Pay Attention or Pay the ‘Dumb Tax’: Your Ultimate Guide to Smart Leadership! 🎯
Hey leadership rockstars! Let’s talk about something that could literally save your business (and sanity) – the art of critical thinking!
Trust me, this is a game-changer you won’t want to miss.
The Dumb Tax: We’ve All Paid It!
Real talk: Ever had one of those “genius” ideas that turned into an “oh no” moment?
Been there, done that! We call this paying the “dumb tax” – and let me tell you, it’s not the fun kind of investment!
“Dumb Tax is the price we pay for insufficient critical thinking”
Its the one that hurts the most and hopefully don’t do again. Its also why we review this in our events every 6 months and get you to write it down!
Quick thought experiment: If you could rewind and undo your three financial decisions, would you be richer today? (I’m nodding yes, and I bet you are too!)
The Three Levels of Decision-Making: Where Do You Live?
Level 1: Cappuccino Thinking
- Quick, frothy, and disappears fast
- The “shoot from the hip” approach
- Example: “Who’s our target market? Everyone with a wallet!”
- Pro tip: If this is your go-to style, we need to talk!
- The EBS community difference: with coaching and business mastery, our clients engage in this one a whole lot less and don’t tend to action their first level ideas!
Level 2: Getting in the Game
- Starting to dig deeper
- Actually doing market research
- Looking at real data – asking people, running analysis and reports
- Now we’re cooking!
- The EBS community difference: Ask any one of our Board of Directors clients and they’ll tell you that this is where the juices start flowing – preparing their quarterly board reports packed full of data and analysis is key to informing strategic decisions
Level 3: Chess Master Mode
- Thinking three moves ahead
- Considering all the ripple effects
- Playing the long game
- This is where the magic happens!
- The EBS community difference:Â This is where our coaching programs and the power of the network is at play. Having a safe supportive space loaded with peers and our expert coaches helps you go DEEP into level three thinking. It’s key to taking a macro view and seeing the long game.
The Branson Brilliance Hack!
Want to know how Richard Branson makes million-dollar decisions? Here’s his secret sauce (and it’s pure genius!):
- Split your team in half
- Make one side champion the idea
- Make the other side challenge it
- HERE’S THE TWIST: Make them swap sides!
Mind-blown yet? This technique is like putting on leadership X-ray glasses – suddenly you see EVERYTHING! And yes, you won’t always like what you see, but the gold lies in seeing this BEFORE you’ve taking the leap or executed at Level 1 thinking
The Million-Dollar Question You’re Not Asking
Here’s the truth bomb that changed my life: The highest leverage activity in your business isn’t what you think it is. It’s not:
- Checking emails
- Endless meetings
- Even closing deals
It’s pure, uninterrupted thinking time! You might also want to check out our Default Diary Tool for ways to get this time blocked out and make it a consistent must do.
Your Leadership Power-Up Challenge!
Ready to level up? Here’s your mission (should you choose to accept it):
- Block out 1 hour this week just for thinking
- Turn off ALL notifications
- Ask yourself: “What decisions am I making on cappuccino thinking?”
Learn from the master himself
Our go to resource on this is from the guru himself Keith Cunningham. His book, The Road Less Stupid provides a whole bunch of critical thinking framework and questions. It’s not a read it once kind of book. You’ll want to digest this one over and over again in small pieces.
The Bottom Line 🎯
Listen up, future leadership legend: You’re either investing in thinking time now or paying the dumb tax later. And between us? The dumb tax has a CRAZY high interest rate!
Quick Win for Today! âš¡
Start small: Block out 30 minutes tomorrow morning. Just you, a notebook, and your biggest business challenge. No phone, no distractions. Watch what happens when you give your brain space to really think!
Remember: Leadership isn’t about being the smartest person in the room – it’s about making the smartest decisions for your team and business! 🌟
Let’s crush it! Who’s ready to upgrade their thinking game?
