How Defining Purpose Yields Results

0:00 I believe in being purposeful. Any of you who've been to my open office hours have seen this firsthand because most likely the first words out of my mouth when we met is, hey, what's your definition of success for the next 30 minutes? You see, I believe this is important for every meeting, not just office hours. You should have a definition of success for every meeting you take as an entrepreneur. And if you don't, you shouldn't take the meeting. And I've been doing this for all.

0:29 a long time, not just with office hours, not just with meetings. One of my pet peeves is when I

0:36 talk to entrepreneurs who have done a great job of getting a pilot into an enterprise customer.

0:42 And I say, that's awesome. What do you need to achieve with the pilot in order to ensure you

0:47 get the big contract? They say, well, we got to do a good job. I don't know. And they haven't

0:52 defined success up front. So they're sitting on pins and needles, not knowing if they're going

0:58 to get the big contract. Now imagine replaying that scenario where as part of selling the pilot

1:03 you ask the customer, hey customer, what would be your definition of success for this pilot?

1:10 What would you need to see in order to sign the big contract? And the customer is going to tell

1:14 you because they want you to be successful. Now you know exactly what you need to achieve.

1:20 There's no more sitting on pins and needles because when you get to the end of the pilot period

1:23 you can come back to them and say, hey, you gave us four criteria for meeting with the pilot. We

1:29 met all four. Can we talk about signing the contract? And you're done. It works 99 times

1:34 out of 100. But now I want to give you something that really very few entrepreneurs use. And that

1:40 is the same technique when it comes to fundraising. That's right, fundraising. Imagine when you're in

1:47 the process of closing your seed round that you talk to your investors and reach a set of mutually

1:53 agreed upon objectives for what is success in order to get to your series A.

2:00 What would you, investor, need to see to lead the next round? And now you make those goals be, again,

2:09 numeric, measurable, objective, so that when you are operating, you know exactly what you need to

2:15 achieve and you're able to go back to your investors and say, well, here were the three

2:19 things we wanted to achieve with our seed round. Boom, boom, boom. We've achieved them all. Can

2:23 we start talking about funding that Series A? I believe that if you are purposeful and you reach

2:30 a set of mutually agreed to objectives for success in meetings, in sales, in fundraising,

2:39 in almost everything you do as an entrepreneur, your life will be easier and you will be more

2:44 successful. Have a great day.