A few weeks ago, I was having a few good business ideas everyday.  Now, it seems that my idea river has run dry.

I am going to take this week to read over Stimulated by Andrew Pek.  I met Andrew at a Product Development and Management Association meeting a few months ago.  Stimulated is about the science of everyday creation and how ideas happen.  It discusses different ways to help stimulate your creativity - your creative genius!

Yesterday, I was reading over Seth Godin’s new book, Linchpin (highly recommended).  Seth mentions how great leaders show their genius…

A brilliant author or businesswoman or senator or software engineer is brilliant only in tiny b ursts.  The rest of the time, they’re doing work that most any trained person can do.

It might take a lot of tinering or low-level work or domain knowledge for that brilliance to be evoked, but from the outside, it appears that the art is created in a moment, not in tiny increments”

In order to refind my creative genius, I don’t need to be a creative genius all the time.  I only need to be a genius every so often.  I also don’t think genius just happens.  I think in order to tap into your creative genius, you can take steps in order to be a genius more often.

Enter Andrew Pek.

I met Andrew at a Product Development and Management Association meeting a few months ago.  Andrew is a co-author of Stimulated.(I also recommend highly) Stimulated is about the science of everyday creation and how ideas happen.  It discusses different ways to help stimulate your creativity - your creative genius!

My goal over the course of the next week will be to find my genius - even if it’s only for seconds at a time.  I’m going to read back over passages from Stimulated and follow Andrew’s advice.  I’m going to mix up my habits and venture off to new locations to help spark my creative side.  Hopefully, my idea engine will start again.  Hopefully, it will have more horse power than power.

Brilliance doesn’t happen by itself.  Ideas don’t happen by themselves.  You need to find ways to stimulate your creative genius so you can show the world how much of a linchpin you really are!

Robert M. Cavezza

(Bob)

I feel that this video summarizes much of my own thoughts perfectly.  It is a great characterization of some of the things you go through as a young entrepreneur.  He also mentioned two books that I hold close to my heart (Crush It and the 4 Hour Work Week) and I recently bought the third book he mentions (E-Myth Revisited).

Robert M. Cavezza

(Bob)

1. Design graphics for selling area of website
2. Find potential partner for distribution of book
3. Write selling copy for selling area of a subscription website
4. Write a few pages for a non-fiction book
5. Send emails to get in touch with former employees
6. Draft email to send to programmer and designer in the Phillippines
7. Determine type and find developer for a short intro selling video

Graphorce - I worked with Prasath Prabhakaran from Graphorce on the web design for SmarterFootball.com.  The design looks great and Prasath was a great asset while working on this project.  I plan on working with him much more in the future.  He was able to easily understand the project requirements and the work received was within deadlines and of the utmost quality.  All of our communication runs very smoothly through the Google Chat area of my Gmail account.

Siliconinfo - I started working with this company a few days ago and have had a great experience with the PHP programmer at this company we are working with.  All of our communication runs very smoothly on Windows Live Messenger.

If you know of any other great talent located abroad, we can build a master list in the comment section below.

Best Regards,

Robert M. Cavezza (Bob)

7 days into 2010, I learned that one of my goals will not get completed this year.  Yes, I received my “not admitted” letter from the Babson College MBA program earlier this afternoon.

Pretty upsetting.

Anyway, the greatest aspect of goal setting  is that they are personal.  The only person they matter to is you.  Because of this, you have the opportunity to change or update your goals each day.

I know I will not be living in Boston from May until 2012.  This creates the potential for a mini-retirement in an exotic country after the successful launch my current projects.  My current mission remains to establish and automate three companies before the end of the year.  Instead of doing so to attend Babson, I am now doing so to create time for a mini-retirement in Taiwan.  I hope to use this trip to learn local customs and return to the US with some  new business ideas.

It is never a nice feeling to get rejected from anywhere.  What matters is your mindset and how you respond.  I intend to use this disappointment to fuel my fire behind my plans for the next few months.

Best Regards,

Robert M. Cavezza

(Bob)

Here are a few steps that I suggest taking if you want to become an author by the age of 25.

1.)  Pick a Subject that You are passionate about which has relatively little competition

I am passionate about fraternity recruiting.  I was a great recruiter for my fraternity in college and loved reading all about different strategies from other national fraternities’ website while in school.

Fraternity recruiting also has little competition in the book market.  There is only one other book written on the subject and I met the authors personally and have exchanged emails in the past.  In this niche, I am reasonably certain that my book will not be competition to the existing authors, but a companion or partner.  My hope is that readers will want to buy both books and maybe we can even collaborate on a project in the future.

2.)  Make sure you can show others that you have expertise in your chosen subject

There are numerous ways to do this.  I had success recruiting for my fraternity when I was in college.  My fraternity increased its membership by 400% when I was president.  This, among other helped me win a chair in the Order of the Diamond Circle, (Phi Sigma Kappa’s highest award for an undergraduate member) and become runner in the Distinguished Man of the Year Competition (2008) at Rutgers University.

This has helped give me credibility in the field.  But, I was also able to achieve credibility by writing a guest blogpost for the blog of the others of the existing fraternity recruiting book.  If you don’t have awards, you can still show your expertise by creating your own blog.  You can write useful knowledge and facts on your blog to help show your expertise.

It is imperative to have expertise in your topic.  If you don’t, then no one will tell their friends on how great your book is.  However, the initial obstacle is showing others that you have expertise in the subject.  If no one thinks you know what you’re talking about, then no one will buy your book.

3.)  Write until your hands fall off.

This is the most important part.  You want to exhaust all of your personal resources.  You want to tell your story and get your hands wet.  Sometimes, you will only get to 1,5,10, or 20 pages.  But if you don’t start writing, you do not know how much information you have flowing through your head.

I was only able to write between 10 and 20 pages when I first started my project.  But this is only the first stage and you want to put down every thought of the subject matter on paper or in Microsoft Word.

4.)  Proofread what you wrote

Read what you wrote after putting it down for a day or two.  You want to read it and make sure it makes sense to you.  You are doing this because in the next step, you are going to send what you wrote to your friends.  You want your friends to think you can write well and that your book will be a success.

5.)  Have 5 of your friends read what you wrote

Maybe 5 is too many, but you want a few people to read it besides you.  See what they say.  Do you think you’re writing is interesting?  Did they fall asleep on the first page?  Make sure they are honest.  This is the only way you will know if your book can succeed.

6.)  Find a way to outsource part of the writing

Find people online who also have expertise or experience in your subject.  Ask them to write in your book.  Maybe you can put a link to their website in their book.  Often, the biggest incentive for someone to write a section of your book is to see their name in print.

For my book, I sent an email to many different national fraternities asking for recruiting success stories.  I want to include case studies where fraternity brothers had success in recruiting.  I want to use these stories to highlight what works and what dosen’t in real world situations.  I think you can talk to a college student about theory all day long, but it won’t matter as long as they don’t think what you are saying doesn’t work in the real world.

7.)  Find a publisher

It doesn’t have to cost you a fortune to have your book printed.  There are many websites that will print as few as one copy of your book on demand.  In a few scenarios, you don’t have to pay an on demand publisher until your book is sold either on your website or on Amazon.com.

The service I plan on using for my book is Lulu.com.

In Closing

It’s possible to publish your own book before you  turn 25.  This is a goal of mine… and I am going to achieve this goal sometime in the next few months.  My goal is to publish before January 31st.  I will let you know if I am able to achieve this goal.

Best,

Robert M. Cavezza

In a recent post, Fabrice discusses the success of major internet companies and discusses reasons why it’s often better to have a partner.

This post is definitely worth a look if you’re considering going solo on your next project.

Robert M. Cavezza

(Bob)

In the past - yes.  But not anymore with the wide range of virtual assistant services available.

I can find someone in India, Singapore, or the Philippines to program a website for me in less than 24 hours.

You can find virtual assistants in other countries by using the following websites:

1. Rentacoder
2. Elance
3. Odesk
4. Craiglist

International workers are not always the best route to go, but they can save you time and money.  it is also possible to find relatively cheap labor in the United States by using Craigslist.

If you haven’t worked with international workers, using one of these services to outsource can be an eye opening experience.  With cultural, language, and time zone difficulties, outsourcing internationally can teach any entrepreneur vital project management skills.

I highly recommend outsourcing a project just to get your feet.  Once you try it once, you will probably get excited about the possibilities and outsource more projects than you may think is possible.

Best Regards,

Robert M. Cavezza

(Bob)

Here’s my one sentence summary of the book.

Tim Ferriss teaches you how to take control of your life.

The book is more about small business, outsourcing, and world travel. This book is about changing your philosophy about life. Tim discusses the term life deferment. This refers to the typical nine to five working schedule where many adults delay actually living their life until they plan on retiring. This isn’t the way I want to live. This isn’t the way I want anyone I care about to live.

I want every person I know to live on their terms. I want to be able to go to every one of my kid’s soccer games when they get older. I don’t want to be told I have to be in an office for 8 or 9 hours a day.

Tim’s work is the closest blueprint for taking control of your life that I have ever read. I want everyone I care about to read this book and take control of their life.

Tim, thank you for writing this book. I am sure you have helped thousands of people across the globe take control of their life.

For more information about Tim’s book, you can visit the Four Hour Work Week’s Official Website.

If you are working and you have the tv on - turn it off. Many people tell themselves that they can work better with the tv on.

Most people are lying to themselves.

Do yourself a favor. Turn the tv off and watch your productivity soar.

If tv is a major part of your life, you can turn off the tv and then reward yourself for your hard work by taking a half hour break every so often to watch a full show.

If you alternate working for two hours and watching tv for one hour, you will be much more productive than working for three hours with the tv on. This is because when the tv is on, you constantly get distracted and it takes a certain amount of time to refocus and concentrate on each task.

Studies have proven that listening to classical music can increase productivity. If you are a person that needs background noise, listen to classical music.

In closing, do yourself a favor - turn off the tv.

Robert M. Cavezza
(Bob)