By Mike Myatt

Create a legacy that transcends your career. Having the advantage of the hindsight my gray hair affords me, I can say with great certainty that who you are as a person is infinitely more important than the title you hold at work. There are few things in life as thought provoking as witnessing what by all outward appearances seems to be a successful executive, but as you begin to peel back the layers of their carefully crafted veneer, you quickly come to realize that they are little more than an empty, bitter, and frustrated person. They work their entire career chasing some illusive form of fulfillment only to fade into the sunset with nothing more than an empty lifetime of regrets as their reward.

I’ve simply lived too long to buy into the myth that success in the workplace will create happiness at home. While it makes for a nice sound bite to console those with a guilty conscience, IT IS A LIE. If your business is growing, but your spouse is crying and your children are neglected, it’s time to do a reality check on your priorities. If your secretary respects you, but your spouse doesn’t you have serious issues that need your immediate attention. If you would rather spend time with your online “friends” than with your children, it’s time to pull the ripcord on your internet connection.

Here’s the cold hard truth…if you cheat your family to invest into your career, you and your loved ones will pay a very heavy price. It is simply wrong to value your workplace commitments over your family commitments – moreover it’s not necessary. If your focus is on your family, your career won’t suffer, it will flourish. Get this wrong and not only will your family suffer, but so will you as you someday mourn the loss of what could have been, but cannot be recovered.

If you really want to get to know me, don’t waste time reading my bio or scrutinizing my professional successes and failures, get to know my wife and my children. My best work, the work that I’m most proud of, my family. While I’ve had more career success than I probably deserve, I’m just as flawed as anyone reading this piece. What I can tell you is that I’ve always made my family a priority. I don’t regret a single second of time I’ve invested in my family, but I’ve lost track of all the regrets I have over time spent away from my family.

You see, everyone creates a legacy – the question is will it be one worth leaving? While a legacy is classically defined as something of significant and/or lasting value that survives its creator, the best legacy is one that can be lived before it is left behind.

If you’re a superstar at work, but a slacker at home you’re not succeeding at anything other than being a disingenuous, ego-centric charlatan. If this describes you, you’re not a leader you are a poser. As a very wise person once said (my wife), “don’t waste your time investing in those who won’t be crying at your funeral.”

[Source: http://www.forbes.com/sites/mikemyatt/2012/01/27/the-true-test-of-leadership/]

According to the Global Entrepreneurship Monitor, 12.3% of the U.S. population was actively engaged in starting or running a new business in 2011, a staggering 60% increase from 2010.

The annual report defines new businesses as ventures less than three-and-a-half years old.

An increase in start-up activity is a good sign for the overall national economy because it will lead to more employment opportunities in the near future, says Donna Kelley, the report’s lead author and an associate professor of entrepreneurship at Babson College in Wellesley, Mass. “It’s indicating that we’re seeing a recovery,” she says.

The report, based on a combination of survey results and population data, shows that more than half of U.S. early-stage entrepreneurs—59%—expect to create up to four jobs within the next five years. Another 27% plan to create between five and 19 jobs and 14% plan to create 20 or more jobs during that period.

Full Article Here: WSG.COM

This is an excerpt from a Jonathan Fields article he recently published on his blog.

I highly recommend taking this creativity audit and buying his book “Uncertainty – Turning Fear and Doubt Into Fuel For Brilliance.

But, then something happens. You succeed.

You begin to build a real business. You have offices, assets, overhead, inventory and employees. People, families, are counting on you to pay their rent and send their kids to school. Your own family begins to expect a certain lifestyle. And so do you. You get comfortable. And, along with your success, you now have the perception of so much more to lose if you fail.

So, instead of continuing to take risks, your mindset begins to shift into what famed psychologist and winner of the Nobel Prize for behavioral psychology, Daniel Kahneman, calls loss aversion mode.

Rather than being driven by what you can build, create and have, you are overwhelmed by a fear of losing what you’ve already amassed. Being an entrepreneur, and innovator, an artist or a creator does not make you immune to the often irrational pull of loss aversion. Because, as Kahneman’s research points out, it’s simply a part of human nature.
Two problems with this when it comes to creators and entrepreneurs…

One – The switch from seeking gain to loss avoidance cultivates a strong negative creativity bias that makes us say no to innovative ideas. Ones that come from our own minds, as well as from those around us. And ones that, embraced, could have been key drivers of innovation and growth.

Two – Because we set the tone as entrepreneurs, when we pull back, stop innovating ourselves and rebuff innovation and creativity from employees, we create an idea-killer emotional virus that destroys the very culture that got us where we are. It breeds loss-aversion, fear and scarcity, which is death to innovation and expansion.
So, what do we do about it?

If you’re an entrepreneur, or you work with an entrepreneur or a team charged with innovation, create a monthly mindset circuit-breaker check-up. Take a step back, preferably leave the office and take a few key creators with you. Maybe get out into nature and ask a big question -

“Am I operating from a place of creative opportunity or loss aversion?”

Take the audit and buy the book!

(Uncertainty: Turning Fear and Doubt into Fuel for Brilliance)