Art Williams (Net Worth – 3. 5$ Billion) is the founder of A. L. Williams & Associates. In 1987, he gave a powerful speech which is considered one of the greatest motivational speeches ever. In the speech, he revealed the primary factors that result in winning in business.

I always listen to the speech because it motivates me to take action, and also reminds me about the things I must continuously do for me to succeed. Below are 8 success lessons I learned from the Art William’s speech

1. It’s Impossible to Win in Business if You Don’t Possess Mental Toughness

Success in business requires positivity, the ability to focus, and self-confidence. People who lack these qualities seldom succeed in business because they fall for distractions and give up during hard times. Mentally tough people succeed because they can persevere the difficulties they face in businesses since they are positive, focused, and self-confident.

2. A College Degree in Business is Not Worth The Paper It’s Written On

According to Art Williams, a degree in business is not worth it as most business professors have no business experience because, as he puts it, “they deal with a bunch of theory.”

I support Art Williams because I have a business degree and I’ve never seen its importance in the business world. The business world needs experience and not papers. No matter how many degrees you have, you need experience for you to succeed in business. For this reason, an individual without a business degree but has business experience is more likely to win in business than a person with 100 business degrees with zero business experience.

Furthermore, many people who succeed in business don’t have business degrees because these degrees prepare students for employment. You can’t succeed in business by being prepared for employment, and being taught by someone who has never been in business.

3. Artificial Things are not the Key to Winning in Business

Today, many people think that for an individual to succeed in business, he or she must have artificial things such as a high I.Q, and a college degree. Little do they know that the inner qualities of an individual are the primary key to winning in business.

That being said, a mentally tough person who knows how to relate with people is more likely to succeed in business than an antisocial, depressed person with a P.H.D in business.

4. To Succeed You Must Get Excited

According to Art Williams, only the people who get excited with the journey to success succeed. Excitement makes you do things passionately and enthusiastically hence making it impossible for you to give up. It also makes you work hard because you become obsessed with whatever you are doing.

Furthermore, excitement leads to success because it makes you attract people who are willing to help you achieve your dreams. People prefer working with excited positive people to sad pessimistic folks. Therefore, GET EXCITED.

5. Become a Dreamer

Art Williams agrees that having a dream is a key to winning.

I also believe that having a dream makes you win because in my experience, a dream inspires you to work hard and achieve big things. My dream to have millions of readers in my blog and to inspire the world with my pearls of wisdom always makes me excited and obsessed with working hard because I know that I will be the happiest person in the world if I live the life of my dreams.

This dream makes me work even when I don’t feel like working, and it also makes me embrace obstacles knowing that they are necessary for success.

6. Believe You Can

If you believe YOU CAN’T you will fail because the subconscious mind always attracts situations that match with your thoughts. Besides this, believing YOU CAN’T will result in you wrongly interpreting obstacles since you will see them as a proof that you can’t achieve your goals.

Therefore, for you to win, you must believe YOU CAN.

7. If You Want to Win You Will Be Controversial

If you want to win you will be controversial because you will have to do things that many people don’t. You will have to believe in achieving big things, and you will have to come up with unique products or services that people have never seen. For this reason, people will doubt your success.

8. You Need a Firm Spiritual Life for you to Succeed in Business

Spiritual practices such as meditation can influence success in business because they clear the mind and make it possible for a person to make clear decisions. Besides this, embracing a spiritual life leads to inner peace that helps an individual succeed because a person with inner peace never worries when he or she meets obstacles on the journey to success.

You can check out my article, Does Spirituality Influence Financial Success for a detailed explanation of how spirituality influences financial success.

Hope the article helped. Thanks for reading.

Check out the video of Art William’s Speech and its’ Transcript

You can find me at my private Facebook community: The Unbounded Wisdom Community for more ideas about success

I’m a firm supporter of hard work, and I believe success is impossible without hard work. However, I believe some factors can make your hard work useless. These factors might make you fail regardless of how hard you work.

Here are they:

1. Playing Safe

Hard work and playing safe equals frustration and lack of progress. Hard work only works if you take risks because taking risks opens you up to many opportunities which can result in you making huge steps in your career.

Therefore, be ready to be left behind if you are a risk-averse hard worker because you’ll always avoid taking advantage of risky opportunities that your competitors will exploit.

‘Travelling on a risk-free road, unfortunately, won’t get you to any important destination.’ – Ernie Zelinski

2. The Lack of Uniqueness

Your hard work will be as useless as shit if you don’t stand out. In the book, Purple Cow, Seth Godin explains how your business or project might fail to attract customers if you don’t offer unique services or products. Today, the competition is tough, and your talent or business won’t get noticed if it is not unique. To be noticed, you have to offer something unique the way Lana Del Rey does it in the music industry. You have to be remarkable and different because no matter how hard you work, you might fail if what you offer is common.

3. Poor Social Skills

Your hard work might be as useless as trap music if you don’t have the right connections. Poor social skills prevent you from having the right connections because they push people away. Besides this, they prevent you from effectively networking hence reducing your chances of success. Conversely, good social skills attract success because they make you a good networker who attracts people with the right connections.

4. Poor Health

No matter how hard you work, you won’t succeed if you neglect your health. Poor health leads to failure because it results in decreased energy and focus levels. Besides this, poor health increases your chances of contracting diseases that might force you to regularly take long breaks from your work hence preventing you from being consistent, thus leading to failure.

5. A Poor Team

If you are working on something with two or more people, your hard work will be useless as my high school diploma if your partners are lazy, unfocused, risk-averse, stupid, egocentric, weed-smoking, alcoholic idiots.  These folks will always drag you ten steps behind every time you make a huge step forward. Besides this, you will also waste lots of energy and time trying to make them a suitable team.

All people who succeeded after working with a team did so because they worked with team members who were as determined and focused as them. Therefore, realize that your hard work will be wasted if you have a poor team.

Conclusion

Working hard and still failing is a depressive thing. Therefore, we must always pinpoint the factors that can make us fail regardless of our hard work. I believe there are many other factors that can make an individual’s hard work useless. You are free to add these factors to the comment box below.

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