Are you spending time with winners or with losers?

Maybe that’s a bit extreme – are you hanging out with successful people, people who are more successful than you? Or are you hanging around with people who are equally successful as you? Or are you spending your time with people less successful than you?

Evaluate your five closest friends and come up with an average. Are your friends up, down or sideways from you?

I’d suggest that you spend more time with people who are more successful than you.

Why?

Three reasons – (1) Being around successful people will make you want to be successful as well, (2) You’ll get better business advice and input from successful people and (3) You’ll get better referrals from people who are more successful.

Will successful people make you want to be more successful? Yes. Be realistic; we judge ourselves by our peers. We don’t compare ourselves to Michael Jordan or Lance Armstrong when we play basketball or ride a bike. We compare ourselves to the others on the court or the road right next to us. We aspire to do well in the crowd we’re in. When you elevate the level of the crowd, you’ll elevate your game.

Will successful people give you better business advice? Of course they will. The fact that they are successful didn’t happen by accident. They’ve got an understanding of the game. They’ll see things you might miss and they’ll have insight into how to make corrections. The more successful they are, the more they’ll know. If you’re willing to take advice, you’re better off getting it from someone who’s doing better than you.

Finally, you’re going to get better referrals from successful people. They’ve got more successful friends and associates. Do you want to represent Bill Gates’ friends or the friends of the guy collecting the grocery carts from the parking lot? It’s your call, of course, but, I suspect you wouldn’t be visiting this site if you were happy with referrals from the cart guy.

How do you elevate the level of your friends? Get some new friends. Take action. This isn’t rocket science. Join some groups, get up and get out. Keep your eyes open. There are plenty of people out there doing well. Your job is to introduce yourself and get a relationship started. Stretch. You can do it. The biggest obstacle is deciding that you want to make a change.

I’ve got to run now so I can go find some successful friends who are willing to put up with me. That’s not going to be easy.