Blow Away Movable Barriers to Rapid Profit Growth

A friend of mine was interested in investing. He put all his money into the financial markets and waited for what he had to grow. In fact, he was so optimist that he borrowed lots of money to buy even more.

My friend then went away on a nice hike for three days. At the end, he called his broker and learned that he was broke. Why? His financial holdings had been sold off by his broker to meet margin calls on his enormous debts as the value of his holdings dropped.

Had my friend thought about it, he could have arranged to call from a cellular telephone during the hike. If he had, he could have avoided these large losses and would now be a wealthy man . . . rather than a poor one. Not being in contact during his hike was a barrier to profit growth for the rest of his life. Had he removed that barrier, much profit growth would probably have followed.

As you can see form this example, sometimes it's simply better to remove an obstacle than to avoid it. Let's consider terrain. Some areas, for example, are so mountainous that the only way to avoid barriers entirely is to drive hundreds of miles out of your way around the mountains. Clearly a better choice is to travel through the mountains following a more direct route from which obstacles can be removed at reasonable cost.

If you follow roads and rail lines in such areas, you will usually find your route winds along through valleys cut by streams and rivers. Rushing water and ice have combined over the years to remove many of the rocky obstacles from the valleys. Seasonal water and ice often remain among the most significant obstacles within valleys. For instance, if you travel at the bottom of such a valley, you run the risk of being flooded out during the spring thaws and heavy rains.

Because of those temporary obstacles, most valley roads and rail lines are elevated with bridges and fill above the level of potential flood waters and away from potential rock and land slides. In other cases where the cost is reasonable, water channels are redirected by dams and levees so that the water and ice obstacles are eliminated. In similar fashion, you will find that it sometimes makes more sense to eliminate an organizational obstacle than to avoid it.

In human interactions, the same observation can be made about removing obstacles. For instance, everyone who has ever encountered a bully knows that avoiding a bully only defers, at best, unpleasant occurrences. If you confront and defeat the bully's intent, chances are that you will have fewer problems in the future.

Human attitudes can be tougher obstacles than rock in this sense. But by using the right tools, you can chip away at some of these human obstacles with reasonable efforts until no barrier to progress remains.

Which of your best profit growth opportunities are being blocked by movable barriers? In thinking about this question be sure to imagine your route as though you have no barriers . . . as though you are seeing the pathway from space. Use your imagination about how you might remove the barriers you find. Sometimes dynamite is required but in other cases it will merely be a matter of finding a removal expert.

Don't let the lack of something as simple as a cellular telephone be a barrier to your profit growth.

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