It's Tuesday at 2:00pm! (PST Time: I live and work from Southern California)

PARTNERSHIP.

We're having a conversation about the questions and themes that move around the launch or the growth of an organization. We've talked about RISK, FAILURE, COLLABORATION, and the first mention was around STARTING.

Today I want to talk about the value of PARTNERSHIP.

Gina and I were a part of starting a ministry years ago in Ecuador called Extreme Response International. We came alongside our friends and "partners", Jerry and Dawn Carnill, and Extreme Response was born.

In the book Building Strategic Relationships by Daniel Rickett, a partnership is defined as: "a complimentary relationship driven by a common purpose and sustained by a willingness to learn and grow together in obedience to God."

It's Tuesday at 2:00pm! (PST Time: I live and work from Southern California)

RISK.

There is risk in everything we do. Sometimes that risk can be managed, and sometimes the risk is completely out of our control.

I remember years ago when our family was facing a major move, I went through a risk assessment. This was more personal, because we were going to start a work, so the primary risk was in our own lives, not so much the work.

When I assess risk, I ask myself these questions:

• WHAT IS AT STAKE? I want to identify what am I putting at risk, and what could I lose?

• WHAT IS THE WORST CASE SCENARIO? I want to evaluate what would happen if everything fell apart.

• WHAT IS THE BEST CASE SCENARIO? What happens if we succeed?

• WHAT AM I CALLED TO DO? What is God asking me to do?

• ARE WE ON THE SAME PAGE? If others are involved in the decision, it's important to know if my spouse is on the same page with me or if team leaders are on the same page with me.

Once I ask these questions and answer them, I can make a clearer decision.

It's Tuesday at 2:00pm! (PST Time: I live and work from Southern California)

ASK THE QUESTION.

We're often afraid of what the answer will be, so we don't ASK THE QUESTION.

I was talking with a young college graduate recently who was sharing his idea about starting a new organization. I asked him a couple of questions, because I could name 3 other organizations that were already doing exactly what he wanted to do. I challenged him to reach out to those organizations and learn from them and identify a need that perhaps they weren't meeting.

He didn't do that. Instead he launched a new organization, which is now struggling to raise funds to operate, and he's having a hard time getting any traction on his growth and messaging.

You can avoid that by asking a couple of simple questions:

It's Tuesday at 2:00pm! (PST Time: I live and work from Southern California)

FAILURE.

There's no way we can talk about START-UPS without talking about failure. General stats say that between 80 and 90 percent of all start-ups fail. The reasons they fail range from poor market research to finance problems to legal issues. There are so many possible variables with any new venture, and sometimes we launch something without ever thinking about failure.

I have 2 great failure stories... There are many, but I'll share 2.

The first one wasn't a "failure", but because I didn't do the work ahead of time, the business never launched.

I had an idea to start a coffee shop. I found the coffee. I liked coffee. I created a brand. I liked coffee. I signed a lease on a storefront. I was excited about this because I like coffee. Here was the problem: I had a full-time job. I didn't have the time to run this shop, and I didn't know what I was getting into until my wife said to me, "Are you crazy?" When she said that, I knew she was right. I failed to account for the needs of this new business. I had done some of the work, but not all of the work. Mundo Coffees never made it, but I learned some great lessons from that, the greatest of which is that my wife is almost always right!

It's Tuesday at 2:00pm! (PST Time: I live and work from Southern California)

START-UPS.

Thanks for your comments from last week as I talked about what an "Entrepreneur" is, and I shared the quote that talked about how everyone has ideas, but some people do something with that idea: THEY START. I'll share a couple of your comments later...

Here's my first START-UP story. This entrepreneurial flame began to burn in my life as a kid, and I was always thinking about what I could do to make money.

When I was 13 years-old, I was living in South America. I couldn't "legally" work in the country because of my visa status (and the fact that I was 13!), so I knew if I was going to make any money to support my food and snacks habit, I would need to create something.

I remember visiting a print shop, and seeing a bin full of leftover paper that was being thrown out. I don't know how I got the idea, but in talking with the printer, Javier (who I still know to this day), I asked him about the paper, and what they did with it, and he told me they burned it. I asked him if I could have some of it, and began thinking about selling it. He suggested I glue some together, and offered to make me some note pads with the scraps. I took those pads out to the street, along with my friend Keith, and we began selling them to cars a they drove by. For those of you who know Quito, we were selling at the "Y", long before the steady stream of vendors that are there now.

We sold out of our pads.

It's Tuesday at 2:00pm! (PST Time: I live and work from Southern California)

ENTREPRENEUR.

This week while on a walk I was listening to a podcast, and Mark Randolph, the co-founder of Netflix, was being interviewed. They were talking about all kinds of things, then Randolph said something like this:

"Everyone has ideas. The difference between someone who has an idea and someone who does something with it is simply this: THEY START."

I stopped my walk, took a note on that, then just thought about that for a while.

THEY START.

My first job, as a budding entrepreneur, was mowing a couple of lawns in my neighborhood. My dad had a lawnmower, and he paid me $5 to mow our lawn. Why wouldn't my neighbors pay me as well?

I started my first lawn business at the ripe age of about 9 years old. I didn't mow a lot of lawns, but enough to keep me supplied in candy.

It's Tuesday at 2:00pm! (PST Time: I live and work from Southern California)

MENTOR.

The quote below meant a lot to me this past week:

"You don't get anywhere of significance on your own. You get somewhere significant beside others." Tom Paterson.

The idea that other people have so much to contribute into my life, into my development, into my purpose is so important.

A definition of a mentor is "an experienced and trusted advisor".

When I look for mentoring or when I've looked in the past for mentoring, this is what I'm looking for... someone that has more experience than I have that I can trust! It's pretty simple, and I've had some incredible people pour into my life over all of my years of growth and development.

This past week, one of these people finished their earthly course, and moved on to eternity.

It's Tuesday at 2:00pm! (PST Time: I live and work from Southern California)

ENERGY.

Personal Energy is something I often take for granted.

I expect that every morning, I will wake up with a certain amount of energy that I can manage throughout the day, and hopefully it will last! I've learned over my years how to "replenish" my energy quickly with some tips and tricks, and I've learned about the things that "deplete" my energy more quickly.

Managing my energy is still a challenge everyday.

This past week, I had some unexpected time to think about my energy management, and I read a couple of great articles that got me thinking.

#1) Seth Godin "Conservation of Energy in Conversation" (April 16, 2013)

He writes a short blog (his are always short!) where he talks about how we can add negative energy or positive energy to any situation with the way we engage with people.

Read his full post HERE.