1. Reinvent Yourself.
Carlin changed his act and attitude and essentially his customers. Those of us who are reinventing ourselves and changing our customers had better be prepared to be dumped by our old customers, as Carlin was dumped by his.
2. Identify Your Transformative Platform.
Carlin began using his comedic platform to share his social commentary and, in his unique way, to tell the truth (at least, his perception of the truth). Entrepreneurs are using the web in transformative ways, including those leveraging blogs and microblogs. What is your transformative platform?
3. Be Specific About Your Brand
Carlin is best known for his “seven words you can never say on television". I remember watching Carlin’s monologue on Jay Leno’s Tonight Show several years ago and was amazed at Carlin’s level of insight and skill at showing the cultural paradoxes that run rampant from our technological advances.
For those of us whose brand includes, for a large part, of the person and personality that we are, identifying our specific brand requires us to spend a lot of time with ourselves in a self discovery mode.
4. Don’t Be Your Own Biggest Stumbling Block
Carlin became addicted to drugs and it affected his health; the long term effects of drug abuse led to the heart failure that literally killed him.
We as entrepreneurs are so focused on keeping out negative people to preserve the sanctity of our motivation. Yet many of us don’t realize that what gets in the way of our continual success is often not other people, but ourselves.
5. Will You Age Gracefully or Cynically? You Choose.
People who are very smart often gain insight into an ugly side of reality that, over time, can dishearten the most optimistic. With this comes a danger of detaching from the human race, as Carlin himself admitted.
The key is to remember that you can choose your point of view and how it evolves.
Carlin epitomizes what one may expect as a transformative force in his field. This takes courage, and for those of us desiring or aspiring to such level of performance, we need to be ready for both the rewards and the sacrifices.
What George Carlin Can Teach Us About Entrepeneurship - To learn more about this author, visit Jane Chin's Website.
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Jane Chin
(Visit Jane's Website)
Microbusiness Mentor Entrepreneur Thinker
Speaker Writer Blogger New Parent. Former
PhD Cancer Research Scientist Medical
Affairs Consultant.
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