CHAPTER 1
Competent
Wealth Maker
When you wake up in the morning and you go to town, especially on
Mondays, you would see lots of people in a hurry going to work. Everybody is
going about their own business and they
have one thing in common, they want to achieve something. This has led to the
starting of many businesses, job hunt, opening of radio and TV stations,
creating of music albums and so on. All these are a means to an end. But, are
they all able to achieve what they aspired for? No, only a few people succeed.
What people need to factor into the equation is competence. You can pray and
work hard for so many years, but if you are not competent, forget it, you are
only wasting your time. We often hear of competence when we want a job and
sadly that word disappears after that.
Competency is when you are equal to the task. It is when you know
what to do to generate results. It is when you have achieved success
continuously and you know for sure that you can deliver. To be competent also
means you know how to put certain behaviours together to generate the success
that you seek. If it is your dream to own a business, you need to know how to
raise money, network relationships, negotiate among other qualities.
We in Africa must be smarter and work harder. We must have tight
schedules if we want to be successful. We must make tough decisions and
persevere till we see what we want materialized. If you want to make it, then
you should be prepared to pay the price for it. All things are possible. What you
see around you once existed in someone’s mind. In your mind is great and
beautiful ideas but the world is not going to see it when you sleep because you
think there is no hope.
We came to this world with nothing but what you need to make it in
life is available in abundance. You need the strength to take your share and
that strength is called competence. In the chapters that follow, you are going
to learn what you need to know about competence so as to develop one by design. Then, the part two shall be crowned with
ideas to remove the leash from your success.
CHAPTER 2
Men of
Exploits
Achievements are the end product of the pursuit of purpose and
destiny. Look at a person’s life after he has made it, and, you would know why
he has been working so hard. The help to societies' unfortunate ones, the
luxury and peace of mind, the respect and envy that goes with it!
Achievements take many forms; real estates, airlines, radio
stations, music albums, political parties, churches, orphanages among others.
It is a subtle mosaic that not every one can lay hold on. Nevertheless, we have
heard and seen people achieve so much in our time.
There are unfortunate under-achievers in our society, and, it is for
them that this book is written. The list of achievers below would quash all
your excuses and make you sit up. We have been undone by our excuses when we
could have made it too. Yes, it is important for you to make it in life; it is
the only way by which you can be at ease with your life, family and society. We
all owe our society something.
If you use lack of education as an excuse, know that there are
people without formal education who have made it and employed the educated.
Using scarcity of financial resources as an excuse is not valid because, others
did not have it but managed to finance their projects somehow. The only common
denominator between you and your wildest dreams is difficulty. It is difficult
and it has always been and forever will.
My encouragement to you is that, what ever you want to achieve in
life is possible. It has been achieved before. Shake off the cloud of
negativity in your mind and have faith. Believe you can make it. It is
possible. Wherever you are, whoever you are, success is beckoning at you. A
careful glance at those who have made it would reveal some shocking truths to
you, that, you are in a better state than when some men begun. You are
better than somebody and you can make it. Rearrange the puzzle in your life
once again.
CHAPTER 3
A Sure Thing
This chapter describes how you
can grow your competence from that of a novice to the expert level, from
unconscious incompetence to conscious competence. Your competency should reach a level where it
is a ‘sure thing’ to bring success. That is to say that, if you should attempt
on a venture, all
other things being equal, you would deliver an ‘A’ result. For instance, modern
football club owners employ football coaches because they do so knowing the
certainty of the kind of results the coaches can deliver. This is what
competence is all about. It is honing your skills and abilities so well that
‘we know what you can do’. Some people are job magnets, because of this, managers
all over the world are prepared to pay any amount for these breed of new
people. We seek no trial and error.
What percentage would you
allocate to yourself if you were given the chance to do what you have been
dreaming about all your life? Would it be 95 percent? You need to understand
that even in the current job acquisitions, employers want somebody who has a repeated
success over what they want to employ them for. That is why there is an area in
your CV that stresses job experience and achievements. They look for somebody
who is deft with what they do, hence, they
ask for 3 years even to 10 years experience.
Levels of Competence
You need to assess yourself on
your level of competence and know what levels you have left to reach. The
competence ladder is one of the best models we can use to monitor and develop
our competency to the highest level. It is agreed by researchers that when a
person is about to engage in a venture, the a person is unknowledgeable about
his or her weaknesses and doesn’t know that he is not good enough at what he is
about to do (unconscious incompetence); then, he moves on to knowing that he is
not good enough (conscious incompetence); then, he develops himself and becomes
better but doesn’t think that he is becoming good or has become good at what he
or she is about to do (unconscious competence); and finally the person through
one way or the other discovers that he is able to perform excellently
(conscious competence). Other writers (Dreyfus and Dreyfus) have come out with
similar levels of competence and it is also very appropriate and can be used to
monitor and develop our skills; novice, experienced beginner, practitioner,
knowledgeable practitioner and the expert.
Unconscious incompetence: This is when you are not aware that you don’t know that you are
lacking in skills; it’s totally on your blind side. For example, you want to
own a business and perhaps you have started but you are ignorant of the skills
you lack. You may work but may not know that you are doing badly. You may be
having financial problems but you don’t know that you can even collect some
loan from some financial institution to build your business.
To surmount this problem of the
mind, find out the competence requirements for what you are doing. This would
unveil your ignorance which would lead you to take a remedial action. If you
don’t know that you have a problem, how can you rise up to solve it? Therefore,
it is wiser for us to keep learning through good books and from other relevant
source of knowledge to help us discover what we are lacking. Getting involved
with a venture may also reveal your problem as you suffer.
Unconscious competence: Here, you have been educating yourself and practicing so that you have
become a master at what you do, but, you are not aware that you have become
good at what you do. You still think you don't know or you are a novice. If
somebody should tell you how excellent you have become at your work, you’d feel
flattered and may think it’s not true.
However, at this stage, you
haven't repeated your actions till you are certain of a top-notch delivery,
you're only a master. So what should you do? Assess yourself, after all the
reading and working what can you produce? This period demands active
participation. One may ask, ' if I want to become president how do I get this
experience?' My advice to such a person is to get involved in anything that
would help him or her practice 'presidency'. Thus, you can be an assembly man,
SRC leader, church youth group leader and the like. Get a leadership position
at where you find yourself. Skills are transferable.
Conscious competence: At this stage you are aware of what you can do. Your confidence at
this stage soars because you have chalked some successes behind you. For
instance, in the Bible when David was asked whether he could kill Goliath he
was so full of confidence and started telling the interviewing panel what he
had done with the lion and the bear. He knew he could transfer the same skill.
So what should you do at this
stage? Measure yourself. If you actually got involved in a big project do you
have the technical, human and other skills that go with it? What history do you
have in your CV? Is it relevant?
I must remind you that, you
need a lot of time to get there - they call it years of experience. At the
outset, figure out what you want to do with your life and get at it. I have
noticed that most people who achieved success in their life started many years
ago. They made all the mistakes and understood the work through and through.
For instance, it is said of Donald Trump that his parents were into real
estate. He'd watched them work; he would get involved right from school and
learn the profession. It’s wiser not to be jack of all trades and master of
none.
Reaching the conscious
competent level is the sure thing. You have become an expert and the world is
yours. There is hope for your dreams and aspirations because you have the most
important thing - a 90 percent certainty of success. Every other thing is
secondary.
CHAPTER 4
Identify Your
Competencies
This
chapter explains the types of competencies. Readers should not overlook this section
as the understanding of competency would help you to develop your own. The lack
of understanding of this concept has wasted many peoples' time, because, they
do one thing today and tomorrow they change to something else. The ignorance of
this concept has also led people to develop stunted growth with their God given
abilities. They don’t know what they are doing, so they stop short of
developing their skills to the highest level; they can do the work but it lacks
swag and it is always shoddy. Had they known the path on which they were
trekking, things could have been different for them.
You
should at this point, identify the competency you want. Your ability to
pinpoint the appropriate competencies for yourself is very important. Once you
identify what is appropriate for your situation you don't waste your time
misfiring. You would discover that your purpose fits in one or two in the types
described here. You may even have to blend the types to suit your situation,
but the most significant thing is that you succeed in knowing exactly what you
want. Then on, you can build your competencies by design.
CHAPTER 5
Competence
Building Blocks
Chapter five shows the medium by which competencies are developed
and shows you nine special areas by which you have to be competent. Please get
the book for full details
CHAPTER 6
Develop Top-Notch Competencies
The quest for the realization of your destiny should
first begin with the quest for competence. Once you become competent it is far
more possible for you to achieve your purpose in life. If you want to surpass
your predecessors you need to develop yourself to the maximum, then you can
match them in terms of achievements. Even if your father leaves you a business
and you don’t have the expertise to handle it, the business might collapse.
Resources are available. Everything depends on your
ability to organize them. Is it the lack
of money hindering you? Whatever it is, you must train yourself to overcome
that area so as to rule your world.
Know what you want to
do or become
Turning yourself into an expert should first start from
identifying what you want to do with your life. What products or services do
you want to bring? What do you want to become? These are important questions
you need to answer.
Develop your
self-awareness
You also need to know your present state relative to what
you want to do. Do you have the natural talent for it? Would you enjoy doing
it? Your present status is important as well. Which level do you belong to
presently? Is it the unconscious incompetence or conscious competence? Are you
good at relationship building? Doing you know how to raise funds very well and
develop profitability from your ventures? Knowing your status would make you
know where to start from. In considering your present status, can you achieve
your goals? You have to be honest with yourself here.
Set your goals and
objectives
Setting your goals and objectives would make you know
what you want from life. Goal setting is like putting a stone to one end and
standing at the other direction and saying to yourself, ‘this is the point that
I want to reach in my life’. It would
allow you to stretch yourself fully. At least, it would show you what you are
up for and give you direction.
Pick your
competencies and equip yourself with them
Here, you list the behaviors that you must possess which
would make you attain your goals. If it is a leadership position that you want,
what skills are you going to need? What should you have in order to make that a
possibility? For instance, you might like to take a course in relationship
building to learn how to develop a following. A course in finance would also
help you to know how to raise funds.
The next thing to do is equip yourself with the
competencies you have selected. Don’t go applying for any job when you don’t
have the qualification for it. By all means get the necessary experience; it
might not be a direct experience but relative. For instance, if you would like
to be a political leader it would do you good to take a leadership position at
school, perhaps the SRC or maybe youth leader at church.
CHAPTER 7
Leveraging
Your Competency
This chapter assumes you have developed your competency. Now you
have to take advantage by profiting from it. That is similar to a person with
lots of cash but don’t know how to invest it. Oftentimes, we don’t benefit from
our skills and expertise. You hear somebody make this comment, “As for me I was
born with music” and yet never create a single album, what a waste of talent!
The instructions here should be your guide if you want to benefit from your
competency.
1. What you develop your
competency from should emanate from your innate abilities.
This is the cause for second rate achievers; most of the times they
are the music artistes who never shine, the writer who struggles to stay in the
field and the like. They never had it in
them but they are stubborn! If you do that you are going to be second best.
Start from what comes to you naturally and build it from there. It makes life
easier for you while others struggle to keep up.
2. Stop switching and stay
in your field
Moving from one career to another makes you a jack of all trades,
definitely you never become a master at anything! Moreover, when you switch you
deny yourself the opportunity of becoming the best in your field. Switch only
when you discover what you do is not the right thing for you or what you are
switching for is related.
3. Begin early
Right from the outset decide on what you want to do and stay
committed. You need ample time to really master what you do. You need years to
make all the mistakes and understand what makes your service or product work.
You need all the time you can get to discover your fit in your area of
endeavour. Verify the background of most great men and you'd see they started
when they were young, right from school.
4. Learn every relevant
thing
These days you cannot afford to learn only one thing. If you did
marketing at school, that alone is not enough. Trouble in business come in
different forms and you should be prepared to solve all problems. You have to
learn to make a speech, raise funds, build relationships, use computer very
well and so on. Make a list of skills you'd need and achieve them.
5. Set the goals
Set some goals for yourself, this is one of the ways to stretch your
abilities. If for instance you want run a TV station, how many stations would
you like to own? Where would you want them located and what would you assign
them for?
If you set limitations on your goals it means you are incompetent in
that area. You might say ' five TV stations? Where am I going to get the money
to fund it?' Straight away you should learn about financing, partnerships,
loans, savings, sponsorships, selling shares and a host of other tools are
available to you.
PART II
CHAPTER 8
Ride your Storm
The part two of this book discusses the limitations often placed on
people's achievements. You meet people, they have everything and yet what
terrible achievements! Sniff around them and the reason is not far fetched;
just some small push and they could have broken through but sadly it is there
that they stop! Back in those days, I lived in a suburb in Accra. I knew a man
who used to advise me and I admired him a lot. I Ieft the area and while
passing by after 8 years, I met this friend and nothing has changed except one
thing, he was aging. I was so morose that day. It was that day that this book
was borne in my breast.
Looking around me, I see lots of capable people in the same
situation. It just surprises me how people so gifted could be trapped and never
improve in their lives. I could have stayed same when I was a store boy
(porter) some years back. I used to complain that my parents did not help me
with my education and when I showed my grades to my boss he wept and that was
all. But one-day while complaining, it hit me like a speeding bullet, 'but I am
now old to pay for my fees?' - After 8 years out of school, I begun and I have
never stopped since.
There is always a reason why we stop at the end of the road, but
that should not be sufficient reason for us to quit or stagnate. We should
delete 'quit' out of our vocabulary! A brand new vehicle used for sometime and
packed for a long time without usage starts corroding and tearing apart. We
were never meant to quit. Drive on until the last minute of your breath!
I believe there is God and he brought us here naked but we are born
in different circumstances some better and others discouraging. Nevertheless,
we receive tools (latent abilities) to work with and moments (opportunities).
You can't tell me there wasn't an opportunity for you to turn around your
situation when you were stuck. We are all given chances, soon it comes.
This book would inspire and direct you to transcend every area of
your life. Read it meditatively and make notes. In summary, this part implores
you not to let any storm in your life ever sidetrack you, but always ride those
storms to greatness. Adversities are disheartening, nobody is disputing that
fact, but they should also be the drive that spurs you for success. I can't see
how the eagle would fly without the storm, they need it!
CHAPTER 9
Great men
Rose to Their Occasions
CHAPTER 10
Why Men
Stagnate
Men are in stages and have levels.
Men enter into different stages of their lives. The natural order is
to grow from babyhood to adolescence, and adulthood into becoming an old man or
woman. We are born, we grow and we die. This is the same for everybody.
Men are also in levels or statuses. It is at the point that men are
not the same. By reason of a person’s status, he could be more wealthy and
powerful than others. Success can bring a man all the good things that life can
offer.
This book was written to aid you learn to reach the highest status
in life a man can. We rise in levels and this rise is precipitated by your
success in life. One of your levels is to complete your education. Then perhaps
have a family and then work. Now, the real levels are in your work for it
determines your status in life.
The levels start with how successful you are. Some people never
attain their full potential in life. For instance, one may attain only the
national level, another continental level and another worldwide. But there are
some levels in life that do not amount much like being a pupils teacher or
having a small company in a store, and staying with it for the rest of one’s
life. Another may be a pastor of 100 members and not progress beyond. Still,
somebody, having lost his father in his lower grade school, might not continue
again. Another person because of some disability would remain in the middle of
the road and not progress again. There is the siege.
A person’s competence may stagnate and be limited, but it is
possible to side step these limitations and proceed with your exploits. These
limitations are conditions that tie people down. It is not a simple thing but a
situation that when anyone is dropped into, will suffer as in the prince and the pauper by Mark Twain.
In the story, when the king exchanged apparel with the poor boy and got to the
slumps, he suffered the evil fate of the pauper. However, the pauper in the
palace, though stack ignorant, lived like a king and reigned. When planting a
viable seed in a loamy soil, the seed has more chance of success than in common
sand. For instance, in Africa though people succeed, it is much difficult when
compared to Europe. Adverse conditions as borne in Africa make it hard for
success. So, you have people scheming their way out through any means
necessary.
The siege or limitation to success has two characteristics:
situational and psychological. The psychological also imply one who has been
disappointed; a bird with a broken pinion never leaves to fly so high. So, one
whose company burnt down may be so broken-hearted and give up the enterprise-
forgetting that he has customers and the skills already and that all he should
do is have courage to set things up once more.
The following are some of the reasons for limitations;
Great expectations; This is when a person expects some favour from life and is
disappointed. For instance, if you loan money and hope it would be returned
with interest but the borrower doesn’t honour his promise. When expectation is
cut off the person surrenders to defeat. Few have the courage to rise again.
Disability; This can be physical or situational. For example, when one has a
problem with parts of the body that incapacitates him. Moreover, a person
without parents may not rise from situation because his is not the normal
situation.
Low level competence; It happens when a person can do one thing. He can sell shoes very
well but does not have the skills (financial, management, foresight) to go
forward. They are everywhere, the same person in a small store for 20years.
Ignorance; A person does not know his Susu Company can be transformed into a
big financial institution. For instance,
partnerships open doors.
Fear; This can be a barrier preventing one from entering his destiny.
CHAPTER 11
How to Transcend
the Siege of Success
The title speaks of itself; you learn about what to do in-order to break the
barrier to your success. What strategies should you adopt to overcome that trap
that have put a leash on your great abilities?
CHAPTER 12
Dream Big
Most people dream small or nothing at all. We say they have no
purpose in life. The pressures of life have forced most people to reduce their
dreams (especially in Africa) until they have nothing left. Soon they
compromise and accept anything life hands over to them; you can see the death
in their eyes, there is no purpose.
Dream big because that is
how it’s supposed to be
The world is now a global village – it has no boundaries, we are all
one. A graduate in Ghana competes with those in Europe; Europeans come to Ghana
to seek employment. The Chinese in Ghana are selling same products as the indigenous. If you dream small a big guy from another country would come with
their big machinery and make nothing out of what you have done. A friend of
mine tried to sell me something at a very affordable price but I could not buy
it because someone was offering a much better price. My friend was not wrong;
the competition changed the game for him. Always have the competition in mind.
Dream big so that when you don’t achieve all you dreamt for, you
could achieve most of it. The secret to stretching your abilities is a big
dream; a dream that look absurd and impossible. When you dream let it be Africa
and the world. A big dream would create a hunger and dissatisfaction in you and
spur you to greater heights.
Focus on both short and
long term
Focusing only on short term gratification would get you nowhere in
life. It means you don’t have the future in mind. Short term satisfaction lasts
for a short time and does not add much to your life. It can be likened to a student
who uses his money for party instead of books. The party ends and the money is
gone and if the book had been bought a better future for more enjoyment would
have been secured.
Long term focus is the secret to great achievements. As they say
easy come easy go. A mosquito takes short time to lay its eggs and hatch its
babies but soon they are dead in three days. A human takes nine months and can
live up to a hundred years. My point is that, when you are building something
big, it takes a long time and that is how it always has been. One needs
patience. However, focusing only on the long term would suck the motivation out
of your life. It should be balanced. As the old cliché goes, all work and no
play make jack a dull boy.
Don’t wait to have
everything
In attempting big things in life, you are likely to face one problem
- scarce resources. But bear in mind that if you want to have everything you
might never begin. Start from where you are and start with the little you have.
One of our African proverbs says, 'God is the one who fans the animal that has
no tail'. Most of the things I have done in my life begun with incomplete
resources. But along the way doors kept opening for me. If you want everything
available before you start then you might as well forget it. Do it little by
little that is how great things have been accomplished. Dream big!
Persevere
Perseverance often becomes stronger when you have a good perspective
as to how things are supposed to be. Life presents things in packages. For
instance, if you want to do your PHD don’t think the package is only the school
fees. It comes with difficult research, financial hardship because you don’t
have much time to work and chase money and so on. The person who has a
distorted view sees financial hardship and quits! Do your calculations properly if you want to
persevere. Don’t keep a myopic perspective of life packages; see everything as
a combined challenge.
Dream big because the purpose of your life is big, it is a worldwide
assignment. You were not born for your country alone but for your world.
Develop a competency to match and you would be able to replicate your
achievements all over the world.
Thank you for having a
taste of HOW TO COMMAND SUCCESS.
Watch out for my book
HOW TO MAKE A HIT.
It is easy to come out with
a music album or any product but how do you make people accept it? How do you
make a hit with your new venture?
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