1. Be your customer – Put yourself in the place of your customer. Go through your online ordering process, walk through your real estate property as a potential buyer or renter, visit your store and and walk the aisles. Find 3 things that you can improve and fix your customers’ experience.

2. Do you know what your unique selling position is? If you have not taken the time to really define this you will be inconsistent in your marketing and customer service efforts. Take some time to determine what your USP is and how you will make it the focus of your business.

3. Wow your next customer. Offer an unexpected bonus. Send a handwritten thank you. Tailor your sales presentation specifically to your next prospect

These three things will propel you forward and help you achieve the business success you desire. Take Action!

The blatant sexism of the late 1950′s and early ’60s might put some readers off. The book is written for men wanting to be successful. Occasionally Schwartz seems to remember that women are capable of being in business and holding positions of leadership and so he will make a small effort at being inclusive, but then soon forgets. It would be a mistake for a reader to let this flaw (which seems to exist in most success and motivational material written before the 1980s) detract from the larger message.

How and what we think matters, and it matters a great deal. No matter how dated the stories and examples used to present this idea the truth of that main principle still holds today.

Like all success books it is for the reader to decide which ideas and tactics will work for them individually and which do not resonate for their own situation. The baby should never be tossed out with the bathwater.

Definitely a recommended read, worth the time to read and the time to think about the principles presented.

As I have discovered by examining my past, I started out as a child. Coincidentally, so did my brother. My mother did not put all her eggs in one basket, so to speak: she gave me a younger brother named Russell, who taught me what was meant by “survival of the fittest.” ~Bill Cosby

Bill Cosby changed everything. His hit sitcom The Cosby Show defined the 80s as the standard for comedy television. His stand-up comedy (which he, perhaps ironically, almost always performed sitting down) is legendary. In 1976, he earned a Doctor of Education degree from the University of Massachusetts (and has since been awarded many honorary degrees). He was awarded Grammys, Emmys, the 12th annual Mark Twain Prize for American Humor, Kennedy Center Honors, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the 2003 Bob Hope Humanitarian Award, and many more accolades.

As a young child, Bill Cosby would work before and after school at a local supermarket to help support his family. He failed the tenth grade and, instead of repeating the grade, became an apprentice at a shoe repair. He eventually joined the Navy, earned his equivalency degree, and graduated from Temple University.

He continues to be an advocate of education, continues to perform his comedy, and continues to shape today’s culture.

His story isn’t so much about humble beginnings – although he certainly wasn’t handed success – as much as it is about standing up for your own beliefs and combating stereotypes. His comedy and his television shows changed the landscape of entertainment, and his principled stances have helped inspire millions. He went against the grain and found success doing it.

So for each of us, the lesson is that there is benefit in trying new things and going against the expectation. Experiment. Shake things up. And see what happens. It could be what brings you the success you’re looking for.

Most people give up just when they’re about to achieve success. They quit on the one yard line. They give up at the last minute of the game one foot from a winning touchdown. ~Ross Perot

Failure is frustrating. When you’re just starting out on a new project or a new business or a new adventure, failure is common – which means frustration is common. And the fact of the matter is, if you’re just starting out, it’s likely you’re not that good at whatever you’re doing. Anyone can start a business, anyone can learn to play guitar, anyone can be a film director, but their first attempts are likely not going to be well received by anyone – including themselves.

Ira Glass, of “This American Life,” has an interesting perspective on this very idea. You can watch the full clip through that link, but what it comes down to is the fact that you’ll likely not meet even your own expectations at first. You know what you want and you know how your end product should look, but that doesn’t mean you’re not going to create a lot of sub-par results along the way.

A lot of people take this as a reason to give up, and by doing so have wasted all the time and effort they’ve put into it. They would have been better off never having started at all because now they’re taking all this progress they’ve made and disregarding it. They’re ignoring it. They’re basing their decisions on what has happened instead of what they’ve almost achieved.

So don’t be one who gives up that close to the goal line. Crossing that metaphorical goal line can be even more difficult, since you may not know exactly where it is or what it looks like. But don’t think that all the progress you’ve made thus far should be tossed away just because you haven’t exactly “arrived.” Instead, continue on your path and realize you’re a lot closer than when you started.

Rose got his start with TechTV/G4, where he worked as the technical production assistant for The Screen Savers. He began the popular “Dark Tips” feature, which provided underground computer and technology tips. It was this role that led to his Dark Tipper nickname.

In 2004, Rose partnered with Owen Byrne, Ron Gorodetzky, and Jay Adelson to found Digg.com. Digg is a social news site that has a vast following and has spawned many clones. Despite Digg’s massive success, Rose is still an innovator and still true to his Dark Tipper roots, so he is still developing new projects and sharing his unique take on the technology world.

But before he made such a name for himself, Mackay was a young boy living in Minnesota with his parents, Jack and Myrtle Mackay. The family lived in St. Paul in an apartment—his parents dreamed of owning their own home. His father worked as an AP correspondent and his mother was a schoolteacher. Both of his parents were the children of immigrants and Harvey’s mother died while he was college.

After graduating from the University of Minnesota and the Stanford Graduate School of Business, Mackay purchased a failing envelope company. He was 26 years old, it was 1959, and he eventually grew the company into a multimillion dollar business. Today, MackayMitchell Envelope Company employs over 600 people and produces 25 million envelopes a day.

Surely Mackay’s business success can be at least partially attributed to his company’s motto: “Do what you love, love what you do and deliver more than you promise.” In his books and weekly column, Mackay teaches how to be competitive in the business world without sacrificing your integrity or hurting others. In general, he teaches that building good relationships with customers and employees is the key to success.

In his spare time, Mackay enjoys running, playing tennis, golfing and traveling with his wife of more than 45 years. He is on the board of the Minnesota Orchestra and has been part of several other civic and academic organizations, including Robert Redford’s Sundance Institute and the University Of Minnesota Carlson School Of Management.

Following his Davis Cup experience, Ashe returned to UCLA, where he won the NCAA singles title in 1965. In 1968, he dominated the sport by winning the Amateur Championships and US Open, as well as being part of the US Davis Cup team victory. 

Using his growing celebrity, Ashe was instrumental in the formation of the Association of Tennis Professional. The ATP gave tennis players a voice in the industry and helped them earn more substantial winnings. Ashe continued to be a spokesman for the tennis world. He publicly spoke out against apartheid in South Africa and helped to draw worldwide attention to the abuses that existed. He went so far as to demand that South Africa be banned from international competition. 

Ashe reached the apex of his career in 1975, winning Wimbledon and WCT Finals. Although he continued to compete after this season, he was slowed by health problems. A heart attack in 1979 led to surgery, and he retired the following year. Four years later, he again underwent quadruple bypass surgery. His health declined over the next several years and doctors discovered that he’d contracted HIV through blood transfusions related to his surgeries. 

Ashe died in 1993 from pneumonia. In the year leading up to his death, he was a fervent spokesman for AIDS sufferers and inspired the public to learn more about the disease. He founded the Arthur Ashe Institute for Urban Health and was named “Sportsman of the Year” by Sports Illustrated. His legacy is one of strength and compassion. He was a dedicated humanitarian who relished the opportunity to shed light on important issues.

Theodore “Teddy” Roosevelt was an outstanding naturalist, explorer, hunter, author and soldier, but that’s not the half of it. He was shot in the chest during a campaign speech but kept speaking, blood seeping from the wound. He tracked down the rare while rhinoceros on an expedition to Africa, then killed six of them. He took up taxidermy as a child and at age nine wrote “The Natural History of Insects,” a paper that codified his scientific observations.

Roosevelt is the only person in history to have received both the Nobel Peace Prize and the Medal of Honor. He was the only person to ever come in second in a presidential election as a third-party candidate. He was both a Western cowboy and an East coast gentleman.

Oh, yeah. He was President of the United States too.

Roosevelt was born to a wealthy family in New York City. He attended Harvard University and was elected to the New York State Assembly just one year out of school, becoming its youngest member.

In 1884, Roosevelt’s first wife, Alice, and his mother died within hours of each other. He was devastated and moved to the badlands of North Dakota, living as a cowboy. After his time in the West, Roosevelt returned to New York City, remarried, and reentered politics. He always had a great love for nature and did much to promote conservationism in the United States.

During the Spanish-American War, Roosevelt led the “Rough Riders”—a small regiment of volunteer servicemen—in the Battle of San Juan Hill, an act for which he was awarded the Medal of Honor posthumously in 2001. He returned home, was elected governor of New York, and within a few years was vice president of the United States.

President William McKinley was assassinated in 1901, making 42-year-old Roosevelt the youngest United States president in history. He was a successful president who worked to move his party toward Progressivism, cracked down on monopolies, promoted the conservation movement, and promised Americans a “Square Deal” under his domestic policy. While in office, he also led the completion of the Panama Canal and negotiated an end to the Russo-Japanese War, which earned him a Nobel Peace Prize.

After he served as U.S. President, Roosevelt went on a safari to Africa. He went to South America a few years later and contracted malaria while there. He also battled an infection in his leg. He said the trip took 10 years off his life, and he died in his sleep at the age of 60 just a few years after his return home. Thomas R. Marshall, vice president of the United States at the time, said “Death had to take Roosevelt sleeping, for if he had been awake, there would have been a fight.”

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Her friend and colleague Tsung-Dao Lee praised her as a scientific genius in her own right, female or not: “C.S. Wu was one of the giants of physics. In the field of beta decay, she had no equal.”

But before she was a successful world-renowned physicist, Chien-Shiung Wu was a young girl living in China. She was born in 1912 in Taicang and grew up in Liuhe, a small town near Shanghai. She attended school in China and studied physics at the National Central University of Nanjing. Wu then decided she needed to continue her studies at a higher level in the United States and took a steamship to California.

Wu studied at the University of California, Berkeley and became a graduate student under Ernest O. Lawrence, who won the Nobel Prize for physics in 1939. Wu received her Ph. D. in 1940 and later became a professor at Columbia University where she spent most of her career.

Wu worked on the infamous Manhattan Project after joining the research staff at Columbia in 1944. She used diffusion techniques to separate a certain isotope of uranium from the more common form of the element, which was instrumental to the project.

As impressive as her work on the high-profile project was, however, she is best known for an experiment she conducted to help friend and colleague Tsung-Dae Lee and Chen Ning Yang test their hypothesis that the Law of Conservation of Parity didn’t apply in the weak nuclear force. Her experiments validated their thoughts and dramatically changed the way we understand the physical world. Lee and Yang won the Nobel Prize for their work in 1957.

Wu made several other significant contributions to the scientific world. Her book, Beta Decay, remains the standard reference in that area of physics. She also worked on research related to sickle-cell anemia. Wu has demonstrated that with talent and hard work, even a young Chinese woman in the early 20th century can change the world.

Rather than learn sign language and attend deaf schools, Heather attended mainstream schools. She relied on lip reading and struggled to keep up with her peers. She was greatly inspired when she learned about the life of Helen Keller, a fellow Alabaman. Heather requested that she be sent to the Central Institute for the Deaf, where she would be given an opportunity to catch up to the other children her age. She excelled in this environment and later returned to mainstream, public education, graduating from high school with a 3.6 GPA. 

While attending Jacksonville State University, Heather competed in the Miss American pageant. Many people around the nation looked to her as an example of rising above challenges and believing in yourself. After a series of several smaller victories, Heather was crowned Miss America in 1995. 

As the first deaf Miss America, Heather broke down social barriers and changed the way many people viewed disabilities. She promoted a achievement program called S.T.A.R.S., standing for Success Through Action and Realization of your Dreams. Heather’s life is a perfect embodiment of the five points of the S.T.A.R.S. program: positive attitude, belief in a dream, willingness to work hard, face obstacles and build a strong support team.