1. Listen to people with proven success
When you’re around proven professionals, people who are
doing it successfully, listen to everything they say. None of the Sharks may invest,
but one may say a sentence that can be the missing piece of strategy to be successful.
Or they may simply say, “You’re on the right track. Stay the course. You don’t
need more money now.” Some participants get on and are working their mouth more than their ears; bad plan.
Do you have proven successful people in your life and are you listening to them?
2. Your passion can be misplaced.
Often participants love their product so much they miss the
point. E.g. It’s really a bad idea. It needs a major shift to be successful. It’s
a great product but not a good money-maker. Also the method
of making the product successful can get swept up in the passion for the
product. Your passion needs to be on the end result. Passion for steps in the
process of getting to the end result can be misplaced enthusiasm. Put your
passion into the mission, not the means to the mission. As soon as there’s a
better way to achieve your end result, you’ll miss it because you love the
current path to it too much.
Given your mission, is your passion appropriately positioned?
3. You can be working a bad plan.
It’s not uncommon when a participant starts explaining what
they’re doing, for the Sharks to all shake their head at the same time. They immediately
know the participant’s not on the right path. What that means is you can
execute perfectly but not get to your goal because you’re perfectly executing
the wrong play. See point #1. And also constantly evaluate if your plan is actually producing
the goal instead of just making you feel productive.
Are you honestly evaluating and measuring what you say your mission is?
4. Subject yourself to brutal truth.
It’s called Shark Tank for a reason. These successful people
say it fast and unedited, especially Mr. Wonderful. They find weak spots and
blind sides almost immediately. It’s amazing how much scrutiny and wisdom a
company can be exposed to in just seven minutes. And if applied, potentially
amazing how this brutal truth can redirect a company.
