The 4 Habits You Need to Be Successful

The most successful people in this world maintain and master good habits. They realize what they do on a daily basis and where they direct their energy deeply matters when it comes to reaching their goals.

The habits you have picked up over the past couple of years is a reflection of where you are right this moment.

The sad news is that most people don’t have very good habits. The great news is if you are unhappy where you are at in your life you can gradually change the trajectory by altering what you do daily. To achieve high levels of success, you must start to develop the habits of the highly successful.

Below you will find four habits that will help you maximize the results you have been producing and live the life of your dreams.

1. Focus your energy. Learning how to direct your energy towards your most rewarding tasks is crucial for achieving high levels of success. One of the biggest mistakes that many people make is directing their energy towards low-valued tasks. Take a look at everything you have going on right now in your life. Pay close attention and ask yourself what the high-valued tasks are -- the ones that have the potential to bring the most reward to you and your business.

2. Ability to prioritize. Think of what is your most important goal right this moment. If you had to pick one goal that would make everything else in your life tick, this is it. High achievers never lose sight of what their major goal is. Every day, do something that will inch you closer to the achievement of your main goal.

3. Can project and complete tasks. Being able to start something and follow through until it's completed is a key to long-term success. 

Picture yourself completely finishing your projects and tasks. Take note of how you feel visualizing yourself getting the job done. The more you can picture yourself following through and completing important tasks, the more determined you will be to actually do so. 

4. Having a PMA.To be successful, you need to have a positive mental attitude, or PMA.If you do nothing about negative thoughts, chances are you will be settling for average. Instead, you need to continually feed your mind with positive thoughts. 

A great percentage of successful people have all experienced some sort of setback or failure. They could have just stopped their journey right there and called it quits. Instead, they had a positive mental attitude about themselves and their abilities, which gave them the power needed to continue along and reach their goals. Creating this sort of attitude could be one of your most important habits that you end up incorporating on a daily basis. 

No matter where you are in life, there is always more to reach for. When you constantly strive to become a better person, refine your skill set and invest in your future daily, you become more as an individual. When you become more as an individual, your value increases. The more your value increases, the more successful you will become -- and it all starts with your habits.

Success Will Never Come to Entrepreneurs Who Do These 10 Things

Whether we are talking about a football game, an election or an entrepreneurial journey, one thing is certain -- there are going to be winners and there are going to be losers.

Want to stack the odds of being a successful entrepreneur in your favor? You can start by taking note of the following 10 things that you should never do.

1. Be jealous or envious

Seeing other people around you succeed should motivate you, even if they are your competitors. You should understand that every single person has the ability to become successful, and wasting time focusing on other people’s success or achievements will just sidetrack your own progress.

2. Look back

You are going to face hard times, difficult decisions and possibly even failure at some point. Don’t let small bumps in the road stop your forward progress. Find ways to maneuver around obstacles and continue to push forward, never looking back.

3. Make excuses

If you make a bad decision and screw up, own it. If something doesn’t work out as planned, don’t look for excuses. Search for the cause of the problem and chalk it up to a valuable business lesson. If you identify and own the problem you will not make the same mistake again. If you are constantly making excuses for your mistakes, you will continue to make them because you haven’t properly identified the root of the problem.

4. Stop learning

Your age, years of experience or level of success should never prevent you from learning. There isn’t a single person on this planet who knows everything. We can all continue to learn and be inspired from other entrepreneurs, whether they are billionaire household names or those just starting his or her entrepreneurial journey. 

5. Associate with negative individuals

People who constantly make excuses, complain and have a negative outlook should be avoided like the plague. We all know people like this. No matter what you say or what the situation is, they always chime in with negativity. People like this are a cancer and their negative aura can rub off on you. Surround yourself with like-minded individuals that are as focused and determined as you are.

6. Wake up without a plan

Time management is a crucial part of being an entrepreneur. There are only so many hours in a day, so to be efficient you need to know what your goals are and what tasks you need to get done prior to starting your day. If you are scrambling to create a plan of attack every day you are going to be in trouble. End each day by mapping out the following day’s to-do list.

7. Be scared to make changes and adapt

You need to be willing and able to adjust your plan and overall strategy, because there is a very good chance that you will need to adapt to maintain success in the future. Imagine if Apple never adapted and just stuck to making computers? After releasing the iPod it started manufacturing smartphones, tablets and now are releasing its first wearable technology, the Apple Watch. Once just a computer company, it is now a consumer-electronics powerhouse. 

8. Let your bark be bigger than your bite

Successful entrepreneurs don’t sit back and talk about what they are going to do. They plan, follow through and conquer. Nothing is going to get accomplished just by talking about it, and nobody is going to be impressed with words alone. 

9. Focus solely on dollar signs and decimal points

Instead of chasing the money, focus on creating products and services that make a difference and provide value. If you do this, the money will come. I would be lying if I said the goal of my company wasn’t to make money, but focusing on providing a great service paves the path for the money to follow.

10. Let failure stop you

Most statistics state that eight out of every 10 new businesses fail. Successful entrepreneurs go into everything knowing that there is a chance of failure. If in fact they fail it is viewed as part of their growth and they keep plugging along.

James Dyson is a perfect example, as his first 5,126 prototypes were failures, but the 5,127th one worked and went on to become the top-selling vacuum in the U.S. He is now worth $4.5 billion because he never once let failure stop him.

Wall Street CEO: Every Successful Person I've Seen Shares These Two Traits

After spending 40 years on Wall Street building Perella Weinberg, a global investment firm, Joe Perella has seen people come and go.

In an interview with financial career site OneWire, he shared what he thinks gives people real staying power — the power to build a successful business and brand in an incredibly competitive industry.

“I think successful people work harder than the average person,” Perella said. “They’re all smart. There are a lot of smart people in this world that aren’t successful. Luck enters into it. I call it serendipity. But you make your luck by really working hard … beyond your maximum level.”

Even more than that, Perella said, successful people don't have a maximum level. That is to say, they're always pushing for more. There is no top. There is no success for successful people.

"They're never satisfied," Perella said. "They know they can do it better than they did it yesterday, and they come to work every day saying, 'How do I do it better? How do I make a better firm? How do we earn a better return for our investors?'"

Perella urged young kids starting out in finance to keep these traits in mind, and when they're heading to interview to remember that everyone is good. In fact, everyone is great. The question is why you want to do the work and what you know about the firm.

Michael Bloomberg's Top 5 Tips for Becoming a Successful Entrepreneur

The following are some tips for becoming a successful entrepreneur based on my experience of building a company from the ground up, leading New York City as mayor, and founding a philanthropic organization.

1. Take risks.

Life is too short to spend your time avoiding failure.

In 1981, at the age of 39, I was fired from the only full-time job I'd ever had - a job I loved.

But I never let myself look back, and the very next day I took a big risk and began my own company based on an unproven idea that nearly everyone thought would fail: making financial information available to people, right on their desktops. Remember, this was before people had desktops.

In 2001, when I was debating whether to run for mayor, most people advised me against it. They all were afraid I’d fail. But one person said: “If you can picture yourself giving a concession speech, then why not go for it?” That was the best advice I received – and I followed it.

In order to succeed, you must first be willing to fail – and you must have the courage to go for it anyway.

2. Make your own luck.

Luck plays a part in success, but the harder you work, the luckier you get.

Whatever you choose to do, even if it’s not the job of your dreams, always work hard at it. Be the first person at work in the morning and the last to leave at night. Hard work creates opportunities where your resume cannot.

3. Be persistent.

Persistence really does pay off.

When starting my company, I would go downtown and buy cups of coffee. Then I’d take the coffee up to Merrill Lynch – our target audience – and walk the hallways.

“Hi,” I would say. “I’m Mike Bloomberg and I brought you a cup of coffee. Can I talk to you?”

Even if people were wondering who I was or where I came from, they still took the coffee.

And I kept coming back, day after day, working to build relationships with potential customers. I learned about the audience for our product and what they could really use.

Three years after starting Bloomberg LP, Merrill Lynch purchased 20 terminals and became our first customer.

4. Never stop learning. 

The most powerful word in the English language is “Why.” There is nothing so powerful as an open, inquiring mind. Whatever field you choose for starting a business – be a lifelong student.

The world is full of people who have stopped learning and who think they’ve got it all figured out. You’ve no doubt met some of them already – and you’ll meet plenty more.

Their favorite word is “No.” They will give you a million reasons why something can’t be done or shouldn’t be done.

Don’t listen to them, don’t be deterred by them, and don’t become one of them. Not if you want to fulfill your potential – and not if you want to change the world for the better.

5. Give back.

You are ultimately responsible for your success and failure, but you only succeed if you share the reward with others.

At the end of the day, ask yourself: “Am I making a difference in the lives of others?”

My first charitable donation was a $5 check to my alma mater, Johns Hopkins, not long after I graduated. I was just scraping by back then, but I continued to give. And while the checks may be bigger today, they come with the same spirit. You don’t have to be wealthy to give back. You can give back by getting involved and giving your time and talents. You just have to be committed to opening doors for others.

7 Secrets To Success

#1. Offer solutions, but always begin with problems.

Every time you say, “It’s not that bad,” you minimize the value of  any solutions you find. Never minimize the pain and frustration of others, even when it seems small to you.

The bigger the pain, the more important the solution.

#2. Forget perfection.

Don’t talk yourself out of imperfect solutions unless you have a better ones. I’ve talked myself out of taking action only to end up doing nothing. Worse yet, I’ve let others talk me out of taking imperfect action, even though they didn’t offer anything better.

Talk yourself into, not out of, taking action.

1. Will it help?
2. Will it harm?
3. What happens if we do nothing?

The present coagulates around you every time you talk yourself out of taking action.

#3. Learn while you take action.

Don’t talk about it unless you plan to do something about it.

Welcome those who point out problems. They aren’t the enemy. The enemy is talk without action.

#4. Focus on getting people in the right roles.

Successful leaders understand and leverage the talents, skills, and drives of team members.

Provide leadership and personality assessments. Watch what gets them jazzed.

The trouble with just getting things done is people get lost along the way.

#5. Build energizing environments.

The most important thing about us is the way we treat each other while we do the work.

Spend more time affirming than correcting. Identify simple behaviors that energize. Talk about wins, for example.

#6.  Embrace forward facing contrarians.

Conformists don’t build the future, but forward facing contrarians pull you forward. Protect them from the frustrations of others, as much as possible.

#7. Results don’t define you.

The path to great results is more important than results themselves. Honor behaviors that get you there.

7 Things Warren Buffett Can Teach You About Leadership

The "most successful investor of the 20th century" has a thing or two to teach you about being a great leader. Warren Buffett is a famed philanthropist, business magnate, and sharklike investor. As the CEO and biggest shareholder of Berkshire Hathaway and someone who consistently ranks among the richest people in the world, he's smart, business savvy, and slick, even into his 80s.

However, the "Oracle of Omaha" is also a notoriously frugal spender and reveres value investing. Having pledged to donate 99 percent of his wealth, he's proof that sometimes old-school techniques work. If you're an up-and-coming leader (or just want to be), check out what Buffett can teach you about leadership, wise moves and humility.

1. On risk

"Risk comes from not knowing what you're doing," says Buffett, which means you can do one of two things. Either you can be a big risk taker and gambler, or you can learn what you need to do, play it a little slower, and minimize your risks. Obviously the latter approach is best, but it doesn't lead to instant gratification. Put those multimillion-dollar fantasies on the back burner long enough to get in control of your risk factor.

2. On reputations

"It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you'll do things differently." This is especially true in the digital era, when, if something's in writing or on video, it's forever. You can even take a screencap of a Snapchat, so be diligent when building your reputation--online and off.

Remember Congressman Anthony Weiner getting caught tweeting explicit photos? Yeah, don't be that guy. His reputation is toast.

3. On who you surrounded yourself with 

"It's better to hang out with people better than you. Pick out associates whose behavior is better than yours, and you'll drift in that direction." Birds of a feather flock together, and you're probably not in the position to be anyone's mentor yet. If you surround yourself with better people, they'll inspire you to do better yourself.

As I tell my children, "If you want to soar like an eagle in life, you can't be flocking with the turkeys."

4. On hindsight

"In the business world, the rearview mirror is always clearer than the windshield," quips Buffett. Of course, this is true in every other aspect of your life, too. Stop focusing on that rearview mirror, though, after you've gleaned the necessary lessons from it. Move forward, even if that direction isn't quite as streak-free.

5. On stupid mistakes

"I bought a company in the mid-'90s called Dexter Shoe and paid $400 million for it. And it went to zero. And I gave away about $400 million worth of Berkshire stock, which is probably now worth $400 billion. But I've made lots of dumb decisions. It's part of the game."

No successful person is mistake-free, and that's a good thing. Each stumble is a chance to learn and a warning when you're tempted to do something similar in the future.

6. On knowing when to quit

"Should you find yourself in a chronically leaking boat, energy devoted to changing vessels is likely to be more productive than energy devoted to patching leaks." In other words, ditch the stubbornness and know when to call it quits. Not every project is worth saving.

7. On frugality

Buffett is legendarily frugal. He lives in the same house in Omaha, Nebraska, that he purchased in 1958 for $31,500. He is well known for his frugality, which includes enjoying McDonald's hamburgers and cherry Coke, and his disdain for technology, such as computers and luxury cars. Despite a net worth measured in billions, Buffett earns a base salary of $100,000 a year at Berkshire Hathaway. It's a salary that has not changed in 25 years.

Today, many top leaders take as much as they can and live as extravagantly as possible. More leaders should take a page from the book of Buffett.

Listen to the wisdom of the Oracle of Omaha.

These words of wisdom come from decades of experience, success, and failure. Why make the same mistakes somebody else has already made all over again if you don't have to? With the likes of Buffett doling out advice by the shovelful, take advantage of it--then spend that saved time putting his words into practice.

Book Talk: Diane von Furstenberg on success and empowering women

(Reuters) - Fashion designer Diane von Furstenberg is known for turning her signature wrap dress into a fashion empire and in her memoir, “The Woman I Wanted to Be,” she describes how she did it.

Von Furstenberg, 67, the daughter of a Holocaust survivor, married a prince and become an entrepreneur before her 30s. But success came at a price. Failed romances, health scares and the highs and lows of business marked a turbulent life.

Despite the obstacles, she became the president of the Council of Fashion Designers of America, founded the philanthropic DVF awards and has celebrated the 40th anniversary of her brand. 

Von Furstenberg spoke to Reuters about success, true beauty and her mission to empower young women.

Q: You write that your mother shaped the woman that you are. How did she inspire you?

A: She taught me to be independent and to never be a victim because fear is not an option. All of those things have a huge impact on you even if you don’t realize it, especially after you lose your mother.

Q: What has life taught you about success?

A: Success is like nature, everything keeps moving. I was incredibly successful and young and I lived a total American dream. That doesn’t mean that you can just sit because after success comes other things, like too much exposure and all of the many different things that can happen afterwards.

Q: How do you define beauty?

A: I think beauty is truth. John Keats said that “beauty is truth, truth beauty.” What I discovered in my life and writing this book is that my religion is to practice truth. It is sometimes painful. It is not always easy. It requires a lot of maintenance but it also avoids so many mistakes, compromises and misunderstandings.

Q: Why is female empowerment important to you? 

A: Every woman inspires another woman. When working on my book, I kept on saying, "Why am I doing this? Is this just an ego trip?" But actually you have to be careful with what you say because what you say, I found can really help somebody.

Q: What can people take from your story?

A: Everyone can be the woman they want to be. I have two granddaughters and I always tell them before they go to sleep to be thankful and then think about the woman you want to become.

Why Are Many Smart People Not Rich?

Being smart can certainly help in becoming rich but it's by far not the only and by far not the most important attribute.

I have studied and talked to a lot of rich / financially free people and found the following attributes to be far more important than being smart:

• Having guts, taking risks, and the willingness to constantly expand out of your comfort zone. The willingness to make mistakes and fail and learn from it. Many smart people are restricting themselves by thinking too much about the risks and then not acting upon opportunities.
• Getting the real financial education - you typically can't learn this at school or university (most teachers and profs are poor) and neither from your parents (unless they are very rich) or from an advisor. Why would you take advice from a financial consultant at a bank. If he knew how to do it, he would not work there in the first place. You get the real stuff only from the right mentors (rich people) and people who teach this and eat their own dog food, e.g. Keith Cunningham, Robert Kiyosaki, Harv Eker.
• A positive mindset about money. Many poor (and smart) people think money is something bad, unethical, and that they have to be ashamed if they are rich. If you don't like money and don't think you are worthy of it you will not become rich because your subconsciousness will constantly sabotage you.
• Developing strong social skills like dealing with other people, negotiating, persuading, being a good networker. IQ is not EQ. And even intellectually knowing something does not mean you will automatically act accordingly.
• Self discipline, not looking for instant gratification, a continuous strive for personal mastery, improvement and lifelong learning, going the extra mile.
• Taking action vs. just theoritizing about things. Being hands-on and pragmatic. Many rich people are more Doers than Thinkers.
• Leveraging yourself through other people's time, money, and skills. There is a nice saying: If you are an entrepreneur and are the dumbest person at your company, then you have made a great job and hired the right people. Many smart people are reluctant to use leverage. They want to solve everything by themselves.