One on One: An Interview with Chris Prefontaine (Part 1 of 5)
In this personal interview we sit down with Chris to discuss some of life's most valuable lessons based on his experiences.
In this first segment we asked Chris, "What lessons do you want your kids to take away from your life or career?"
Wednesday, February 29, 2012
Tuesday, February 28, 2012
Stuck on Stupid
Seth Godin’s "Tribes” is a must read for all leaders, wanna be leaders, stuck entrepreneurs – everyone.
His book is broken into small sections with hilarious, but effective titles:
Stuck on Stupid is one I loved:
“My colleague Gil likes to quote U.S. Army LieutenantGeneral Russel Honore, pointing out that too many people get ‘stuck on stupid.’
I’m imagining that your colleagues aren't stupid. But when the world changes, the rules change. And if you insist on playing today’s games by yesterday’s rules, you’re stuck. Stuck with a stupid strategy. Because the world changed.
Some organizations are stuck. Others move quickly. In a changing world, who’s having more fun?”
My simple suggestion is to substitute “industry” or “profession” where you see world and do a gut check on where you are right now – whether that’s conventional business, job, profession, etc.. When Kim and I made a recent change inside the same profession I felt like we picked our head up from the sand and missed about 2 years of dramatic change. Thankfully that happened as we’re not stuck on stupid now!
Monday, February 27, 2012
Hard Just Got Easy (excerpts from Seth Godin’s “Tribes”)
Hard Just Got Easy (excerpts from Seth Godin’s“Tribes”)
It used to be hard to plow the field.
It used to be hard to find steel needed to build a car.
It used to be hard to get a package from New York to Cleveland on time at a reasonable price.
It used to be hard to get a new company funded.
………….those things are easy now.
It used to be hard to speak to others about the network marketing profession for so many people who really wanted to have success. …with the new Challenge Model…now it’s easy!
“What’s hard is to seek out innovation and then, in the face of huge amounts of resistance, lead a team into a new world.” Seth Godin
Wednesday, February 22, 2012
Tuesday, February 21, 2012
1 Out of 5 People Are 20-30 Pounds Over Weight - What Do We Do About It?
He reminded us about the obesity problem in the U.S. and that 1 out of every 5 people are 20-30lbs over weight. That’s not even talking about extreme obesity but just using that statistic, let’s look at some numbers.
The average person has 300-400 friends on Facebook. If 20% of them could lose at least 20-30lbs you have 60-80 people TODAY that should be on one of the e84 Burn Challenges. Once they're on the challenge they will - as a group- lose approximately 6000-8000lbs!
OK – now take the remaining 240-320 people and assume they’re in good to moderate physical shape. Let’s get 20% of them (40-64 people) on either the Fuel or Edge e84 Challenges. You’ve now helped approximately 100-125 people dramatically improve their health.
At the conference we heard a lot from Tamilee Webb as well and she said some pretty cool quotes and statistics that totally feed into what we’re doing at Evolv as we help 8.4 million people take the e84 Challenge.
She said the average person spends 2-3 hours per day in front of the television. 2-3 hours!
Be The First Penguin
In the book The Last Lecture Randy Pausch said, "“Experience is what you get when you didn’t get what you wanted.”
I read that and it stuck with me. I’ve ended up repeating it over and over again. It’s a phrase worth considering at every brick wall we encounter, with every disappointment and at every road block. It’s also a reminder that failure is not just acceptable, it’s often quite essential!
In the book a professor talked about how he gave his students a “First Penguin Award” and that award went to the student or team that took the biggest gamble in trying new ideas or new technology, while failing to achieve their stated goals. It enabled them to celebrate out-of-the-box thinking and using imagination in a daring way.
Here’s why he started the award: when penguins are about to jump into the water that might contain predators, well, somebody’s got to be the first penguin in.
The person who failed often knows how to avoid future failures. The person who knows only success can be more oblivious to all the pitfalls.
I can attest to this personally. After being in the real estate for 20 years, I made at least 15 large mistakes throughout 2005 and 2006 that made my 2007 & 2008 quite miserable.
I then spent 3 ½ years really building and working hard to amass an organization of over 25,000 people only to be totally misled and disappointed by the company I was affiliated with.
As a result, however, my wife and I are in a position in 2012 and beyond to not just experience our best year ever but to also have the best experiences as we are amazed at the healthy, productive, profitable and fun culture that we’re currently aligned with.
I’m not bummed about the real estate market and the lessons we learned or the experience and subsequent lessons in the network marketing profession; rather, I’m ecstatic beyond belief.
Some of my partners and investors who recognize this and stuck with us will also reap enormous benefits in the years to come in our new venture in Network Marketing. For the ones who don’t recognize the Penguin in the situation, well – you’ll have to watch from the sidelines.
Go be a Penguin.
I read that and it stuck with me. I’ve ended up repeating it over and over again. It’s a phrase worth considering at every brick wall we encounter, with every disappointment and at every road block. It’s also a reminder that failure is not just acceptable, it’s often quite essential!
In the book a professor talked about how he gave his students a “First Penguin Award” and that award went to the student or team that took the biggest gamble in trying new ideas or new technology, while failing to achieve their stated goals. It enabled them to celebrate out-of-the-box thinking and using imagination in a daring way.
Here’s why he started the award: when penguins are about to jump into the water that might contain predators, well, somebody’s got to be the first penguin in.
The person who failed often knows how to avoid future failures. The person who knows only success can be more oblivious to all the pitfalls.
I can attest to this personally. After being in the real estate for 20 years, I made at least 15 large mistakes throughout 2005 and 2006 that made my 2007 & 2008 quite miserable.
I then spent 3 ½ years really building and working hard to amass an organization of over 25,000 people only to be totally misled and disappointed by the company I was affiliated with.
As a result, however, my wife and I are in a position in 2012 and beyond to not just experience our best year ever but to also have the best experiences as we are amazed at the healthy, productive, profitable and fun culture that we’re currently aligned with.
I’m not bummed about the real estate market and the lessons we learned or the experience and subsequent lessons in the network marketing profession; rather, I’m ecstatic beyond belief.
Some of my partners and investors who recognize this and stuck with us will also reap enormous benefits in the years to come in our new venture in Network Marketing. For the ones who don’t recognize the Penguin in the situation, well – you’ll have to watch from the sidelines.
Go be a Penguin.
Friday, February 17, 2012
Thursday, February 16, 2012
Tuesday, February 14, 2012
Trey White and the Story of EvolvHealth
When Kim and I did our due diligence on the industry we quickly narrowed down our search to companies with a proven Challenge model/concept because it takes it from - 'Kim and Chris can do it'....to - 'The masses can do it!'
That then zoned us in on a few companies. We spoke to the Evolvhealth corporate team (40+ amazing people all with their own laser focussed function). We were out of this world with confidence in all of them. Check out www.evolvhealth.com and under "company" - "Getting to Know Evolv", and watch our Chairman and Co founder Trey White here:
That then zoned us in on a few companies. We spoke to the Evolvhealth corporate team (40+ amazing people all with their own laser focussed function). We were out of this world with confidence in all of them. Check out www.evolvhealth.com and under "company" - "Getting to Know Evolv", and watch our Chairman and Co founder Trey White here:
Monday, February 13, 2012
Life's Too Short to Be Mediocre
"But for tribes, average can mean mediocre. Not worth seeking out. Boring.
Life's too short to fight the forces of change. Life's too short to hate what you do all day. Life's way too short to make mediocre stuff. And almost everything that's standard is now viewed as mediocre....The end result of this is that many people (many really good people) spend all day trying to defend what they do, trying to sell what they've always sold, and trying to prevent their organizations from being devoured by the forces of the new. It must be wearing them out. Defending mediocrity is exhausting."
I love this new book by Seth Godin and in this particular quote it addresses, in my opinion, a couple major things inside and outside the Network Marketing Profession:
1. For all of those that are working all day and not excited about it, and doing mediocre things, come see what the excitement is all about and why I've been screaming for 3 1/2 years that WE HAVE A BETTER WAY. Jump in.
2. For all of you that are NOT catching the new trends of this amazing profession, pay particular attention to the last three sentences of the above quote from page 32 of Seth's book.
Congrats on being in the profession, but for goodness sake, pay attention to the trends and don't just participate - catapult your success by being aligned with those trends.
Life's too short to fight the forces of change. Life's too short to hate what you do all day. Life's way too short to make mediocre stuff. And almost everything that's standard is now viewed as mediocre....The end result of this is that many people (many really good people) spend all day trying to defend what they do, trying to sell what they've always sold, and trying to prevent their organizations from being devoured by the forces of the new. It must be wearing them out. Defending mediocrity is exhausting."
I love this new book by Seth Godin and in this particular quote it addresses, in my opinion, a couple major things inside and outside the Network Marketing Profession:1. For all of those that are working all day and not excited about it, and doing mediocre things, come see what the excitement is all about and why I've been screaming for 3 1/2 years that WE HAVE A BETTER WAY. Jump in.
2. For all of you that are NOT catching the new trends of this amazing profession, pay particular attention to the last three sentences of the above quote from page 32 of Seth's book.
Congrats on being in the profession, but for goodness sake, pay attention to the trends and don't just participate - catapult your success by being aligned with those trends.
Thursday, February 9, 2012
Virtues to Live By
Ben Franklin went through some challenges in the 1700's - not unlike any successful person these days.
He created 13 virtues which he lived by. One of those was to absolutely never say anything negative about another person. He lived by that and created massive success.
Interesting thought as you all go about your business and / or job. Face forward- do not look back, do not look left, do not look right- focus like a laser and never say anything that is not positive about someone.
I was reminded of these virtues today by Ken Dunn, one of our top earners.
He created 13 virtues which he lived by. One of those was to absolutely never say anything negative about another person. He lived by that and created massive success.
Interesting thought as you all go about your business and / or job. Face forward- do not look back, do not look left, do not look right- focus like a laser and never say anything that is not positive about someone.
I was reminded of these virtues today by Ken Dunn, one of our top earners.
Wednesday, February 1, 2012
With the Benefit of Hindsight
This is from Win: The Key Principles to Take Your Business from Ordinary to Extraordinary
and quoted from Steve Wynn - great Casino and Resort developer. It's funny because perfectionists are always looking to improve and grow. In the midst of the change I hear myself saying to people "...with the benefit of hindsight we are building differently now..." based on our experience.
"My thing, that aspect of my life that describes my passion and gives me the most pleasure, is in dreaming up this stuff. I guess that's because I've always thought of myself as a student of all this. So when the places are done, whether it's Mirage or Bellagio, Treasure Island or Golden Nugget, unfortunately, I would see the mistakes we had made, or the opportunities that we hadn't really taken advantage of properly. And I'd say,'Boy, oh, boy, I wish I could do that over again. I wish I had one more chance.' Because I'm always thinking that if I could do one more hotel, maybe, just maybe the next time I could get it right."
and quoted from Steve Wynn - great Casino and Resort developer. It's funny because perfectionists are always looking to improve and grow. In the midst of the change I hear myself saying to people "...with the benefit of hindsight we are building differently now..." based on our experience.
"My thing, that aspect of my life that describes my passion and gives me the most pleasure, is in dreaming up this stuff. I guess that's because I've always thought of myself as a student of all this. So when the places are done, whether it's Mirage or Bellagio, Treasure Island or Golden Nugget, unfortunately, I would see the mistakes we had made, or the opportunities that we hadn't really taken advantage of properly. And I'd say,'Boy, oh, boy, I wish I could do that over again. I wish I had one more chance.' Because I'm always thinking that if I could do one more hotel, maybe, just maybe the next time I could get it right."
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