Yes, what Barrack Obama the President elect did in the US presidential election 2008 is the embodiment of The Spirit of America. He is the finest example of The American Way! I have being analyzing what it takes to be an entrepreneur and the Obama victory is a classic example of an entrepreneur who crossed the finish line.
An entrepreneur is that rare person who takes on a risky Project X that most of us ordinary people never dare to do or understand the risk taking and when he win, he can win very big as President elect Obama shows. The biggest prize ever: Winning the Presidency of the United States Of America!
If you look at it this way, the President of the United States of America is the biggest entrepreneur in the world, nobody takes on a bigger project and realize his dream than the person seeking the US presidency. When we talk about the Spirit of America, it really means the entrepreneurial spirit that set America apart from the rest of the world. While the rest of the world may be surprised at America electing the first black man as president, they did not realize the underlying attitudes and supports the person must have to succeed. It got nothing, I repeat, nothing to do with color. It got to do with the very soul of the person, how he look at life. The Spirit of America is really the entrepreneurial spirit and the quest for the US presidency is the clearest illustration of this Project X that comes to fruition. Lessons here that can be applied to any person’s Project X, whatever you may have.
Dissecting Obama’s Election Victory: If you are an entrepreneur you probably see what I mean.
Top ten reason why he succeeded, in no particular order:
1 Oprah Winfrey’s endorsement. Fund raising early in game. You remember there was a big Oprah endorsement for Obama in Hollywood to bring in the big bucks. That is like an angel investor fueling Obama’s presidency project. It’s the kindling that become a small fire , the angel investment from Oprah, money and prestige, that give life to Obama’s campaign, turning his campaign gradually into a roaring fire, first overcoming his own party’s most formidable opponent Hillary Clinton, next overpowering John McCain , ‘incinerating’ his foe by a lop sided electoral vote victory of 2 to 1 ratio!
2 Able lieutenants, two capable sidekick strategists like Karl Rove for Bush. It will be very difficult for an entrepreneur to succeed if he does not have a capable sidekick to brain storm and execute his programs.
3 Rubbery soul. Yes, persistence is an absolute must to succeed as an entrepreneur but there is a fine line between being foolishly persistent and persistent that is based on valid arguments. For every setback, he ask himself if he should press forward, but he won’t just give up easily and press forward using his all important intelligence to get closer to the finish line. For example it’s silly to have a rubbery soul, persisting to fight a 100 year war to win for winning sake, it’s far better to call it quit to cut one’s loses if one spend 10 years on a war and it get’s nowhere. You hear me Prez Bush?
4 Marketable product ie Democratic policies appears to sell well with the general population so he won.
5 Product is past alpha stage, already have a prototype, this in fact is a very difficult part of this whole project. Nobody wants to talk to you until you get to this stage first. You are just a lot of ‘noise’ at this early stage. You can be good in all other aspects, have hope, blah blah but if your product is not viable prima facie, then you just don’t have much chance to succeed if ever. You cannot sell something that people don’t want, try as you might to cultivate them but people are resistant to stuff that they don’t see it do any good to them immediately. Most of them are short sighted, any wonder then why people got misled by ‘introductory offers’ . Unable to get pass this alpha stage is the singular reason why most of us, ( including me!) is unable to get to the finish line. It is as if your project is still born, so how can it ever move forward? The Obama camp must have done a lot of internal polling early on to test their political positions and find which policies will win the most votes without being too specific early on…. These early positions is akin to the alpha stage prototype I mentioned above, an apparently saleable ‘introductory offer’ product.
6 Financing. Heavy funding to market it to success. That is the art of war practised by the Obama camp. This of course we see how the blizzard of Obama’s advertisement outspend McCain’s heavily drowning out McCain’s message. So a good product still need a lot of money to get past the finish line.
7 Intelligence. Yes, you gotta have ‘business acumen’ you gotta have the ‘right stuff’ to succeed. No use blindly pursuing something when you are not up to it ‘upstair’, know what I mean? However like any realist, he have to surround himself with good advisers to help him ‘fill in the blanks’, nobody can ever know everything but he must know quite a bit to start off with, to get a handle of the big, big picture. So if you don’t know it all, this should not be a reason not to push forward!
8 He tap into the resources of others, their time, money, their skills, in other words he delegate, so he can focus on winning the election without being distracted with stuff that can be delegated to others.
9 There is a fine line, a very fine line between being foolish in pursuing a project to conclusion which may never happen if one takes on a wrong project, an undoable project and one that is possible, however remote, but possible. In this case, Obama rightly takes on this ‘remotely possible, long shot project’ which is not undoable. Frankly speaking an entrepreneur needs all the luck he can get to succeed in record time. In this case President Bush unpopularity serves as an accelerant to propel Obama to victory.
10 Self belief and yes, belief in God’s help. Yes, this Supreme Guidance and self belief propel all the forces in the universe , line them up to direct him past the finish line. yes, through his mindset, he is riding this invisible forces to get him to his destination, the Presidency of the United States of America! Hold on tight to your dream… this is the hope, attitude, never let bad news be extrapolated, be like teflon.
P/S: It’s fine to talk about being an entrepreneur, but if the goal post keep changing beyond your control, you can be as entrepreneurial as you want and gets nowhere. For example you develop a new software, big money potential, but by the time you finish your product, your creation becomes obsolete due to fast changing technology. You better pray God don’t deal you a bad hand, making your life miserable!
