My Next Big, Hairy, Audacious Goal

audacious goals, personal goals, business goal

There’s nothing quite as inspiring as setting an audacious goal for yourself.
In the past two years, I’ve set numerous goals for myself. The biggest goal of all was quitting my job and starting my own law firm, which I accomplished in September of 2011.

I didn’t know how it would go – and I don’t know how it will end – but so far, I’ve been much happier with the decision to blaze my own path. I’ve often said I’ve been my most successful throughout this life when I’ve followed a nontraditional path, and that’s never more true than when you start your own business.

Every business is a reflection of its owner, and every person is unique. Which is why your own business must be a unique reflection of you and what value you bring to your target audience.

I am now working with an incredible group of small business and entrepreneurial clients and real estate investors, I have more time for my family (though not always), and I have the freedom to work on new projects like Business Profit Academy and this blog.

More recently, I started working with a business coach which has helped me to hone, focus, track and keep accountable for my numerous goals. I’m reading and studying books such as Good to Great by Jim Collins and Book Yourself Solid by Michael Port (affiliate links). I’ve also gone from large goals to more granular goals as I’ve become more disciplined in using planners to plan out my work on a weekly and daily basis.

That doesn’t mean I’ve given up on big, hairy, frightening goals.

My Next Big Goal

The big goal I am working on now is to build this blog into a platform and a resource for entrepreneurs and small business owners who want to grow their businesses.

I plan to do that by writing about my entrepreneurial successes and failures, interviewing successful entrepreneurs (like this interview) and sharing non-boring legal tips for entrepreneurs. In short: by providing as much value as I can.

I want to diversify my business, to move from a model nearly entirely reliant on one-on-one client-based revenue to one which generates revenue from this blog, and from phenomenally useful, helpful information products like Business Profit Academy.

That’s why I dramatically overhauled Smart Business Revolution in May of 2011. And it’s why I continue to seek out opportunities for learning and developing my abilities so that Smart Business Revolution continues to become more valuable to its readers.

Toward that end, I recently became a charter member of Fizzle, which is a new membership-based online community aimed at helping entrepreneurs to build effective, successful online platforms.

It was started by Corbett Barr, who I met at a book signing for Chris Guillebeau’s $100 Startup (affiliate link) earlier this year, with his partners Chase Reeves and Caleb Wojcik (rhymes with “logic”).

I just signed up, so I don’t have much to share yet. But I’ll let you know in the months ahead what I’ve learned.

When I joined Fizzle, I had to fill out an introduction about myself for the forum, and I thought it would be useful for all of the readers of this blog — just so you can learn a bit more about me and what my goals are for this blog.

So here you go…

My “About Me” Introduction from Fizzle.co

Who am I? I’m John Corcoran

Where am I? I’ve lived in the San Francisco Bay Area for about 10 years (Marin county – the other side of the Golden Gate bridge from San Francisco). But I’ve also lived in Washington, D.C., Los Angeles, Santa Barbara, and outside of Boston.

What Is my Day Job? I have my own law firm in San Rafael, just north of San Francisco. I went out on my own in September 2011 and I’m really glad I did. My clients are mostly small business owners, entrepreneurs and real estate investors, and I help them to grow and resolve disputes.

What am I building? Smart Business Revolution is aimed at small business owners and entrepreneurs who want to grow their businesses without working 24/7. I write about my experiences with entrepreneurship, how to be efficient, I interview interesting entrepreneurs, and I share non-boring legal tips for entrepreneurs.

I work with business owners every day and have the benefit of seeing what works and what doesn’t work, and what missteps to avoid. I share those lessons.

I also recently launched a podcast where I interview interesting entrepreneurs – mostly ones with an offline business that also has some online component. Past or upcoming interviewees include the founder of Lending Tree, a co-founder of LogMeIn.com, the founder of Three Twins all-organic Ice Cream (a super fast-growing national organic ice cream brand), and Fizzle’s own Corbett Barr.

What Is my Goal? The short-term goal of Smart Business Revolution is to support my law practice and provide value for existing clients and attract new small business / entrepreneur clients.

The long-term goal is to create a platform, build a larger following, and monetize the site further especially through e-courses. I’ve co-created one product already (with Kevin Waldron, an entrepreneur/business coach who built a $24M/year business), BizProfitAcademy.com, which is a video training program to help entrepreneurs grow their revenues to increase their business’ value.

Why did I join Fizzle? Like many others who are here (I imagine), I realize my current profession isn’t scalable and has the simple limiting equation of hours worked x hourly rate = income. You don’t get paid if you’re sick, on vacation, or sleeping. I love the variety of building a blog which requires good writing, audio interviews and video – all different skill sets. Also, I love working with interesting entrepreneurs and small business owners who want to grow and I see moving online as an opportunity to do more of that.

What Is Interesting about me? My wife Nicole and I have a two-year-old son who is like a bundle of energy wrapped in a whirling dervish of kinetic motion inside a spastic baboon, but we love him anyways. I love the San Francisco Giants (yay!) and the Washington Redskins (there’s always next year). Before I became a lawyer, I worked in politics, as a writer and speechwriter in the Clinton White House and in the California Governor’s office for the guy who got recalled by Arnold Schwarzenegger.

Photo credit: Microsoft office online.