Exciting news… its a Boy!

For those if you I haven’t had the chance to catch up with yet, I have some great news!

It’s a boy; I am a dad for the 4^th time!

Little Thomas Boyd was born on the 12^th of November, weighing in at 7.65 pounds.

He and mum are both healthy and happy, and I couldn’t be happier!

One of my goals in life was to have 4 kids, so I can tick that off my bucket list.

We went into the hospital at 6.30AM, then into the delivery room at 8.30AM and the doctor delivered Thomas at 10.30AM by caesarean section delivery.

A few hours later, Thomas was ready for his first feed and colostrum was on the agenda (the fluid secreted from the boob, prior to milk coming out.

Did you know that it can take 3-7 days for the breast milk to appear, so in the mean time baby drinks what little colostrum they can get and loses about 10% of their body weight in the process or they can have a mixture of colostrum and infant formular.

Mum can if she likes, avoid breast feeding completely and put bub on formular from day one if that suits.

Over the next 6 weeks (which they learn in the first few hours) baby can get a feed when every they want, all they have to do is squeal and milk is on tap (be it breast or infant formular) 24 hours a day, 7 days a week… and boy don’t I know it!

What I picked up in the process of welcoming my 4^th child into the world is that for the sake of convenience, we introduce children into the world, setting them up and training them for immediate gratification!!

The doctor wants the child delivered at a set time so he can stack the deliveries, efficient, productive and profitable, immediate gratification…

The mum doesn’t want to breast feed, give the baby infant formular, problem solved, immediate gratification…

The baby doesn’t wait 5 days sucking non stop for a decent feed then finally, mothers breast milk comes through, so instead, gets the formular straight away, immediate gratification…

Through out the growing years, the kids get toys regularly, they ask and they receive, immediate gratification…

The old lessons we were taught as kids, lessons like;

• get what your given or you go with out
• money doesn’t grow on trees
• take care of that because you wont get another one
• wait until Christmas and see what Santa brings you
• eat all your dinner because there are starving children in Ethiopia who are dying for a meal like yours

These lessons are probably as endangered as the T-Rex was 65 million years ago…

The funny thing is…

Once you get your baby at home all the systems, schedules, plans and projections go out the window and we are told “every baby is different and there is no set formular, you just need to take notice and do what you can when you think its right.

For someone who likes systems, process, planning and outcomes, I found it very hard to just ‘go with the flow’ and wait and see with my kids.

Time is more and more valuable as we in the western world evolve and people will pay anything or anyone to make their life easier or give them immediate gratification…

I know someone who has a full time nanny, full time PA, house keeper and who swears that unless they also get a ‘night time nanny’, they won’t be having another child (no it’s not my wife thank goodness).

So in this world of immediate gratification and commercialism, what can you do as a business owner to provide that immediate gratification for your clients and customers?

What do you do to solve your client’s problems?

What new markets or niches could create or serve that aren’t currently being properly serviced now?

Virtual services

Over the lat 5 years we have seen an exponential growth in the number of services sourced from over seas.

Accountants are having all the “number crunching” done over seas (at a fraction of the cost of here in Australia) and charging the same rates, making fantastic profit.

I employ staff in Bali, India, Pakistan, Slovenia and the US, these people provide services to my businesses and my clients at a fraction of the cost of what they would pay here in Australia for.

Personal Services

On the home front, we can have gardeners, lawn mower services, house keepers, personal PA, nanny, cleaner, image consultant, online clothes, shoes, toys, and grocery shopping, home deliveries, often free of charge from across the world or Australia wide.

The point is, as the world gets smaller, it also gets more competitive, the cost of increased competition is less time to do the things we used to do, wish we could or what we should do …

If your products, services or delivery of service makes life easier for your clients and customers, easier than you competition makes it, then you have the market to yourself!

Global services

I remember five years ago hearing about a window dressing company who had 20 outlets in the US that would measure up the orders. The orders would be emailed to Queensland, Australia and then sent to China to be made up and exported to the US in just a few days.

I just received a delivery of new business cards that we designed in the US, manufactured in Europe and then delivered to Perth in 3 days…

If you want to discover where you can serve your clients and customers better, to identify and then create a market which isn’t being serviced at the moment and you would like to position yourself separate from the competition, but you don’t know where to start… We can help!

Let’s discuss this at our next meeting!

To your business success!