Bruce Outridge
Artist | Author | Radio & Podcast Producer | Television Host
The Professional Driver Brand
You’re probably wondering why I am talking about brand in an article for truck drivers. When most people think of brand they think of company logos or storefronts, products and services, but very few think of themselves as a brand. It’s like sales, if you ask people if they sell or like sales most will tell you they can’t sell or don’t like to sell. The fact is we all sell ourselves every day. You may be trying to get a new job and your selling yourself, you may be meeting with a client and be selling yourself, or you may be doing your job to the best of your ability and selling yourself to your company. The fact is we all sell ourselves continuously and need to be aware of the things we do and how they affect our careers. In my workshops and communications with business owners I stress the fact that their name is their brand and that logos, products, and other business items are secondary. So what does this have to do with truck drivers?
When I hold workshops for professional drivers I get two types of people in the workshop. One set is very eager to have a successful career and are new to the industry, the other have been around a while and figure their career has already been set. In the workshop my main message is that what you do throughout your career follows you where ever you go. The reason for that is that is your brand. Your name is your brand and if you think of yourself as a little business you will protect that name for all it’s worth. Your name is what people know you by and gives them the first impression as to the type of person you are. We all know how small the transportation industry is and names and facts get around. Some companies won’t care but most decent companies won’t jeopardize their record by hiring people that will tarnish their image or safety record. Your name, brand, and image are all connected which makes you either a liability or an asset, the choice is yours. The same as teenagers we don’t think the things we do earlier in life will affect us later on but we all know or find out later how untrue that is. Things have a way of following us along in our lives from one place to another even if we have forgotten about them. So how do you keep your brand in top shape?
Operate in a professional manner on the job, not matter what the job. As I tell many people in my workshops for newer drivers even if you want to change positions down the road you need keep your career in check early on. Although I know people in this situation, if you want to be the safety person for a company later in your career, having a list of accidents as a driver isn’t going to give you much credibility in that department, if you’re still working in the industry at that point. if you want to be a dispatcher having lousy time management skills won’t take you very far. Everything follows you in your career so keeping your brand clean is the best thing you can do. If your brand has been tarnished up to now then you can still make it right, correct the things that have been going wrong, learn skills and techniques that you may need to take you to the next level. Increasing your brand awareness is the best way to secure your career for the future.
About the Author
Bruce Outridge is a business and leadership consultant with over 30 years experience from driver to owner operator to consultant and is a columnist for many industry blogs and magazines. For more information visit www.outridgeenterprises.ca
What They Don’t Tell You in School About Business
I often speak to youth groups about entrepreneurship and getting started in business. Not because I am as successful as someone like Richard Branson or other famous entrepreneurs, but often because of the business I started and my background. You can understand why when you look at the odds, high school dropout, starting an art business after a career in trucking, and then leaving a successful position at a large company to begin on my own without any kind of a real plan. A real recipe for success right? Now you’re thinking I am about to tell you what I wished I had done right, but that won’t be happening here!
That’s because I wouldn’t change a thing. I feel I didn’t have the information I needed back in school to make the decisions I have had to make today. When I look back at my school days I don’t feel as though I was encouraged to pursue my talents or interests. In fact I found it the opposite, I was discouraged from drawing which I loved, I got in trouble for drawing on note books, and I wasn’t told how the information I was getting would help me later in life. There was no talk of business opportunities. There was no career days until you got to grade 12. I got 59% for an illustration mark in school and I don’t even remember taking the class. It wasn’t until I got into the work world and began a career did I start learning things that I thought would really help me. It was practicing my art on my own that got me to the level I am at today, and it was good instructors after returning to school in my forties that really encouraged me to follow my dreams and gave me the confidence that is required to move forward.
Today I spend much of my time encouraging others and offering information on the way it really is in the world. People can follow their dreams or make their own choices, but they need the right information. There is enabling someone and encouraging with the right information. I am glad to see that we now have career days beginning earlier at school. We need to let people know that there is hope in their lives even if there is a long road ahead for a career in that dream. I happened to fall into my careers and both involved my passions, but there are many that don’t know that is available. Let’s encourage and not enable, let’s give information and set people off into with their own dreams.
About the Author
Bruce Outridge is an artist, author, consultant, and speaker located in Burlington Ontario and author of the books Driven to Drive, Running by the Mile, and How to Start an Artistic Business in 12 Easy Steps. For more information visit www.outridgeenterprises.ca
What’s Your Style?
How important is style in your business? Do you have style? Do you need style? First you have to know what style is? In the art world many artists seek style, it shows independence, it shows uniqueness. Style can set artists apart and give them a leg up in their career above others in the same field. The problem with style is that it has so many components that it can take years to come to the table. For an artist, style can be a the way they use brush strokes, how they compose a picture and much more. What about business and entrepreneurs, how do you get style if you’re not an artist?
Every entrepreneur or business has a style, some wild and some drab. Like an artists style, a business has it’s own style. That style includes the operations, the product or service, the staff, customer service, and the equipment or talent involved. Styles include the type of marketing or networking that you do, how you deal with people, and the integrity of your company or brand. Do you stand behind your product or service? Do you focus on quality or quantity in your product line or service? What are the goals for your company, are you building it to sell, retire, inspire, or pass on to others? All of these decisions determine your style. The problem with style that I have found as an artist is that you can’t push it. It will come out on its own over time and when you look back after ten or twenty years you will see how you have built your business and the road that you traveled down with your business. So how do you start down the road of creating your style?
As mentioned the style will come on its own so don’t try to have a style, just be yourself. Build your business the way you see fit, treat people the way you would 
want to be treated, offer the best product or service that you can and you will see your style come to the forefront on its own. If you try to force style and be something you’re not, it will look phoney and your business will come off as fake and untrustworthy. Style is you or the brand of your business and is intertwined with values and integrity of the people or brand. I have found that doing your best will help bring the best brand and style to the forefront for your business. Enjoy your life and you will create a style that you will be proud of for the long run.
About the Author
Bruce Outridge is an artist, author, entrepreneur, and speaker from Southern Ontario. He is the author of a number of business and leadership books for the arts and transportation industry. For more information on Bruce and his work please visit his website at www.outridgeenterprises.ca
Starting in Business, Take Over the Neighbourhood!
Have you taken over your neighbourhood yet? With the invention of the Internet and the world seemingly getting smaller due to ease of access, many entrepreneurs feel they need to come out of the gate with their new business on a global scale. You see it all the time on shows like Dragon’s Den or Shark Tank. The first statistic most new entrepreneurs throw out is that fact that there is 100 million people in the U.S. or the the health industry is one of the largest industries in the world. If you watch the investors on the show you can all see them roll their eyes and almost simultaneously everyone will say together, what are your sales? Maybe some products need to hit it big right out of the gate, but for most of us starting small is the best way to go.
I am a firm believer in starting local and expand as you are able and comfortable. I do think you should stretch your wings once in a while and take chances if the benefit is there. Taking on the world before you have even sold to people in the neighbourhood is the same as taking your new boat out on the ocean before you have tested it in the lake. There may be lots of water out there,but the lake has smaller waves. When we started our art business in 2003 we did just that, we worked our way up with the same system. We started selling our products and services to people we knew in the neighbourhood, then we expanded our reach to the local community, we then moved regional to to a certain limit. Today we still work primarily in our Province, but we are steady and busy. Could we offer more by expanding further? Sure we could, but what most people forget is that to expand takes more money and time. It’s the same as that person who dreams of getting their product into a big box store, they dream of the millions they will make by having their product on the shelves. Usually they are seeing the footprint of the store in their community. A store like Walmart however, has stores across the country and getting a product in that store may mean a large purchase order, but you also have to be able to create and stock the product. It may cost you millions to get the product in the store in the first place. As they say on the shows, do you have distribution, manufacturing, etc?
So before you jump the gun and plan on taking over the world, you may want to start by taking over your neighbourhood. Get some sales, listen to what customers are saying about the product. Refine the product in your local market before launching on a bigger scale. We have had products succeed and fail, we have had products that we have shelved and refined. The process is ongoing and it is much easier to make changes in small markets than in larger ones. As I always say focus on the quality of your product and not the quantity of product and you will be better off. Now get out there and take over your neighbourhood, your customers are waiting.
About the Author
Bruce Outridge is an entrepreneur and author of the books How to Start an Artistic Business in 12 Easy Steps, Running by the Mile, and Driven to Drive. More information can be found on his website at http://www.outridgeenterprises.ca
Living Your Dream Starts with a First Step
Do you want to do what you love for the rest of your life? Do you want to achieve
that success you have been told is just beyond your reach? The truth is that there is no easy path in life. Hard work, dedication, and persistence will help you get to the destination you are trying to reach, but you have to take the first step. Failing or succeeding is not the problem because most people don’t get out of the gate. There is nothing scarier than business, I get that, I was terrified when I first started and many entrepreneurs will tell you that the feeling never really goes away, no matter what level of success you have the cards could turn against you and it may all disappear in a heart beat. Focusing on what you want will help you stay true to the direction that you want. I remember telling my father one time when I first started my business that I had finally done it, I had finally got on the scale to riches. Of course I was at the bottom of the scale and people like Richard Branson were on the top of the scale, but at least I was on the scale. That hasn’t changed to this day, I am still on the scale, I am slowly moving up and achieving the goals I set out for myself and one day I will be at the top end of the scale.
What’s the secret? There isn’t one, you just have to do one thing, you have to get started. If you are forty today and are thinking about a new career but afraid it will take to long to achieve, then think again. Assuming you would retire at 65, even if you took five years to complete any training required you would still have a twenty year career in what you love to do. Do something you love and you may never retire. To make that first step is the hardest thing to do, but those that take that first step, keep their head down, and move towards their goal eventually find the success they seek. Failure is part of that road to success and helps make us stronger than if we flew through life without any problems. So find your motivation for success, find your calling, and get on the scale.
About the Author
Bruce Outridge is a business and leadership consultant and author of the books Driven to Drive, Running by the Mile, and How to Start an Artistic Business in 12 Easy Steps. To learn more about Bruce and his business visit www.outridgeenterprises.ca
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