Often times when we see people doing very well in business, career, legal practice etc. we acclaim their successes to their talents or gifts. You will hear phrases like “He is gifted”, ‘She is naturally talented” and so on.

Truth be told, some people have natural flairs towards certain things; they can easily acquire knowledge or understanding in doing those things than others. They still though, have to strive or practice over and over again to attain mastery.

Attaining mastery in anything does not come cheap or easy. You have to deliberately practice over and over again to be very good at it. This same principle applies to business mastery effectiveness.

The belief that people are naturally talented to excel in business, legal practice or any professional career, is a myth. There are principles that guide every business and profession. Once you follow the guiding principles, you will excel regardless.

No matter how successful in business or in career people are, if they don’t stick to the success principles, ethics, habitual discipline that brought them to where they are, they will go bankrupt and fail.

There is nobody that is failure-proof. The only things that are failure-proof are PRINCIPLES. So, find a way to weave the unfailing principles, ethics etc. into your daily routine and gradually you will experience growth. A consistent ordinary routine built on principles will produce massive results.

Here are 5 critical insights necessary to be sustainably successful in your legal practice as a business.

1. Commitment to Mastery and Excellence

There is no successful entrepreneur or business owner that you wish to be as successful as, that is born with an innate set of skills that produce business excellence and success. They all have had to commit to mastery and excellence. They work hard in mastering their art. They practice, test, think, correct and practice over and over again.

To attain that level of success, you need to commit to mastery and excellence in your career more than before.

2. Do not attempt to re-invent the wheel

When you try to re-invent the wheel, you will make your journey slow, painful, expensive, long and daunting. When you stay with the principles that work it will save you time, money and energy. You will get to your destination faster.

When you know the route (the principles that work) the journey to your destination will be smoother and faster. So, pattern your daily routine on success principles.

3. Have an advisor. Practice makes permanent

Practice does not make perfect, practice makes permanent. It does no good to practice the wrong thing. Get an advisor or a coach or a mentor to watch your swing, to watch your game and provide candid advice about what you are doing wrong and how you can improve and do better.

Humans that we are, we tend to romance our ideas and decisions without totally looking at it to weigh the pros against the cons.

Therefore, do not rely on your own emotional judgment. Have an advisor or a coach or a mentor to diligently critique you.

4. You must get better to do better

People do better in businesses or in careers because they get better. They don’t do better because they necessarily want to do better.

So, to achieve a new outcome, you have to learn something new and practice what you’ve learned. Knowledge unused is a wasted effort. Application of knowledge acquired gives power, excellence and mastery.

5. Make better choices

People with better lives made better choices. People with a lousy life have made more lousy choices. If you want to improve your life, you need to create and make better choices.

In conclusion, there are only two types of cheques that are available to write in business and in a career.

(i) The SMALLER less expensive cheque of mastery and excellence cashed by willing and committing to doing the required hard work and applying principles that work OR

(ii) The BIGGER more expensive cheque of trial and error “cashed” by ignoring principles that work.

Everyone has a cheque to write. One happens to be far smaller than the other.

So the question is, “Which of the cheques are you writing?”

Let us know in the comments section.

To your success

Luke Ikekpolor