When You Shouldn’t Fire Your Weakest Link
As an executive working for a business I didn’t own, I fired employees right and left. It was clear to me that my primary duty was to the business — and when someone working for me couldn’t cut the mustard and could be replaced rather quickly by someone better, I…
READ MOREBecome Happier By Giving and Sharing
“A happiness that is sought for ourselves alone can never be found: for a happiness that is diminished by not being shared is not big enough to make us happy.” – Thomas Merton (No Man Is an Island, 1955) ETR is modeled on Ben Franklin’s goals of becoming healthier,…
READ MOREPromise #9 for the New Year: To Become Wiser by Reading ETR Every Day
You are a very busy person. And so I appreciate the fact that you take the time each morning to make reading ETR a priority. The single most productive thing I do each day is the work I do writing ETR. It’s energizing because it gets me thinking positively first…
READ MOREMake Your Personal Life Richer This Year
What are your hobbies? If you say “watching sports on television,” I’ve got news for you. That’s not a hobby. It’s a habit, and a bad one at that. A hobby is, or should be, something that makes your life richer. The kind of hobby Winston Churchill was recommending…
READ MOREBecome Healthier with Healthful Exercise
Keeping yourself healthy should be a priority in your life, even if it isn’t your topmost concern. To accomplish your other life goals, you need a working body and an energetic mind. You have to be able to get up early — the earlier the better — and work with…
READ MOREResolution: Increase Your Income
Let’s start with some simple arithmetic. Joe Ordinary is 25 years old, makes $28,000 a year, and gets ordinary 3% to 4% yearly increases. Over a 40-year career, he makes approximately $2.3 million. Elwood ETR is not satisfied with ordinary. He follows the advice he gets here every morning and…
READ MORECountdown to the New Year: 2 More Working Days
“And now let us believe in a long year that is given to us, new, untouched, full of things that have never been, full of work that has never been done, full of tasks, claims, and demands.” – Rainer Maria Rilke Last week, if you did what I suggested, you…
READ MORECountdown to the New Year
“Each age has deemed the new-born year / The fittest time for festal cheer.” – Sir Walter Scott Yesterday, you took a stab at the one or two resolutions you ignored this year. Today, you are going to spend at least an hour moving ahead on those tasks. Remember, you…
READ MORECountdown to the New Year: Four More Working Days
“Be not forgetful to entertain strangers, for thereby some have entertained angels unawares.” – The Bible (Hebrews 13.2) Christmas is over. We’re closing in on the end of 2002 and almost ready to make our New Year’s resolutions for the coming year. In other words, it’s “last-chance” time — your…
READ MOREThe Perfect Life
“Let age, not envy, draw wrinkles on thy cheeks.” – Sir Thomas Browne (A Letter to a Friend, 1690) I know a successful young executive who has accomplished more in less than 40 years than most people achieve in their lifetimes. He is rich. He is accomplished. He has a…
READ MOREExpect Change and Plan For It
“Our goals can only be reached through a vehicle of a plan, in which we must fervently believe, and upon which we must vigorously act. There is no other route to success.” – Pablo Picasso Once a business has more than seven or eight employees, it can benefit from some…
READ MOREThree Essential Rules for Fast Learning
“Never believe on faith, see for yourself! What you yourself don’t learn you don’t know.” – Bertolt Brecht (The Mother, 1932) If you want to learn a complicated subject quickly and completely, you need to follow three rules: 1. Learn less, but learn it. My big problem with learning…
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