Achieve 10X Results with the 10X Rule – ebook review

Motivation is an inside job.

If you’re like the rest of us, chances are you’ve set a goat, laid out the plans and even acted on it but the plans don’t always deliver satisfying results despite your seemingly flawless performance.

This is where the 10X Rule comes in. In this book, realtor, entrepreneur, trainer and New York Times best-selling author Grant Cardone teaches us how to take massive action to take our career, business and other aspects of our lives to the next level.

Massive action has been the single biggest determining factor in any success I have created.

The 10X Rule offers an informed take on how we set goals and why we fail to hit them. First, by setting our goals too low, then not taking enough action or failing to estimate the right amount of action needed to bring these goals to fruition. We also focus too much on the competition and we fail to oversee adversities or hindrances that may come along the way.

About the book

You never do what others do. You must be willing to do what they won’t do—and even take actions that you might deem “unreasonable.”

The 10X Rule is basically setting your eye on a target or targets, anchoring them to a purpose and then doing all sorts of (ethical) things to hit those targets. This will basically include just about everything from cold calls to pitches and follow ups on business deals, communication and compromise on some relationships and pure domination and client acquisition when it comes to your clients and business prospects. To get all these goals, you need to take action, more action – massive action that you commonly do and to do this, we need to change our thinking and moving, things which have been hardwired with years of practice and training.

Cardone writes that there are 2 parts to the 10X Rule:

1. assessing the level of effort necessary to realize a goal
2. adjusting my thinking so that I dare to dream at levels previously unimaginable.

If this was going to work, it would depend on my ability to increase my efforts—not my excuses.

If we are to succeed and even make progress on hitting any of our targets, it is important that we have the right tools in our arsenal and that we know how to use them to our advantage to succeed. Grant puts emphasis on success, “Success is important, it is our duty and there is no shortage of success.” (Cardone, 2011)

Lucky people don’t make successful people; people who completely commit themselves to success seem to get lucky in life.

We, more than we are willing to admit, are responsible for both our success and failure. “Success is not something that happens to you; it’s something that happens because of you and because of the actions you take.” (Cardone, 2011)

We attain or fail to attain success based on the levels of actions we take and Grant identified 4:

1. Those who do nothing
2.  Those who retreat by fear of success or rejection
3. Those who takes normal levels of action; and
4. Those who take massive action.

The major problem we face with our business or industry, according to Cardone, is obscurity. We fail to sell, sign up clients and close deal simply because they do not know who we are or what we represent and in order to change that, we need to do more. We need to dominate and domination will not be possible if we are only going to take normal, average actions to achieve normal and average goals.

The solution is to set up not just mediocre goals but 10X Goals – goals which are both meaningful and big enough to hold one’s attention and commitment.

Your goals are there to fuel the actions you will need to take—so make them big and make them often and then tie them in with your other greater purposes.

Here are some tips from the book when setting goals:

1. You are setting these for you—not for anyone else.
2. Anything is possible.
3. You have much more potential than you realize.
4. Success is your duty, obligation, and responsibility.
5. There is no shortage of success.
6. Regardless of the size of the goal, it will require work.

In terms of work needed to attain success, Cardone believes that we should never pay too much attention on the competition – looking at what others are doing distracts us from taking massive action. He also believes that we should be obsessed with our 10X goals and the amount of work we need to do to be successful.

Obsession is like a fire; you want to build it so big that people feel compelled to sit around it in admiration.

Apart from obsession, the author also advises us to go all in and never hold back. Over-promise and over-deliver. He also believes that time management is a myth and that customer satisfaction is the wrong target.

If you start with a commitment to success and then agree to control time, you will create an agenda that accommodates all you want.

We need to identify our priorities and know where we spend our time because we would need to get more done in order to achieve our 10X goals. Keeping customers happy after they buy or signed up shouldn’t be the focus. The fact that we offered them something, we should have thought about delivering to their satisfaction conscientiously.

The problem should be the customer – the prospect that never buys. Why did we fail to acquire or convert them? If improving customer satisfaction – the number of happy clients or customer, is a priority then, we would need to improve on their numbers.

You will not get to quality without seeking quantity.

My take

I absolutely love the concepts in this book. Grant Cardone used simple straightforward language in delivering his message to the readers. I was woke the whole time I was reading it. It had me thinking, nodding and writing notes and comments on the side margins.

Achieving something worthwhile would require not just big scary goals but also massive action that others would deem both unconventional and unreasonable. You have to be prepared for criticism and fear because both indicates that you are getting other people’s attention and at the same time you are moving – maybe not always in the right direction but moving forward is better than being stuck.

Action is necessary in order to create success and can be the single defining quality that will enable you to make the list of successful people.

The significance of success and the benefits it will bring together with the traits and characteristics that the successful ones have is also another bonus. There’s really nothing groundbreaking in the book but it breaks away from the usual when it comes to approaching our goals and achieving success.

Whether you own a business or you’re working for someone, whether you’re looking to improve social and personal relationships, this book is a good read to open up your mind to the things we commonly miss, overlook and underestimate.

Where to get a copy

You can get a copy of the book from Grant Cardone’s website here. It’s also on Amazon.

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Cardone, G. (2011). The 10X Rule The Only Difference Between Success and Failure. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

The 12-Week Year – an ebook review

Execution is the single greatest market differentiator.

According to Moran and Lennington, 12 weeks is enough time to accomplish or move projects significantly forward and yet short enough time to motivate us to getting things done. The authors argue that we often fail to execute and hit our desired targets with annualized planning because we often think we have plenty of time to get it done. You have an entire year, right?

This is precisely the line of thinking that somehow gets us further behind in executing the plans and attaining the goals. Hence, their solution: The 12-Week Year.

The 12-Week Year posits that we can take on and plan new projects and activities we want to accomplish and work around them on a 12-week period compared to the annual and quarterly planning approaches we’re used to.

About the Book

Divided in to 2 parts, the book teaches us the principles and techniques we need to implement the 12-week year into our personal lives and even careers and businesses. The first part covers the principles and the second part guides us onto using these principles in planning our 12-week year.

There are 8 fundamental components of the 12-Week Year is divided into 3 principles and 5 disciplines. The principles are the foundation of both professional and personal success and these include:

1. Accountability – refers to ultimate ownership of one’s actions to achieve desired results
2. Commitment – refers to a personal promise that reflects into the future
3. Greatness in the Moment – happens the moment one chooses to do the things that needs to be done in order to become great.

The 5 disciplines are required to effectively execute and these include:

1. Vision – painting a clear picture of the future, the emotional connection
2. Planning – focuses and clarifies priorities and actions
3. Process Control – tools and events that align daily actions with critical actions
4. Measurement – provides the feedback necessary to make informed decisions
5. Time Use – being in control of and intentional with time use to achieve results

My Take

“If we did the things we are capable of doing, we would literally astound ourselves.” —Thomas Edison

I find the steps practical and do-able. The components of the 12-week year are really nothing revolutionary. As the authors have pointed out, it’s always a problem of execution and we fail on it because of a number of reasons. It may be because we are overwhelmed, disorganized or just plainly do not have an idea on how to get started.

My personal favorites were the way they tackled commitment – as a promise to one’s self and how it is different from an interest, accountability – in terms of ownership and not as a yardstick or judgment and the greatness in the moment – because all we really have is now (a.k.a. the present moment).

The only way to know if you really can achieve your goals using this technique is to execute. Apply this on your work, business or a passion project you’ve been planning to get off the ground – like this blog of mine – that you haven’t quite gotten around in your mind yet. This might just work for you. I am going to do the same and maybe you can let me know how if these steps are helping you achieve more.

One of my favorite quotes is from Franklin D. Roosevelt, “Above all, try something.” Don’t settle for not getting what you want, failing on your promises and missing the things you know you deserve. When you really want it that bad, then do something, do everything, do whatever it takes – make sure you have exhausted all the possibilities before you even think about quitting or changing your mind about wanting something.

Where to get a copy

You can get a copy of the book from the 12-Week Year website here. Hard copies, Kindle version and MP3 CDs are available on Amazon.

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Moran, B., & Lennington, M. (2013). The 12-week year: Get more done in 12 weeks than others do in 12 months. Hoboken, NJ: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.