Are you sitting on the sidelines or are you an innovator?

Champion Assistants supports innovators

According to Wikipedia, “An innovator or pioneer (pronounced /ˌpаɪəˈnɪər/) in a general sense is a person or an organisation who is one of the first to do something and often opens up a new area for others and achieves an innovation“.  Not sure what an innovation is?  Check out Wikipedia’s Timeline of Historic Inventions for examples from pigment to PageRank.

You don’t need to invent a wheel to be an innovator.  In fact, just creating a useful product or service makes you an innovator in my book! Innovators are those special people who are able to take an idea, test it, tweak it and put it out there for others to consume and criticize.  Being an innovator is not for the faint or heart, but it is for the determined.

Successful small business are run by innovators – people who think and act ahead of the curve and able to create and adapt.  They are people who aren’t afraid of feedback because they know they can use it to their advantage to tweak improve and leap ahead of their competition.  Most people are stagnant in their own self-doubt.  I don’t know how many times I’ve left a networking event or luncheon remembering complaints and criticisms such as “anybody could have thought of that”, “My boss keeps me so busy I don’t have any time to pursue my real dreams”, “nobody would ever buy that”, and other criticisms and self-defeating thoughts.  I usually navigate away feeling bewildered, but the truth is these people just aren’t innovators.  Innovators take action!

I know business owners who sit around for months just considering whether or not to update content on their website, and exactly what content to use, etc.  How can people get consumed by such trivial matters – after all updating website content is a couple hours with provided content! – why waste so much energy when there are much bigger issues to face?  The bottom line is these people aren’t innovators.  Innovators don’t get tripped up in the small stuff.   They see the big picture, a larger goal, and put whatever they need to in place in order to achieve it.

Innovators are exciting people to be around.  They don’t sit still, stew or cluck at how things could/would/should be – they do!  Opportunities abound even in this economic climate and innovators prove this to be the case.  Nearly all of our clients sell online whether they work from a commercial office or at home after the rest of their family is asleep.  They have products they believe strongly in.  They challenge themselves to live their business dreams, take consistent action towards their goals and seize opportunities that help them along the way.  They are exciting people to be around!

I started Holiday Assistants in October 2007 after mulling it over on the side since June.  That June I was in a group of women and one of them complained how next thing you know the holidays will be around the corner and it’s going to get stressful all over again.  A huge holiday fan myself, at first I was shocked at how she could dread what should be a festive and joyous time 5-ish months in advance, and then the opportunity lighbulb went off.  I spent the next few months doing a little research on the side and after developing basic business plans kicked myself to launching the company in the beginning of October even though I didn’t have everything planned out to the finest details.  I reassured myself by approaching the season as 1st year research and see how it goes.  As it turned out the 1st year just turned a profit (and the 2nd year was up 600%).  Why did this happen?  Yes, sound business planning and being in tune with the local community needs, but the real answer is because I took action.  I could still be thinking of this today and not getting anything off the ground.  Instead, I have a successful second company that has even been recognized as Best of the City by Seattle Metropolitan Magazine.

Now is as good a time as any to step out self-doubt or other limiting beliefs and step into innovating.  It’s much easier to sit on the sidelines, but a whole lot more rewarding to take risk and reap the rewards of great ideas, persistence and passion!

Best,

Heather