Bud has terrific advice for small businesses about hiring, setting goals and creating the kind of start-up that can grow. 

His
long career as a successful consultant, having earned his stripes at
Harvard and several large companies, makes him one of our star
advisor/bloggers (on My Venture Pad).

Click here to enjoy the podcast!

Welcome to the second edition of Success Common Sense.  This blog is devoted to bringing you common sense ideas on becoming a career and life success.

I have developed a model of career and life success.  You can find this model in the box in the top right of this page.  It has five points:

1. Self Confidence
2. Personal Impact
3. Outstanding Performance
4. Communication Skills
5. Interpersonal Competence

In order to keep my information flow balanced, I have decided to devote one day a week to each of these five points.

• Monday – Self Confidence
• Tuesday – Personal Impact
• Wednesday – Outstanding Performance
• Thursday – Communication Skills
• Friday – Interpersonal Competence

The Star Power model is simple.  Here is a quick overview of each of the five points in the model and the three things most important to each of them.

Self confident people have at least three things in common:

1. Self confident people are optimistic.
2. Self confident people face their fears and deal with them.
3. Self confident people surround themselves with positive people.

People with powerful personal impact have at least three things in common:

1. People with powerful personal impact develop and constantly promote their personal brand.
2. People with powerful personal impact are impeccable in their presentation of self.
3. People with powerful personal impact know and practice the basic rules of etiquette.

Outstanding performers have at least three things in common:

1. Outstanding performers set and achieve goals.
2. Outstanding performers are organized.
3. Outstanding performers are detail oriented and execute well.

People with good communication skills have at least three things in common:

1. Good communicators are excellent conversationalists.
2. Good communicators write in a clear, concise easily readable manner.
3. Good communicators are excellent presenters – to groups of two or 100.

Interpersonally competent people have at least three things in common:

1. Interpersonally competent people are self aware.  They understand themselves, and as a result they understand others.
2. Interpersonally competent people build solid, long lasting mutually beneficial relationships with the people in their lives.
3. Interpersonally competent people are able to resolve conflicts with a minimal amount of problems and upset to relationships.

My aim in writing this blog is to provide useful information for anyone interested in truly becoming a career and life success.  Also, I hope to build a community of like minded people.  I’m hoping that I will get a lot of comments on my posts.  I promise to respond to every comment.

I’m excited about this blog.  It is a spinoff.  I have been writing another blog www.CommonSenseGuy.com for the past 19 months.  Originally, the Common Sense Guy blog was devoted to three topics: career and life success, leadership and running a business.  I’ve found that these three topics were too wide of a focus.  Therefore, I have decided to focus Success Common Sense on careers, and Common Sense Guy on leadership and running a small business.  In this way, I hope to bring more focus to these important topics.  I’m looking forward to posting here and to reading your comments.

That’s it for today.  Thanks for reading.  Log on to my website www.BudBilanich.com for more common sense.  Check out my other blog: www.CommonSenseGuy.com for common sense advice on leading people and running a small business.

I’ll see you around the web, and at Alex’s Lemonade Stand.

Bud

PS: Speaking of Alex’s Lemonade Stand – my fundraising page is still open.  Please go to www.FirstGiving.com/TheCommonSenseGuy to read Alex’s inspiring story and to donate if you can.

Hello, and welcome to Success Common Sense. I’m Bud Bilanich, and I will be writing this blog.  I am an executive coach, keynote speaker and management consultant.  I’ve been helping individuals, teams and entire organizations develop, grow and flourish for over 30 years.

I’m excited about this blog because it gives me a forum for my ideas on what it takes to become a success in your career and life.   I’m hoping that my ideas will provide a starting point for discussion.  Comments are one of the things I love about blogs.  They provide an opportunity for sharing and discussion.

You might be wondering why I am qualified to write this blog.  Here is a little information about me.  I’ve spent my entire career in the human development field.  After studying Human Development at Penn State , I became a VISTA (Volunteers In Service To America) Volunteer – kind of like a domestic Peace Corps, in the fall of 1972. 

After my year of service was completed, I spent the next 15 years working in corporate training and organization development.  Along the way, I received an MA in Organizational and Interpersonal Communication from the University of Colorado , and an EdD (Doctor of Education) in Adult Education and Organization Behavior and Intervention from Harvard University.  I also spent three years on the faculty of the Northeastern University School of Business.

I started a speaking, coaching and consulting business in 1988.  I love what I do, and I enjoy sharing my thoughts.  I’ve written six books – you can find the titles on my website.  I’m in the process of writing a seventh – Star Power: Common Sense Ideas for Career and Life Success.  I am planning on using this blog to help me sharpen my ideas for this book.  That’s why I am so interested in hearing from you and reading and responding to your comments.

I write another blog, www.CommonSenseGuy.com in which I focus on leadership and running a business.  I’d appreciate it if you would check it out.  This blog is an outgrowth of Common Sense Guy, which used to focus on career and life success as well as leadership and running a business.  I have found that career and life success is a topic that is too big to share space with two other topics, so I have decided to create a blog specifically dedicated to it.

On a personal note – I live in Denver, CO with Cathy, my wife.  I am a cancer survivor.  My favorite charity is Alex’s Lemonade Stand Foundation – dedicated to fighting pediatric cancer.  Common Sense Guy readers and I raised over $2,500 for Alex’s foundation earlier this year.  I’ll write about Alex and her inspiring story in a post in the not too distant future.

I am a retired rugby player and an avid cyclist.  I enjoy movies and live theatre, and watching pro and college football, basketball and hockey.  I love to read – especially crime fiction.  I have an extensive library of business books and novels.

I’m looking forward to writing this blog and to interacting with you.  Please send me your comments.  It’s the only way to build a sense of community on a blog.
That’s it for today.  Thanks for reading.  Please log on to www.CommonSenseGuy.com and my websites www.BudBilanich.com, www.CommonSenseCoach.com and www.CommonSenseKeynotes.com.

I’ll see you around the web, and at Alex’s Lemonade Stand.

Bud

PS: Speaking of Alex’s Lemonade Stand – my fundraising page is still open.  Please go to www.FirstGiving.com/TheCommonSenseGuy to read Alex’s inspiring story and to donate if you can.