PR TIMES AFRICA PR TIMES AFRICA Magazine june 2015 | Page 16

Seven Ways
to get out of a Rut
BY PAUL LEMBERG
T
hey say a rut is a shallow
grave with two open
ends. The good news is
that the ends are still open...
which means if you act fast, you
just might out of it.
Rut: a routine procedure,
situation, or way of life that has
become uninteresting and
tiresome... And not
surprisingly, unprofitable.
How do we get into these ruts
anyway? Who would voluntarily
lie down in that grave, shallow
or otherwise? Dr. Edward
Debono suggests that thoughts
are pathways literally "etched"
in our brain as electrical
connections, that get
strengthened each time we think
them - thus limiting our mental
options. Just like cow paths.
It all begins when one of the
cows wanders home from the
field along a new path. Being
cows, others naturally follow,
nicely beating down the grass.
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The next evening our intrepid
cow is a bit less bold, and
follows her own freshly
trampled path, fellow cows in
lockstep behind her. And so on,
night after night, widening the
path into a footpath, which over
time becomes hardened into a
dirt road. More time passes and
the road is paved into a street,
then an avenue, a two-lane
highway, and ultimately an
interstate.
By the time you come roaring
up the onramp in your shiny
SUV, your direction is all
mapped out in front of you.
There's no way to turn, and
nowhere to go but towards the
next exit. If you want to chart a
fresh direction you are going to
have to grab the steering wheel
and give it a hard, gut-
wrenching yank to the right.
And so it is with your thoughts
and actions. Repeating them a
few times all but insures you
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1ST EDITION
will comfortably repeat them
indefinitely unless you take
deliberate - possibly disruptive -
action to do otherwise.
Here are seven rut busters I use
with my business coaching
clients that you can apply
immediately to get yourself and
your business out of a rut.
1. Shift your mindset from self
to customer.
Most business people think of
themselves first. They craft
product and service offers from
their own perspective and
consider themselves the
beneficiaries of their actions.
While that's not wrong, to get
out of your rut do this: put
yourself into the mind of your
customer.
Who are these people anyway?
What are they concerned about?
What are they trying to
accomplish?
If you were your customer, what
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