Capitalizing on Passion as the best form of Specialization and Financial Gain
by Steven Brown
We've all heard the career advice of "do what you love, the money will follow". As an investor, Warren Buffet states it a bit differently: "I buy businesses I can understand". Unfortunately most people don't know how to act on this advice, frequently allowing the unknown of finding buyers to prevent them from creating opportunities. Taking a first step becomes too difficult and nothing happens with their dream.
Here's an example of a very smart woman I know, developing her passion into expertise and business opportunity. Stacy Menas is a college educated IT professional, working at the forefront of automating healthcare business. She also happens to ride a sportbike. Fast. Think race track fast. I personally have driven my sportbike at more than twice the speed limit, but I was essentially going straight. Stacy goes at least as fast while cornering, her knee extended to graze the ground. In the process of going very fast, she's also educated herself on all aspects regarding women riding sportbikes.
Along the way of enjoying her passion she realized that her friends and acquaintances were asking for advice. They recognized her expertise and sought that value from her. She eventually developed her knowledge into a book and is marketing that book through her various sportbike connections and activities. The book, "Starting Out Sportbike: An Introduction to Sportbike Riding for Women", is a getting-started guide for women who want to make good choices with their time and money. The book is now available on Amazon.
I've enjoyed observing the process and brainstorming various marketing venues, messages, and techniques. One that has gotten the most response from her clients is "For those of you Angels that have a little Devil in you", and other variants on that theme. I'll let your imagination run wild about those other variants, and you're probably right.
The important lesson here is Stacy is having fun. On those rainy days in November through March she was thinking about her passion and writing. On sunny days she rides, fast. And all year long, people now pay her money to share that passion.
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David
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1 comment:
Hey Steve,
Nice post. I'm intimately familiar with the "do what you love advice", not so much from personal experience, but from my wife's work. She's a serial entrepreneur; must be on her fifth venture since we started seeing each other. This latest is ViciVino.com (http://www.ViciVino.com), an informational website for people traveling to the various wine regions in California and elsewhere. This combines her love of wine, food and travel, and allows her to dispense information and advice to people who may not have spent as much time as she has on these pursuits. She just launched the website earlier this year, so we're waiting eagerly for the money part to follow, but the do what you love part makes the work easy. Check out the website if you haven't already.
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