Boot Camp Syndrome

Boot Camp Syndrome

There is a “boot camp” syndrome that people adapt as they try to become successful. People who survive the difficulties of a boot camp (military, police, even some misguided organizations which listen to the HR people) love to brag about it. They are comrades having come through the arduous experience, each one feeling his or her trials were tougher. People extend that to entrepreneurialism: You must experience rejections, critique, depression, and that dreaded “hard work.”

I believe you work smart, not hard. There is no gantlet you have to pass through as others claim, suffering from the storms and earthquakes of building a business. Do you really want to be coached by people who couldn’t figure out a fast, less harmful approach?

Discipline and accountability—as sense of self-worth and achievement—are not hard work. They are a mindset.

Most people faced with an oval track and told to get to the other side begin running around the track, coached by people to get into the inner lane and breathe correctly. However, this isn’t that kind of a race and, in most cases, you can simply cut across the track in the middle, from one side to the other, while everyone else is running hard. That’s not “cheating,” it’s intelligence.

You need someone to boot you out of the boot camp.