The Lazy Millionaire

by Marc Fisher

  He adds:

  « The brain and nervous system respond best when the eyes focus on the smallest possible target. Why this is so is not important. It just happens to be the way the human system works.»

  When I read these lines, I couldn’t help but be struck by the similarity between the way these golfers act and the way some people with whom I interact at my conferences or during private consultations act (or think!).

  In fact, I cannot count the number of people whom I have asked to tell me their financial objective for the year, and who have replied:

  that they do not have one;

  that their objective is to pay off their debts;

  that their objective is to find a more lucrative job;

  that they want to make a fortune.

  These objectives all have the same defect: they are too VAGUE! With money, the equivalent of the smallest target possible is definitely not a minuscule monetary objective, which could be depressing, but:

  THE MOST ACCURATE OBJECTIVE POSSIBLE.

  And what is the most accurate objective possible?

  It is an objective that has AN AMOUNT AND A TIMELINE FOR ACHIEVING IT.

  One day at a conference, during the break, an excited young woman came up to me and said: “Mr. Fisher! Mr. Fisher! I have to tell you something! Last week, I had a job interview. I was telling myself: ‘“$25,000 … $25,000! I won’t accept anything less than $25,000!’ But the day before the interview, I came across your book The Instant Millionaire in a bookstore.

  I read it in one sitting, and then I told myself: ‘$40,000 … $40,000! I won’t accept anything less!’ And do you know what? I got it!

  I warmly congratulated her, and said: “Not bad for two hours of reading!”

  Not bad at all indeed…

  $15,000 more…

  How much is that per hour?

  It’s $7,500 per hour!

  And she would have this extra $15,000 YEAR AFTER YEAR…

  Not only would she have it year after year, but her eventual salary increases would be based on a $40,000 starting salary, and not on the $25,000 that she was originally expecting…

  And if she changed jobs, she would be able to say that she had previously been earning $40,000, which would immediately place her in a better category than if she had accepted a job at $25,000…

  If she had followed the philosophy of the intelligent worker instead of the lazy worker, how many years would it have taken her to increase from $25,000 to $40,000, assuming a hypothetical annual increase of 5%?

  I’ll leave that one for you to calculate —It tires me out just thinking about it!

  In fact, without even knowing it, after she read The Instant Millionaire, this young woman started to think like a lazy millionaire…

  All she had done (and it doesn’t have to he complicated to be effective…) was allow her objective to do the work for her!

  How many people do exactly the opposite?

  Instead of letting their objective work for them… they WORK!

  Like madmen.

  Yes! They work, and work, and work… for next to nothing!

  Like those golfers whose balls fly all over the place—and rarely where they want them to go!—their objective is neither specific enough nor lofty enough.

  They seem to be running in place, despite their perseverance and intelligence, and the overtime hours that they accumulate, to the point of making themselves ill or so nervous and irritable that nobody —not even their loved ones —dares approach them!

  The most amazing example of the power of the objective I ever witnessed was when I was working in the publishing division of Quebecor, a media oriented Canadian company. It’s founder, Pierre Peladeau, was a brilliant businessman who’d started with $1500 borrowed from his mom and went one to build a 10 billion dollar empire.

  In 1982, the company was doing well, but Peladeau was not satisfied. He had a dream. He wanted to gross one billion a year. He said he liked the figure.

  One fall morning in 1982, in the modest offices that he occupied at the time on Roy St. in Montreal, the colourful entrepreneur called together his vice-presidents, and stunned them by announcing that he wanted to increase sales to $1 billion in ten years…

  And how did he plan to achieve this amazing objective?

  Quite simple: by making one acquisition per month!

  Yes, one acquisition —buying out one existing company each month!

  It was extremely ambitious, and virtually inconceivable —in fact, it was a statement that was so over-the-top that several vice-presidents left the meeting with their faces ashen, their eyebrows arched, and their scepticism deeper than ever.

  It did not take Pierre Peladeau ten years to achieve the $1 billion mark.

  See what happened.

  In 1982, Quebecor’s sales were $208 million.

  In 1983, sales increased to $221 million, which represents a modest leap of $13 million.

  In 1984, sales reached $279 million, which represents a juicy increase of more than 25%!

  In 1985, sales increased to $342 million, for another solid 22% increase…

  In 1986, sales grew soundly to reach $446 million, yes, nearly half a billion dollars!

  And that’s when the real explosion happened, making the company’s growth curve resemble a geometric progression, which we all know constantly doubles the previous number in a series…

  In 1987, Quebecor’s sales were $650 million…

  Finally, in 1988, sales virtually doubled, breaking the $1 billion mark, soaring to $1.284 billion!

  And he did that in only six years!

  Not ten, only six!

  Did he work harder?

  No, he continued working the same hours, which were in fact already long hours. (He was more of a workaholic then a lazy millionaire!) So he could not really work a lot more.

  But his objective could.

  Of course, you wont necessarily reach your objectives simply because you set your sights on a specific amount and deadline.

  But —and this is the really important point:

  YOU WILL NEARLY ALWAYS ACHIEVE BETTER RESULTS WITH AN OBJECTIVE, THAN WITHOUT.

  And the thing is, you won’t necessarily work harder.

  This is why setting an objective is so precious to the Lazy Millionaire.

  A lazy millionaire knows that the size of a fish is determined by… the size of the aquarium!

  For the Lazy Millionaire, the equation for fortune and success is simple.

  Since: AQUARIUM = OBJECTIVE

  Therefore LARGER OBJECTIVE = LARGER SUCCESS

  Of course, if you are fine with the idea of your little fish (read: income) staying little, then let them spend their whole life in the same small aquarium!

  That is what bosses sometimes do with their employees.

  Husbands sometimes do this with their wives —or vice versa.

  And parents sometimes do it with their children.

  Especially fathers, who can’t stand it when their sons earn more than they do…

  Sometimes the sons themselves decide, either consciously or otherwise, to stay in the same aquarium as their fathers, for fear of upsetting them and humiliating them with their overwhelming success, because they must follow the “order” that, without even knowing it, was dictated to them when they were children, and because they were good children, they were “obedient”. We are all familiar with the outcome.

  In your own life as you know it, haven’t YOU also been content to swim in an aquarium that is far too small for YOU?

  We just saw how the lazy millionaire wisely —and effortlessly —increases the size of his income thanks to the magical lever of the objective…

  However, he does not only want to earn a lot of money —he also wants to… work a lot less!

  That is why he constantly follows a law whose very name is music to his ears: the law of least effort…

  Let’s find out how in the next chapter!

  CHAPTER 6

>   THE LAZY MILLIONAIRE FOLLOWS

  THE PRINCIPLE OF LEAST EFFORT

  There are several definitions for the principle of least effort…

  For most people, it means expending the least amount of effort possible, and staying in your comfort zone for as long as possible…

  In screenwriting, there is an interesting law that resembles the line of least resistance. It stipulates that a character only acts if he no longer has a choice not to act, which means that he is only snapped out of his inertia if forced to do so…

  For the lazy millionaire, the principle of least effort has another meaning: it essentially means doing as little work as possible to produce the greatest possible financial result…

  This law is in fact a corollary, or if you prefer, an elaboration of the famous Pareto principle, which was discovered by Italian economist Vilfredo Pareto, in 1897.

  In studying the levels of wealth in England in the 19th Century, he noticed a foreseeable imbalance in its distribution. This finding later led to the famous 80/20 rule, which was developed by George Zipf, a Harvard professor, and Joseph Moses Duran, whose theories were passed over in the United States, but spread through post-war Japan, and produced their spectacular revival.

  But what exactly did Pareto discover?

  He discovered that 80% of England’s wealth in the 19th Century was held by 20% of British subjects, and this is still true in modern society.

  Pareto’s successors found practical applications for this discovery… And it’s here that any lazy millionaire, whether he is accomplished or just starting out, should pay close attention and take notes…

  We all have a tendency, and it’s quite frequently a mistake, to think that there is a direct correlation between effort and results.

  For example, we assume that 50% of the hours that we work enable us to accomplish 50% of our tasks, and 50% of our efforts generate 50% of our revenues…

  So, if we start a business, we expect 50% of our products to be responsible for 50% of our sales; 50% of our employees to be responsible for 50% of our revenues; and 50% of our sales people to be responsible for 50% of our sales and so on…

  But in the real world, as Pareto and his successors discovered, there is a foreseeable imbalance between cause and effect.

  Overall, experience shows that, on average…

  20% of our clients are responsible for 80% of our sales,

  20% of our salespeople are responsible for 80% of our sales,

  20% of our efforts are responsible for 80% of our success.

  and therefore, despite all of our democratic zeal, good sense advises against distributing our time, energy, and money equitably among our clients, salespeople, and tasks…

  The Lazy Millionaire focuses 80% of his efforts and time on clients and activities that are profitable, and sets 20% aside just in case, because you never know…

  A small customer can suddenly grow big, or can be bought back by a larger corporation, therefore becoming overnight a large customer…

  And when you are starting out, you don’t know which customer will eventually become big…

  An example of the Pareto’s principle?

  Book publishing.

  Having worked in the industry for half of my life, I know that the 80/20 rule applies nearly perfectly.

  For every ten books he publishes, a publisher will see the following results: 3 books will be published at a loss, 3 will break even, 2 will generate a modest profit, and only 2 will be really successful. These two books (especially if they both are real bestsellers) will allow the publisher to end his year with a profit despite the poor performance of 6 out of 10 books, and in fact, closer to 8 out of 10 books.

  Publishing is an industry that follows the 80/20 rule to a T, just like the film and music industries, which is why the best-sellers (representing 10% of books published) are found at the entrance at most bookstores, and why 90% of the customers who venture through the doors come to purchase the best-sellers over any other book, because in reality, bestsellers are all they buy.

  Major retail chains also follow the law of least effort…

  Almost as if by chance, most of them place their cosmetic products at the entrance.

  Why?

  On the one hand, because more women shop than men, and on the other hand, because these are the products with the highest profit margins.

  The benefit is twofold, and illustrates another example of the 80/20 rule, because these are the products that, even though they only occupy 20% or 30% of the entire surface area of the store, are responsible for the largest profits…

  You might well ask: “How can you know in advance what books (or in other fields, what products or services) will enjoy exceptional success and generate 80% of your income?”

  Well, nobody has a crystal ball, especially in publishing.

  I remember the first time I planted rose bushes.

  In my zealousness, I bought too many roses for my flower beds, and I had five or six left over. Throwing away roses is a crime against… beauty. Only a barbarian would discard a rose bush!

  So with my five or six plants in hand, I noticed that my garden which I wasn’t too familiar with yet, had a small piece of land that I thought would not be suited to roses because the soil was poor and sandy.

  I planted the roses anyway, telling myself that they would probably only last one season, and that I would have to get rid of them the following summer… But by some strange phenomenon (strange to me because I was only a budding horticulturist), of all my rose bushes, those were the ones that blossomed most spectacularly, year after year.

  With my beginner’s lack of experience, I didn’t realize that the roses I planted first were poorly planted, because I had planted them all along the immense cedar hedges that surrounded my property.

  Like many other flowers, rose bushes do not compete well, which means that they tend to suffer, especially if they are up against a hedge that is six metres high and that casts shadows and weakens the soil with its many roots…

  In fact, they love the sun, and they also like soil that has a high sand content!

  Like the soil in which I planted my last rose bushes, which I thought would wilt!

  So when you start a business, do not throw away any rose bushes.

  Give a fair chance to all of them.

  It’s hard to predict which one will produce the nicest roses.

  But learn from your experience and try to cultivate what works best for you and bring the nicest and most abundant roses. After all, as every lazy millionaire, you want to smell the roses, yes or no?

  Here is how you can use the 80/20 rule in your life and in business in the smartest possible manner…

  First, try to determine which of your activities, products, or services generate 80% of your returns…

  This exercise is not only useful, but is also necessary if you want to become a lazy millionaire, especially if you have never done it before…

  You might be in for a big surprise and you will probably see that, in general, the 80/20 rule will be respected…

  Of course, it is important to note that the distribution does not have to be exactly 80/20 in order for the exercise to be useful

  You might be at 70/30, or 65/35, or 90/10, or even 99/1!

  Once you have a clear picture of the situation, and of the ratio between your efforts and your results, you can take the following actions:

  1. if you have established which 20% of your clients constitute 80% of your business, obviously you must try to keep them happy, increase your business with them, and no matter what, be sure that you do not make the mistake of distributing your time evenly between them, i.e. 20% and the other 80% of your clients…

  2. try to find new clients (and new employees and salespeople) who correspond to the criteria for your best clients (the 20%), and who will enable you to grow by following the law of least effort…

  You should also use the principle of least effort to solve your problems.
Take a close look at your problems. You will probably realise that the Pareto law applies here too.

  Here is how to use it the lazy millionaire’s way:

  1. Identify the 15% or 20% or 25% of your clients, employees, sales-people, or suppliers (or tenants if you are in the real estate business) who account for 80% of your problems: bad payers, trouble makers, those who are harmful to the work climate, are unreliable, are late in their work or in their shipments, etc.

  2. Then try:

  as quickly as possible (time is money)

  with the minimum amount of effort possible

  by spending the least amount of money possible

  in as permanent a manner as possible …

  to improve your clients, employees, salespeople, and suppliers…

  Try to bring them up to par with your best, or at least your good clients, salespeople, employees, suppliers…

  3. If you fail in Point 2, replace these people as soon as possible!

  This may appear cold and harsh, but aren’t they the ones who have been harsh with you by treating you so badly in the first place?

  All you are doing in the end is exchanging bills for coins!

  And you will often be able to avoid serious financial losses or… ulcers!

  The lazy millionaire thinks that making money or doing business shouldn’t be hard and detrimental to his health. So he acts accordingly by surrounding himself with employees, colleagues, and clients that bring him what he wants in his life.