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The Secrets to Lindsay Fox’s Business Success (That You Need to Learn)

Lindsay Fox’s journey to his billions is full of lessons to the entrepreneurs that come after him. Here are the most impactful for your perusal.

Have you ever found an Australian – who’s not a very young child – who hasn’t heard of Lindsay Fox? With a net worth of $3.3 billion, Fox is one of the wealthiest people in the world.

He’s the owner of Linfox, Australia’s largest privately-owned trucking and logistics company. And his road to that status is nothing short of inspiring.

Fox has a set of unique rules that have served him well as he grew and continues to grow his business. There’s no doubt he has a lot to offer entrepreneurs and current business owners who aspire to make it big.

What’s the recipe to Fox’s success, as monumental as it is? Let’s find out.

1. Positivity Is Key

We all know that mindset plays a huge role in business success. If you’re not in the right frame of mind, you’re going to make many mistakes that will cost you down the line. Knowing this, many business owners fill their lives with as much positivity as possible.

In the case of Fox, however, that’s taken to a whole new level.

Just look at his answering machine. Most of us aren’t in the position to call the business magnate directly. But suppose we had the number to his direct line, we’d hear a rather blunt voicemail prompt if he wasn’t in a mood, or position, to pick up:

‘If you have got good news, leave a message. If you haven’t, don’t waste your time.’

Removing negativity from our lives is critical not just for business success but for our overall well being. Too much exposure to toxic people and doom and gloom stories can put you in a bad state of mind.

Fox doesn’t have this problem. He knows the importance of being in the midst of positivity and so he’s doing everything in his power to do that.

Now, it’s important to make a distinction between positivity and delusion. You don’t want to just ignore problems for the heck of it. But then, much of the drama in one’s personal or business life is totally avoidable, which is exactly what you should do. Identify the sources of unnecessary negativity and avoid or get rid of them.

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2. Passion Over Money

What are you in business for? Would you be doing what you’re doing if there wasn’t money involved?

If the answer is ‘no’, you must have some higher purpose and more power to you.

But chances are you’re in it to make a boatload of money, just like most other people.

However, Fox believes that what separates the ones who achieve greatness and those who are toiling is that they’re doing something that they truly enjoy doing. Money only comes to them as a side effect.

The fact is that most ambitious companies don’t make a lot of money in the beginning. If the ambition is big enough, it might take them years to reach the breakeven point.

If money is your chief motivator, however, you’re likely to get discouraged quickly. As you get sick of not seeing any reward for your hard work, you’ll be wondering why you should even bother. You’ll probably make more money working for someone else.

This is how many start-ups end up failing. It’s not that the business owners can’t find a way to grow – they’re just not motivated enough to continue.

And this is also where passion shines. If you love what you do, it’s not going to bother you that you’re not rolling in money. The material things aren’t going to matter, or at least not as much, if you find what you’re doing fulfilling.

That’s not to say that money doesn’t matter. On the contrary, it’s necessary for business growth. It’s just that from the perspective of motivation, money shouldn’t be anywhere near the top of your list. Focus on doing the work that you love and the money will come naturally.

3. Mistakes Are Essential for Success

Many entrepreneurs are deadly afraid of failure. Their ego attaches to their business so any failure seems very personal. And because of this, they have a bad habit of overthinking everything in the belief that they must make the best possible decisions.

In Fox’s opinion, this is a very destructive way of thinking and doing business. In his words:

‘Life isn’t about algebra and geometry. Learning by making mistakes and not duplicating them is what life is about.’

Every business owner is going to make at least a few mistakes in their career. Some of those mistakes might even be big and costly. But there’s nothing wrong with this.

Running a business requires taking massive action. The consequence is that you’re going to get burned a few times. That’s not a bad thing at all if you can recognise the mistake made and learn how to do better the next time.

After all, progress is about being better today than you were yesterday. And that’s not going to happen if you’re doing the same things all the time.

Whether you like it or not, mistakes will happen. You might as well choose to react to them in a constructive way. Treat every mistake as a lesson and you’ll know not to think of it as a failure.

4. Design Your Business on Your Own Terms

You’ve learned the importance of doing the things that you love. Except that not every activity of your business is going to fall under this category. In fact, a good number of business functions will probably be outside of your genius and passion.

Because of this, you must actively build your business in such a way that you can focus on doing the things that you love the most. As for everything else, you should find the right person or persons for the job and task them with the responsibility.

If making sales is your strongest suit, for instance, you might want to focus on talking to clients and closing deals. If you’re best at product development, focus on tweaking your product then. Whatever it is, you’ll want to stick to what you love doing, which should preferably be what you’re good at as well.

You won’t have an option sooner or later. If you’re any good at this, your company is going to grow too big and complex for you to handle everything on your own.

You must be very clear on what you want and don’t want to do. After all, you’re the owner and you get to call the shots. That’s going to remain the case until your company becomes too big, but that’s another story for another day.

 

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5. Confidence, Confidence, Confidence

The success of your business starts with you. If you don’t believe that your business can succeed, nobody else will. And this will only become problematic down the line.

For example, let’s say that you have to look for investors. How can you expect a VC to have faith if you don’t believe in your business? Make no mistake, investors will see through fake confidence.

This is only one of the many problems arising out of a lack of confidence. You’ll be a champ at indecision and miss many opportunities.

As you can imagine, Lindsay Fox does not have confidence issues.

‘If you believe you can make a difference, then you will make a difference. Believe in yourself, your family and your community and you will win,’ he says.

You have no excuse because confidence is a skill that you can learn. With enough practice, you’ll pick up confidence and with that, a whole host of opportunities to come.

6. Meaningful Connections Trump Shallow Networking

As you go about growing your business, you’ll meet many people. You might do this intentionally and attend events where your peers will be. Or, you might stumble upon a fellow entrepreneur once in a while.

Either way, you’ll want to focus on building relationships with those around you. Fox puts it as follows:

‘Personal relationships are always the key to good business. You can buy networking; you can’t buy friendships.’

Meaningful relationships are important for a great number of reasons.

First of all, nobody in business can win all on their own. Pulling off a lone wolf isn’t going to do you a whole lot of good in the long run. Having capable people by your side to support you can make all the difference in the world.

Besides, today’s business world is already way too formal and disconnected. A handful of strong personal relationships can be worth more than any number of shallow connections.

Whenever you meet someone, especially if it’s someone you feel good about, you might want to be open to the possibility of friendship. If nothing, it’s going to make your personal and business lives brighter and more enjoyable.

Enjoy the Ride

Nobody becomes successful overnight, at least not the kind of success that lasts. While someone may get lucky and scoop up some wealth, that’s very likely to go away when luck takes a turn to the south.

Building a prosperous business requires hard work, determination, and time. But that doesn’t mean that you should spend all of that time being miserable and borderline burned out. Wouldn’t you agree that it’s so much cooler to enjoy it every step of the way?

As you go about it, all the material rewards will come as a consequence of doing what you love. Lindsay Fox has taken this mindset to the running of his company since time immemorial. It’s worked out pretty well for him by anyone’s definition.

Whatever you do, don’t make it your blind ambition to chase after growth and wealth. Keep doing what you’re passionate about and make your business journey exciting and fulfilling. Besides, that’s going to work out better, perhaps way better!

At CUB, our ambition is to unite those who are changing the world through their businesses. We support these people by building a private community of Australia’s next titans of industry. And we bring these titans together to accelerate the achievement of each other’s ambitions.

If you wish to be considered for membership, please feel free to request a club introduction on our membership page: www.cub.club/membership