How to Change Your Perspective on Age When You Are the Oldest

Jan 13, 2016

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Mike

in TODAY’S ISSUES

Have you ever heard the remark that age is relevant only if you are a cheese? All of my career it seemed I was one of the youngest guys in the room. Then, overnight, I looked around and was shocked to discover I was the oldest guy in the room. Working on my third career, I don’t know why that should have been a surprise to me.

Check out our thoughts on team leverage.

It was though … a reality check. But why? Who knows, especially since I have no fear about the value I bring and my ability to keep delivering relevance in a young person’s world going through rapid change. Luckily the feeling did not last long.

Marketing, at its best, is about the future. Unfortunately, we spend most of our time stuck in the past. We research what already happened and extrapolate forward to produce a plan. It’s not that we’re lazy, we simply know a whole lot more about the past than the present or the future.

We already know that marketing is becoming more social, local, and mobile, just as we know that big data and new interfaces such as touch, voice, and gesture are becoming increasingly more important. What comes next?

Here are my top 5 tips on how I focus on keeping ‘one step ahead’ of the cheese:

Do not rest on past successes …

There is nothing more dangerous to life success than a great last result, is there? We are ‘only as good as our next result’. Stay paranoid.

Age is relevant … make yourself a project

Hairdressing icon Vidal Sassoon was famous for having said: “The only place you’ll find success coming before work is in a dictionary.” We have to work on ourselves. Put pressure on ourselves. Critique our days. Give back to society. Be our own very best coaches and cheering squads. All of this applies as much for our personal lives as for our business lives.

Continue to add to your connections and be a continuous learner …

Woody Allen said: “85% of the secret of success is just turning up.” Turn up to events. Make that phone call. Read that book. Do that training. Have the courage to ask that question. Make the effort. Stay connected to what’s happening around you.

Age is relevant … is a priority ‘ninja’

Getting more of the important things done every day. Be obsessed with getting priorities rights, on what’s really important, every day, and make sure you spend the majority of your day on these priorities.

Creative minds online … embrace change

Darwin said it was not the strongest of the species that survived, but the ablest to adapt to change. There will be more change in the next five years than we’ve seen in the past 50. Get excited by change. Be part of the most movements that you can. Help shake things up.

The bottom line

“I knew that if I failed I wouldn’t regret that, but I knew the one thing I might regret is not trying.”

For some reason, many of us have been conditioned to be more afraid of failure than we are of inaction. However, failure, in addition to being inherently valuable as a learning process, contains within it the chance of success. And no matter how small that chance is, it’s better than the chances of success when we choose not to even try.

We’ve got one shot at our lives.

Work hard on yourself to stay relevant if you want the chance to avoid being the cheese.

All you get is what you bring to the fight. And that fight gets better every day you learn and apply new ideas.

When things are not what you want them to be, what’s most important is your next step.

Test. Learn. Improve. Repeat.

Are you devoting enough energy to innovate your social media strategy?

Do you have a lesson about making your advertising better you can share with this community? Have any questions or comments to add in the section below?

Mike Schoultz is the founder of Digital Spark Marketing, a digital marketing and customer service agency. With 40 years of business experience, he blogs on topics that relate to improving the performance of your business. Find them on G+, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

Digital Spark Marketing will stretch your thinking and your ability to adapt to change. We also provide some fun and inspiration along the way.

How to Change Your Perspective on Age When You Are the Oldest

Check out our thoughts on team leverage.

It was though … a reality check. But why? Who knows, especially since I have no fear about the value I bring and my ability to keep delivering relevance in a young person’s world going through rapid change. Luckily the feeling did not last long.

Marketing, at its best, is about the future. Unfortunately, we spend most of our time stuck in the past. We research what already happened and extrapolate forward to produce a plan. It’s not that we’re lazy, we simply know a whole lot more about the past than the present or the future.

We already know that marketing is becoming more social, local, and mobile, just as we know that big data and new interfaces such as touch, voice, and gesture are becoming increasingly more important. What comes next?

Here are my top 5 tips on how I focus on keeping ‘one step ahead’ of the cheese:

Do not rest on past successes …

There is nothing more dangerous to life success than a great last result, is there? We are ‘only as good as our next result’. Stay paranoid.

Age is relevant … make yourself a project

Related post: Lessons Learned in LIfe … Class Contiues Daily

Continue to add to your connections and be a continuous learner …

Woody Allen said: “85% of the secret of success is just turning up.” Turn up to events. Make that phone call. Read that book. Do that training. Have the courage to ask that question. Make the effort. Stay connected to what’s happening around you.

Age is relevant … is a priority ‘ninja’

Getting more of the important things done every day. Be obsessed with getting priorities rights, on what’s really important, every day, and make sure you spend the majority of your day on these priorities.

Creative minds online … embrace change

Darwin said it was not the strongest of the species that survived, but the ablest to adapt to change. There will be more change in the next five years than we’ve seen in the past 50. Get excited by change. Be part of the most movements that you can. Help shake things up.

The bottom line

“I knew that if I failed I wouldn’t regret that, but I knew the one thing I might regret is not trying.”

We’ve got one shot at our lives.

Work hard on yourself to stay relevant if you want the chance to avoid being the cheese.

All you get is what you bring to the fight. And that fight gets better every day you learn and apply new ideas.

When things are not what you want them to be, what’s most important is your next step.

Test. Learn. Improve. Repeat.

Are you devoting enough energy to innovate your social media strategy?

Do you have a lesson about making your advertising better you can share with this community? Have any questions or comments to add in the section below?

Mike Schoultz is the founder of Digital Spark Marketing, a digital marketing and customer service agency. With 40 years of business experience, he blogs on topics that relate to improving the performance of your business. Find them on G+, Twitter, and LinkedIn.

Digital Spark Marketing will stretch your thinking and your ability to adapt to change. We also provide some fun and inspiration along the way.

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