Hill discovered that Henry Ford, Harvey Firestone and Thomas Edison all had a formal “Mastermind Alliance,” and met regularly in away-from-business locations, to creatively brainstorm about all their businesses and interests. These men enunciated to Hill the belief that putting their three minds together in harmonious, progressive thought multiplied their power exponentially. Hill subsequently found the same principle at work in other “Mastermind Alliances.”

I have used this tool numerous times in my career as an entrepreneur and believe that it has been the most effective for me in regard to breaking through bottlenecks and achieving growth.  It has worked so well for me that I now lead one for other business owners and professionals to help them receive all the same benefits that I have over the years.  You can read about our Mastermind Group here 

If you’ve never heard of the Mastermind Concept, grab ‘Think and Grow Rich’ and turn directly to chapter 10.  The first time I was introduced to this concept was through Robert Kiyosaki’s book ‘Cashflow Quadrant.’  In it Kiyosaki makes the point that the five people that you spend the most time with are who you will become like.  Kiyosaki references income as a quick measurement of how similar you and the five closest people to you have become.  You would be surprised as to how this theory unfolds, not just in regard to income, but in regard to every area of your life. 

For  one friend of mine, I am the only one in his life that is not or has not been divorced.  Everyone he is close to has been divorced.  For me, the people I spend the most time with are all overweight, just like me.  We are all between 35 pounds (me) to 65 pounds overweight and all happen to be working on reducing that, too, independent of each other.

You get the point.  So with the Mastermind Group, having other like minded, growth and freedom oriented entrepreneurs to get together and share ideas with is a powerful thing.  The only thing to watch out for is to keep from turning it into the ‘blind leading the blind.’  If you are in need of consistent, effective lead generation systems for your business, make sure someone else in the group has accomplished this or can bring in someone who has so that you are not all just guessing as to how to implement this in your business.

If you want to start your own Mastermind Group, here are a few groundrules to operate by:
1. Meet regularly.  Once a month works great.  We also meet for a full day (9am-5pm) without interruption.  Focus is key.
2. Demand attendance.  If someone misses more than one meeting every six months, they can be booted.
3. Demand transparency.  There is not anything you can share in the group that would be stolen or implemented in a way that hurt your business.  Collaboration always trumps secrecy and isolation.
4. Be flexible.  You may get it started and then realize you are not getting anything from it.  Do not feel guilty for bailing on it.  It needs to be a clear win-win for everyone involved.
5. Do not let it turn into a leads group or book of the month club.  Focus on what is relevant for each business involved to achieve growth and breakthrough.

Enjoy!

LinkedIn vs. Plaxo: Is LinkedIn winning? by ZDNet’s David Berlind — Are you using LinkedIn, Plaxo, Orkut, or one of the umpteen contact management or Six-Degrees of Kevin Bacon-like business card exchanges? If there’s someone you need an introduction to through someone else you know, chances are pretty good that you know the right people to make that introduction happen. Provided everyone keys their information into [...]

That quote is from the great author and self-made millionaire, Jim Rohn. When I first read it four years ago, I remember thinking about the people that I spend the most time with, particularly in my business life. I also started making mental notes about who I felt was a positive influence and who tended to be a negative influence. Have you ever had a friend rain all over your idea or tell you that you couldn’t do something? Or, have you ever been at a networking event and felt that, for once, you were the smartest one there? In both cases, I want to encourage you to take a fresh look at who you are spending the most time with and, specifically, consider whether or not you feel challenged, supported, encouraged, and refreshed as a result.

I am not suggesting that you immediately go out and get some new friends, nor am I telling you that there is nothing to be gained by always being the sharpest knife in the drawer. Giving of yourself and helping others do well is both worthwhile and rewarding. What made a huge difference in my life is when I made a conscious effort to seek out and spend more time with other people whom I felt were both of the same mindset and, I hoped, smarter than I was! One of the most powerful visuals for me is a picture I once saw with Henry Ford, Thomas Edison, President Warren G. Harding, and Harvey C. Firestone. Can you imagine what it must have been like to be a fly on the wall when these four men got together? Can you imagine how one must have pushed or encouraged the other? Or how they all must have shared a particular strategy that was working for them? It must have been awesome to have such a support group.

A few years ago I heard the following expression: “If you want to run with the big dogs, you have to get off the porch!” So as you go through the rest of the week, think of the opportunities you have to build your success team and how you will benefit from being around a group of other like minded people to challenge each other.  I sincerely hope that you are ready to make 2007 the year that you, too, get off the porch and start running with the big dogs!

I finished it a few days before going to a Dan Kennedy seminar in Atlanta on marketing and Ferrazzi recommends becoming a Conference Commando when attending seminars and not just going to learn, but to make great connections with others that are there.  I didn’t have time to implement many of the strategies, but did make a hit list of who I wanted to get to know that I thought would be there.  With my focus on networking I walked into the room the first day where there were about 550 people and I ended up sitting next to a Billionaire from Australia named Anne McKevitt!!  Nobody knew who she was and I ended up taking her to lunch (and I picked up the tab, too!) and picking her brain for a full hour, one on one.  She had made it in the UK as their Martha Stewart equivalent and sold her product lines company in ‘05 for $970M.  We chatted throughout the conference for the following couple days and I gleaned a wealth of knowledge from her.  Another person I connected with was Mark Victor Hansen’s publicist who is a brilliant woman who can get to anyone in the media.  We had lunch and dinner together and she is a huge fan of our new venture we’re launching (website coming soon) and wants to help publicize it when the time is right.

Needless to say, his advice paid off in spades and that was just one of a thousand ideas and practices that he has perfected in his career.  The thing I appreciated most about his view on networking is that it’s all about relationships and building friendships through the process.  I agree that the personal life/business life separation is a joke and we all do business with people we like and trust.

To top off the great seminar, I emailed Keith while waiting to catch my plane home (most CEO’s and small business owners email is simply their name@theircompanydomain.com) to let him know of my success and thoughts on the book.  I used one of his strategies and said I’d like to interview him for a newsletter we’re doing for a mastermind group I’m in that is focused on marketing for small businesses.  He recommends interviewing people you want to meet that you think are ‘out of your league’ because everyone loves to be interviewed.  He emailed back in less than 5 minutes that Saturday afternoon and set me up with his editor to interview for the piece.  It wasn’t him, but I got a ton of info from the editor and am building ties with their organization through the process.  It worked like a charm.

The book is great for anyone (wanting a better job, a big sale, to get into that group you want to be part of, to find a mentor, etc) and I recommend it wholeheartedly.

What makes me qualified to create a financial revolution?  I’d say it’s the way my brain is wired.  First, being the grandson of a brilliant mathemetician helps make the numbers easier to see.  Then getting a Master’s in Business Administration that was focused on Entrepreneurship helped shape the way I view money, cashflow and the idea of wealth creation.  Finally, owning a Mortgage Brokerage www.towermort.com for the past three years that helps create financial strategies for our clients real estate needs and networking with the top minds in the nation about wealth creation has really been the catalyst for wanting to effect change in how everyone views and treats money.  All this leads to my passion for revolutionizing the financial lives of everyone that cares to.

We will pull this off through multiple methods, one of which being this blog, others though business and charity.  I hope to share my views, and those of the brilliante people I’ve studied, on important areas of our everyday financial lives.  These can include your credit score, credit cards, what a mortgage really does for you, sound strategies for real estate investing, what it takes to be a successful entrepreneur (as I figure it out one step at a time), and finally what it means to amass wealth for more than just living like a rock star and how to change the world with what you’ve been given.

You can subscribe to the right or just check back as you like to see what’s been added as I strive to add enlightening thoughts and ideas every week.