Having Definiteness of Purpose
“I cry out to God Most High, to God who fulfills his purpose for me.”
Psalms 57:2
Not too long ago I spent a week in San Diego with my family. We do this about once a year.
Rent a beach house for a week and go enjoy each other’s company. We play games, play in the ocean, and do something fun (like deep sea fishing, visiting an iconic attraction, etc).
And in the down times, I work on our business.
Notice I said that I work ON our business. Not in our business. There is a MAJOR difference there.
During this trip, I spent the downtime working through a process called Traction.
It is where you organize your business and make sure you are on the right track to success.
Most entrepreneurs, including myself, have this little thing called shiny object syndrome.
It is where we get distracted very easily and start chasing after all the shiny objects aka new ideas to grow our business.
What really happens is that when we take our eyes off our real purpose then we end up confusing our team, customers, spouses, and yes even ourselves.
So, during this trip, I worked through the process that I am going to explain to you here.
Not only that I am going to give you the answers that I came up with as well as the original answers. And why they got changed.
Shall we dive right in???
The first thing that you want to do is really figure out what your vision for the company is, or if you don’t have a company your personal life. You need to figure out where you want to go and who you want to help.
So the first thing I did was look at my life and figure out the 3 people that if I could clone who they would be and what are their amazing characteristics that made me want to clone them!
It might be crazy but the first person that I would clone was myself. After that came my right-hand man, Sam. Then to top it all off I would clone Tony Robbins.
If you want to see the reasons, then you can shoot me an email saying that and I will get you my complete breakdown of everything in this blog.
The reason for doing this is because the characteristics that stand out the most, or come up the most are the characteristics that make up your business values.
Our focused Core values are as follows:
Extreme Ownership
Our team always sets extremely high standards for ourselves, our products, our services, and everything in our lives. Some call it integrity, we just call it life.
Morals
We do it right the first time, every time. There is never a reason to take a shortcut because those shortcuts cost us WAY more than the time to do it right the first time would have taken us.
Faith
Our company trusts that everything happens for a reason. We also know that God doesn’t call the qualified, he qualifies the called.
Driven
We are not afraid to get out there, get our hands dirty, and get the job done. We don’t quit when we are tired, we quit when we are done.
Innovative
Our team is always looking for better strategies and better ways to serve our clients and the business. This means that we are willing to experiment with new innovative ways of accomplishing what needs to be done.
Inspiring Leaders
We strive to be the people who influence others to do it right and guide them down the path that is going to make them and their businesses ultimately successful. All while keeping logic in everything that we do and teach.
After that process, I spent a few days coming up with our core purpose or mission if you will.
I used to think that our mission was to Take complexity out of compliance which we do. But since we built DOT Docs, an online platform that I WISH I would have had when I started DOT compliance. Our core purpose has changed.
Because now that is DOT Docs purpose. If you have a company that uses trucks you should check out www.DOTDocs.com to see just how easy compliance really is when you have the right tools!!
I wrote down purpose after purpose. Then after going for a walk on the beach with my family, I came back to the house, opened up the computer, and wrote this down.
Eclipse DOT’s Purpose Is to Give Companies The Tools They Need To Grow And Scale Effortlessly!!
After I wrote it down I realized that we are MORE than a DOT company. We are people who want to help businesses that use vehicles to be able to grow their business by using the frameworks and tools that we have already discovered, refined, and utilized to grow our business.
Which leads us to our niche.
What is a Niche? Well, it’s a small number of people that you actually want to work with! When your niche is too broad then you won’t be able to help anyone. But if it is too narrow then you won’t be able to help anyone either. Because then you won’t be able to find the perfect customers.
Can you guess what our niche is?
That’s right, it’s to help businesses that use vehicles to be able to grow their business by using the frameworks and tools that we have already discovered, refined, and utilized to grow our business.
After I completed those I just let it marinate for a few days while kept working through the process.
The reason for this is that I wanted to MAKE sure that I had the right niche and the right purpose.
There were a few more things that I did that made a HUGE difference for my team when I shared all of this with them.
One of those was what are the 3 things that make us unique compared to our competitors! I actually came up with 4.
We Care
We Have Your Back
We Answer Your Call
We Have Been There Before So We Know How You Feel Right Now.
Other than that, I named our proven process and then started brainstorming a Guarantee that we can have that will help us sell our products and services to our perfect customers.
I spent the rest of the week working on goals for the company. I like to start far out and work my way closer.
So, I worked up a 10-year goal, then a 3-year goal, next a one-year goal, then the last was the quarterly goals that we will need to achieve to get to our one-year goal.
This is an amazing process that every business should go through EVERY year.
It helps provide much-needed clarity not only for the leadership team but also for the entire company. I was shocked by how much better everyone understood our company after I shared our vision with them for the company.
My suggestion is that you do the same thing I just did, every year. It is 1000% the investment to get your company and team on the right track.
Time to Take Action
If you made it this far, congratulations! You are amazing!!!!
Maybe you read this and said, “Wow Dan has been talking a lot more about business, and I don]t have my own business. Maybe I don’t relate to these anymore.
Here’s the thing.
If you replace the word business or company with personal life, then you can still make all of these tactics that I talk about for our business for your personal life.
Having a purpose in life is HUGE!
So today I want you to use this devotional as a guide for your personal life instead of a business.
Unless you have a business, then by all means use it there.
Prayer
Lord, today I pray that you help us to read between the lines and find our definiteness of purpose. Help us to uncover or discover one of the reasons you put us here on this amazing earth.
That’s right I said one of the reasons is because we know that you have placed us here for multiple reasons. God today we pray that you help give us the guidance and wisdom that is required to step up to the plate for the purpose you have for us.
We ask all these things in your precious son’s name.
Amen
A Little More
As I stand here writing this(that’s right I finally moved up to the 2000s and got a stand-up desk.)
I am reminded of when I used to not have a true purpose in life. I’m also reminded of when I thought I had a purpose, but really I was chasing something that wasn’t my true purpose.
Thinking back to when I was in high school and all I wanted to be was a helicopter pilot and a firefighter. I would have done just about anything to be both of those at the same time.
I guess I was a little bit of an adrenaline junky, but in a safe way. Not like skydiving or taking crazy chances that would cause me to die. Lol
Anyways..
Thinking back, I have always had a huge amount of drive.
If I wanted to make something happen I found a way to make it happen.
I don’t say that to sound cocky, but to be honest.
There are people out there who don’t have that same drive. They are kind of drifting and just waiting for something amazing to be handed to them. They don’t go out and chase it.
When I wanted to be a pilot I was talking to recruiters almost daily. I was also calling the local helicopter place to see how I might be able to help them or work for free.
After meeting Jenna and getting more serious I made the switch from a helicopter pilot in the military to a firefighter. Then I started pursuing that with an unrivaled passion.
I mean I had my EMT-=B before I was out of highschool. And writing the first 2 months out of High school I had 5-6 certifications that took most people over a year to get.
My drive allowed me to pursue this passion relentlessly.
Looking at a lot of others in the world, I’m not sure they would have that same drive to make it happen.
And to me, it’s as simple as making a phone call, asking how to make it happen, and then taking action on making it happen.
It seems that a lot of others in this world say, I really want ‘X’ but that’s as far as it goes. They don’t take any action to make x happen!
I know that stepping out of your comfort zone is hard, but if you always hide in it you will always wonder what it would be like if you would have pursued it!
Dan Greer