Recently we read the latest work of brilliance by Scott McKain, Create Distinction: What to do when great isn’t good enough to grow your business. Scott is a speaker, best selling author and world-renowned thought leader in the area of distinction
This is a MUST read for anyone in business or running their own business.
It is hard to identify our favorite section of the book as I found myself highlighting, writing notes and marking the chapters (yes I am one of those people who totally destroys a book when reading it).
The premise of his book is great isn’t good enough any more – you need to create distinction.
Scott’s practical advice, relevant examples and challenging questions make this a valuable go-to resource. His four cornerstones of clarity, creatively, communication and customer-experience focus are filled with brilliant suggestions. We were drawn to the section on creativity.
Also as a productivity expert I loved his executive summary at the end of each chapter (gotta love someone who provides you with the depth and the summary all in one place).
Some of my favorite takeaways were:
Creativity without execution is managerial masturbation. As many of you know I have a huge bias to being accountable for time, engaging attention and leveraging your energy and this statement appealed to me because Scott is forcing people to implement – love that!
Execution without creativity is excruciatingly boring – it’s one thing to have ideas on what needs to be done but without creativity it is difficult to distinguish yourself from your competitors.
“Organizations that clearly and creatively seek to differentiate – and raise their performance to a level that creates distinction – will naturally become superior to inconspicuous competitors,” says Scott McKain
Believe you are creative – being creative is simply believing you are. It drives me crazy when people say ‘but I am not creative’ – that’s rubbish – I believe everyone has a unique perspective or idea to bring to a conversation or situation. Thought leaders know how to package their intellectual property uniquely.
Expose yourself to stimulus – creative people expose themselves to movies, books and art says Scott. We would add that those who want to be more creative expose themselves to cool people (do you have a group of people you can bounce ideas with, an accountability group, mastermind) this will also drive your creativity from sharing ideas with them?
Stimulating productive creativity
Three actions to create a positive impact on your organization include drive it through your organization, break down all the points of contact with your customer and develop a difference – voila – instantly more productive, instantly more creative.
A great suggestion is to audit the process in your business or practice: What is every point of contact a customer has with your organization?
Once you do this exercise you can pick a point – choose one of these specific points of contact and practice creativity. Enterprise Rental car did this by identifying that picking up people for their rental cars would give them a point of distinction – people love them for this!
Develop a Difference and exploit the area you choose – as a speaker we have a unique process for before, during and after we speak that also includes driving accountability in the organization after we have spoken on Folding Time™ – our clients love it, it is our unique intellectual property and helps us stand out from the gazillion other speakers in the market place.
As a thought leader, do yourself a favor, buy Scott’s book, read it, implement it and discover how you can really create distinction in your business or practice.
What are your ideas on how you can create distinction in your thought leadership practice? Share your ideas with us here on our blog.
PS. If you want more ideas on how to increase your productivity – check out other blogs here and several eBooks you can share with your team.
