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Entrepreneur Insider
Here are three lessons on people power delivered
during workshops with our Entrepreneur Insider members.
To join us, visit entrepreneur.com/insider.Make Your
Network Stronger
HE HAD A PROBLEM/ Koenigs’
consulting client needed a job
done—but “it was just going to be
a pain in my butt and too much
work,” Koenigs says. He didn’t
want to do it.HE FOUND A SOLUTION/ Koenigs
realized there was an event com-
ing up, and he was friendly with
lots of attendees—people who,
together, could help his client inevery possible way. “I said, ‘Look,
let’s meet at the event. I’ll person-
ally introduce you to everyone,
and tell why you need to know
each other and why you should
work together.” For this, he said,
he’d charge $25,000. The client
agreed, and Koenigs spent five
hours making intros. “They got
exactly what they wanted, and I
got paid up front with a wire trans-
fer,” he says. And his friends now
had a new client. Everyone wins.Create Value for
Everyone
MIKE KOENIGS/ Consultant, serial entrepreneurSUCCESSFUL entre-
preneurs have suc-
cessful friends. That’s
no coincidence— it’s
because they’re creating
a “high- performance
environment” for each
other, says Daniel
Priestley. Do you have
the right peers? Here’s
his test to find out.
THE TEST/ Think about what
you want to achieve in three
years, then tell it to your friends.
Listen to their reactions.THE RESULT/ “If your friend-
ship group says, ‘Wow; that’s
amazing—that’s an incredible
goal,’ then you’re actually in
the wrong friendship group,”
Priestley says. “What you want
is for them to say, ‘Cool; that’s
what we’re doing, too.’”
THE REASON/ “You need to be
surrounded by strategies and
best practices,” Priestley says.
That means you need peers
whose road-tested insights help
you along your journey. Don’t
fall for flattery; seek out friends
who will push you instead.Find the Most
Supportive Friends
DANIEL PRIESTLEY/ Cofounder, Dent GlobalENTREPRENEURS TALK a lot about mentorship. But Dorie
Clark sees a problem. People often imagine “this one perfect
person who is older than you, wiser than you, and who will
somehow magically advise you and take care of you profes-
sionally.” That’s just not often realistic, she says. Instead,
Clark suggests building what she calls a mentor board of
directors: “Look for a group of people in which each person,
though they may not represent the totality of your aspira-
tions, has a trait or a skill you’d like to learn more.” Then
focus on learning—spending time observing them, asking
them questions, and so on, without forcing some kind of for-
mal mentorship relationship. “That really frees you up,” she
says. “You can learn a lot more from different people.”Build a Mentor
Board of Directors
DORIE CLARK/ Business professor, Duke University