVID. Now what’s interesting is I’ve got clients who had their best year despite COVID. So why do you think that is? Why do you think some people are claiming that COVID made it really really hard and others are like, it was a great opportunity. And part of that is because it’s about preparation and understanding that if you want to understand how to succeed with certainty, then you need to go and train with people who’ve been there and done it.

Den Lennie (17m 29s):
And if you want to try and figure it out on your own because you’re worried that you might have to spend some money, then you got to leave it up to take the chance. And as soon as you let outside forces dictate your outcomes, you’re screwed. You can’t let the outside world dictate or anything outside dictate your outcomes. So it’s really important that you’re prepared. So Amundsen, back to the story. Store three tons of supplies for five men versus Scott who stored a one-ton for 17 men. Amundsen used sled dogs learned from the Eskimos.

Den Lennie (18m 10s):
Whereas Scott used unproven mortar sleds, which failed within days of his journey. Amundsen carried enough extra supplies to miss every single supply depot and still have enough to go another hundred miles. Scott runs everything dangerously close to his calculations. So that missed opportunity at a supply depot would bring disaster. A single detail aptly highlights the deficits in their approaches. Scott brought with them one thermometer for key altitude measurement and it explode. And it didn’t work. And he exploded an outburst of wrath and it broke. Amundsen brought four such devices for the divergence and preparation goes on and on and on and on.

Den Lennie (18m 54s):
Unlike Scott, Amundsen, systematically built enormous buffers for unforeseen events. Do you have unforeseen buffers, on your business for unforeseen events? On our coaching call last week, we were talking about the importance of putting money aside every month so that you can build up to six months’ worth of cash flow so that if something goes wrong in your business, you’d be okay. So, Amundsen designed the entire journey to systematically reduce the role of big forces and chance events. And so all of my members who’ve been with me for a while got through the Coronavirus outbreak without any real impact on their business.

Den Lennie (19m 37s):
Yes, there was, there was some downturn, but we focused on what we could control and not what we couldn’t. So if you’re someone who’s listening to this saying, oh, well, I’ve had a rough year because of COVID, you’d give it a rough year because you haven’t approached corporate, but the right mindset and the right preparation. And that’s important you understand that. COVID is just another impact in our world. Like it could be anything. Those situations, always provide opportunities if you know what to do with them. Now on December the 15th, 1911 Amundsen, and his team reached the South Pole. He and his teammates planted the Norwegian flag and went right back to work.

Den Lennie (20m 18s):
They couldn’t have known Scott and his team are known desperately minor hauling the slides, a full 360 miles behind. More than a month later, Scott found himself staring at Amundsen’s flag at the South Pole. Amundsen had already traveled 500 miles back north. Scott and his team turned back dejected just as the seasons began to turn. So I spoke to you earlier about we’re coming into December, January. That’s a season where it gets a bit quieter in our industry. Those members of my business group, they’re going to be like, downing tools and have a month off because they’ve put enough supplies in place. They put enough stock in the bank to be able to do that.

Den Lennie (21m 2s):
You don’t want to be like Scott, where you’re turning into the winter months and you’re like, oh shit. You know, it’s going to be quiet. So the already many, some weather turned more severe while supplies, dwindled, and Scott and his men struggled through the snow. Amundsen and his team reached home base on January the 25th, the precise day, he had planned. Running out of supplies, Scott and his team stalled mid-March exhausted and depressed. Eight months later, a British reconnaissance party found the frozen bodies of Scott and his two teammates and a four Lorne snowdrift, a little tent, just 10 miles short of his supply depot.

Den Lennie (21m 42s):
His whole team had perished. So one of the key points here, and we’ll just strike a difference between the preparations between the two men was the discipline of Amundsen to press forward and bad weather and haul back his team in good weather. About the journey, Amundsen adheres to a regime of constant and consistent progress. Never going too far in good weather, careful to stay away from the red line of exhaustion that could leave his team exposed yet pressing ahead and nasty weather to stay on pace. Amundsen throttled back his well-tuned team to travel between 15 and 20 miles per day in a relentless march to 90 degrees. So when a member of Amundsen’s team suggest they could go faster up to 25 miles a day, Amundsen said, no.

Den Lennie (22m 28s):
Now I want to just touch on this point because we measure our member’s revenue every month. And we asked them to check every quarter, are you on target? And if you’re on target, great. Stay where you are. The temptation to do more is always there. But the danger is the same as Amundsen experienced. You have to rest and sleep to continue your planet. Your energy business has to rest. There has to be time for the business to adjust to new pressures, to ensure you’ve got the right workflows and the right systems in place so that when things get busy, you don’t drop the ball.

Den Lennie (23m 10s):
In contrast, Scott would sometimes drive his team to exhaustion on good days and sit in his tent and complain about the weather on bad days. So if you are someone who complains when there’s no work and is exhausted, when you’re doing too much work, maybe you want to draw some comparisons to this. And I realized, I’m calling this out. I’m not here to sort of blow smoke up your ass. This is just what business is like. If you don’t measure your progress and if you don’t move at a consistent pace, you end up burning out and, and you can’t just brute force your way through the business. Cause at some point the ball will get dropped and you’ll be exhausted.

Den Lennie (23m 52s):
Business needs to be done in a methodical way. And that can be challenging for creators because we like to do shiny. We like to do new. And some of the things you have to do in business involve monotony. But if you build the systems and put the team in place, you don’t have to be the one to do them. So at one point on this journey, Scott faced six days of gale-force winds and traveled none of those days. Whereas Amundsen faced 15 days of gale-force winds and traveled on eight. So Amundsen clocked in at the south pole, right on his pre-decided date, having averaged 15.5 miles per day, Scott in contrast fell behind our league with no plan of a daily pace.

Den Lennie (24m 34s):
And as the conditions worsened enhanced by his lack of preparation for unforeseen events, he and his team never recovered. So how does apply to filmmaking? Well, we tend to wildly overestimate what we can achieve in 12 months, but we underestimate what we can achieve in 60 months. So one year versus five years. And so rather than thinking, how can I make all this money now? Think about it this way. How can I build a business with the right infrastructure and the right mindset as the business owner? That means I can build a business that will give me everything I need and want forever. If I just build it over the next three to five years.

Den Lennie (25m 16s):
And the second lesson is proper preparation research will allow you to prepare for the times when things don’t go to plan. You know, if you lose a client who has been a significant income generator for you and panic sets, and if you’re prepared for that, rather than not, sitting there thinking, I’ve got to hope this doesn’t happen. And then it happens. And I’ve seen it multiple times. I’ve seen businesses that have reliance on a key client and that client goes away and it literally destroys them. So be prepared for that. If you don’t have a certain skillset, then either outsource it or invest the time to learn it. No one was born a natural marketer or salesperson. These are skills that you learn, but it takes time to become a master of them.

Den Lennie (26m 0s):
All too often, a lack of patience to play the long game hinders meaningful progress. You’re no one expects you to be an expert in everything. So play to your strengths and don’t be too proud to ask for help. And finally, planning is critical for success. So make sure you prioritize doing it. Ask yourself this. Has owning your own video business, been everything you dreamed it would be when you first got started. It might be hard to admit, but think about whether you’re genuinely achieving everything you set out to when you made that decision to grab the camera and go it alone.

Den Lennie (26m 40s):
Are you really working less? Are you really earning more? And are you really in control? Chances are you’re bloody good at what you do, but you’re having to work like a dog 70 plus hours a week, whether it’s filming, editing, marketing, or any of the other jobs that come with being the big boss of your own video company. When you’re managing projects constantly searching out for new clients and worrying about cash flow, it’s easy to lose sight of the bigger picture or make real progress. Let’s face it. That stress is the last thing you need when you’re trying to run a profitable company that supports you and the people you care about. Truth is a business that provides financial professional and personal freedom really is achievable, but maybe you’ve got that nagging feeling that you’re overworked, lacking stability, and struggling to get to where you really want to be right now.

Den Lennie (27m 27s):
It could be that you just don’t know how to make a positive change on your own. So I created the video business accelerator coaching programs to really supercharge your video business. With these unique coaching programs, you’ll learn all the tools you need to get complete confidence in the success of your video business. You can take the first step on your journey to a successful business that doesn’t control your life. Let me show you how. Head over to denlennie.com and click on accelerator.