I’ve started a whole bunch of businesses in my 37+ years as an entrepreneur. Some of them were well-researched, and some of them were off-shoots from other, less-profitable start-ups.

And, some of them were even quite successful … and it is these that I would like to talk about today.

First off, I’m not a particularly religious guy, and I’d like to get this straight right up-front. Now, this doesn’t mean that I don’t believe in some sort of “Higher Power” …  au contraire, I most certainly do! But it does mean that I am not one of those guys who buys off on the protocol of organized religion, especially the ceremony and the ritual. This, along with the overall Big Business aspect of religion, I can most certainly do without.

I believe that most of what the more religious folks tend to call “intervention” is really something that takes place deep within our own heads. In other words, I believe that most of the things that happen in this world do so because we make them happen. And, almost always, we make things happen because we desperately want them to.

Because too often, I have started a company and just as I am germinating some idea that then must be turned into a product or service, the perfect person to execute that step turns up at my front door!

I’ll give you a hard example of this.  I was once starting a new business that would clearly need some tech guru to both define and oversee the creation of a very specialized set of software programs. I needed someone who had the rare combination of tech acumen, combined with an ability to speak to and negotiate with the end-users of the to-be-built software. This is a very tough parlay to hit, I assure you.

The very same week that I determined I was in need of this specific type of individual, who should show up on my front PORCH but an old colleague whom I had once worked with and whom I had envisioned as the perfect candidate. (Hell, I had no idea whatsoever where I would even begin to look for this guy … he had simply gone off the radar screen once we had last parted company.)

I was stunned. I was even more stunned when he said, and this is a direct quote, “Ron, I have no idea what it is that you are about to do, but whatever it is, count me in.”

I hired him (employee number five, I believe), and the rest was history. He oversaw the development of a software system that enabled us to generate tens of millions of dollars in revenues over the next five years.

As if that weren’t enough, employees three and four had followed a similar path to our door. They were friends of friends or people who just showed up at the right time and place. In all cases, each and every one of these hires stayed with the company from beginning to end. All of them eventually acquired equity in the business, and all of them ultimately became wealthy when the company was sold.

I could cite similar stories vis-à-vis customers and suppliers, too. In fact, I can remember one start-up wherein our first customer was a guy whom I had once done work for during my senior year in college.  It was a study for a business finance course and in my final paper I proposed an alternate business activity for his company (which was extremely cyclical).  I did the paper pro bono, but it eventually made it all the way to the owner of the company who not only loved it, but who also implemented most of its suggestions. Ten years later, whilst starting up a new business, this same man became my very first customer. He took a chance on us when he realized that I was the same guy who had created his revised business strategy nearly a decade earlier. The rest, of course, is history.

Another time, I was starting a company that provided optimized route management systems for local delivery services. The owner of that company was a tough guy (Marine … I almost said, “ex-Marine”) by the name of Mike. He had started his home heating oil delivery business with just one truck and one delivery man (him) and built it to become one of the largest such businesses in western PA. I used to call him over and over again, in an effort to just to get an appointment with him. Unfortunately, I never had any luck.

Because this was a start-up, and since I had no customers, I paid my rent and food bills by moonlighting as a parking lot attendant. The lot was right next to my (subterranean) apartment.  One night, a big Cadillac pulls into the lot and to my ultimate horror, the man driving that Caddy was none other than “Big Mike”.

It was time to lie or die. I chose the latter. I told the truth --- “Er, Mike, ahh, sir … this is just a way for me to earn extra money so that I can afford an extra employee for my software company.” (Well, MOST of that was the truth.)

He looked at me, flexed those Popeye forearms that he had developed from carrying so many propane containers, and then laughed as hard and as loud as any high-school educated guy might laugh. Then he said, “Call me first thing Monday, son … better yet SEE me … I need guys like you on my team.”

He became my first customer and eventually I quit parking cars.

Now, how DO things like this happen? I have no idea. Except for the fact that, and in each case, Good Fortune seemed always to follow Hard Work.

And so it goes. You work hard … hard as can be, foregoing sleep time, party time, TV time (hell, I didn’t even know that Elvis had died until nearly two years after the fact) party time, and just about everything that doesn’t relate to improving either yourself or your business (did I mention cutting out Party Time?) and the Great Creator will in turn reward you … almost always in multiples.

Remember, your dreams are 100% in your hands. YOU and you alone make your way in this world.

But there IS this unknown force, too. The harder you try … the harder you work at anything … good things just seem to come back to you in multiples. So … why not practice what I have herein preached. Go and work hard and do things for others and then see if good things don’t also begin to happen for you and your company.

Until next time.