Synopsis

People, like water, tend to seek the path of least resistance. They do what’s easy instead of what’s best. A BNI chapter that takes the easy path doesn’t hold members accountable for attendance, quality referrals, or ongoing education. They don’t keep the classification cowboys out. These chapters inevitably struggle.

Following the BNI program can be hard. It’s not easy to maintain attendance, generate quality referrals, immerse in a culture of learning, and maintain a positive attitude. But in the long run, chapters that take the “hard” path are more successful.

Groups that do the hard work generate much more business than those that don’t. The secret to success, without hard work, is still a secret.

Is your chapter taking the hard-easy route, or the easy-hard route? What could your chapter do to follow the path to success?

Brought to you by the Networking for Success YouTube Channel.

Complete Transcript of Episode 488 –

Priscilla:

Hello everyone and welcome back to the Official BNI Podcast, brought to you by the Networking for Success Channel on YouTube, featuring Dr. Ivan Misner and many networking experts. I am Priscilla Rice, and I am coming to you from Live Oak Recording Studio in Berkeley, California. I am joined on the phone today by the Founder and the Chief Visionary Officer of BNI, Dr. Ivan Misner. Hello, Ivan. How are you and where are you?

Ivan:

Hi Priscilla. I am in Austin, Texas. I just experienced the New Year, and I think this is a great topic to start the year. It is a good topic for chapters to look forward as to how to be a successful group.

I also wanted to mention that the new sponsor is the Networking for Success Channel, as you mentioned. We will have a link in this podcast for the Networking for Success Channel. It is a YouTube channel that is sponsored by Entrepreneur.com. A lot of great content there, not only by me but also by many other networking experts that I have brought on to the channel.

Priscilla:

Great. I look forward to seeing that.

Ivan:

Yeah. Thanks. So today’s topic is the easy path is harder. That sounds like a little bit of a paradox. How could it be harder? Here is how:

Early in my career, I learned that people, like water, tend to seek the path of least resistance. That is, as a rule, people will often do what is easiest rather than what is best and generally harder. So throughout my time in BNI, I have seen groups that take the easy path.

These are chapters that don’t really want to follow the system. They don’t hold members accountable for attendance. They don’t really hold people accountable for quality referrals, following the program or ongoing education- getting the entire group immersed in education.

Many of these things are, in fact, hard to maintain. They are hard to do consistently. It is not easy to run a great chapter of BNI.

The real tragedy is that these groups may go down this path for a really long time, unwilling to take the necessary hard steps to build a successful group. The results are inevitable. The chapter struggles.

It’s really interesting because oftentimes, I will hear people say to me, Priscilla, “You know, the chapter is doing fine. The chapter is doing good. You know, we’re okay. It’s alright.”

I always think when I hear that, I think of John Collins and his book, Good to Great, where he says the enemy of great is not bad. The enemy of great is good because that is when people will say things like, “That’s good enough. We are doing okay.”

On the other hand, I see some groups that work really hard to maintain attendance,