What are your criteria for evaluating opportunity?

What are your criteria for evaluating opportunity? Posted: 03 Mar 2009 11:15 AM PST If you are the resourceful type, you're probably now seeing opportunities that others don't see in this recession. New business opportunities. New investing opportunities. Maybe new personal or career development opportunities. This is great! The problem with being so resourceful is that you might also be chasing opportunities that you shouldn't be chasing. I have noticed this during my private consulting meetings with clients. I notice that people have the tendency to chase multiple opportunities at the same time. In almost every instance of this, I recommend that the person stop chasing lower-value opportunities and reinvest their time and resources into other higher-value opportunities. So how do you determine what opportunities to pursue? This is a million-dollar question, isn't it? I would suggest setting up your own decision-making criteria. Apply your criteria with every opportunity you consider. Your criteria will help you quickly focus on the best opportunities and eliminate others. Here are a few things for you to think about in creating your "opportunity" criteria. 1. Does this opportunity provide any synergy for you? Does it directly relate to something else you're already doing? Synergy occurs when one opportunity feeds the other. Disney is fantastic about using Synergy in their businesses. One business feeds the other. Disney started with kids movies. Then they moved to theme parks based around characters in the movies. Next, they build resorts for theme park visitors. Notice they didn't go from kids movies to auto manufacturing? Each new opportunity they pursue can be promoted to the same customers. Had they chosen to go into auto manufacturing, they would have to start from ground zero without any momentum. 2. Does the opportunity give you leverage? Can attractive outcomes be obtained from little inputs? For example, I have been asked to provide consulting on many occasions. I could build a consulting business, however, there is zero leverage in consulting. Consulting isn't a business. It's a job in which you trade time for money. I would rather work once and get paid over and over again. See the leverage? 3. Do you have control over the opportunity? Most people don't want control. They would rather be passive and leave the decision-making process and responsibilities up to others. Not me. I want control. I don't like to be dependent upon anyone or anything. I'll pass on opportunities if I don't have control over them. 4. How much do you have to invest and what is the expected return? Your investment includes both your time and your money. Does the opportunity provide an attractive return based on the total required investment? Is there another opportunity that meets your criteria that would provide an overall higher return? One Income for Life member I met with had just made $12,000 on one opportunity with about 15 hours of work. However, he was chasing a new opportunity that provided significantly less return with more risk. I suggested he spend more time on the $12,000 opportunity instead. Be honest when applying this criteria. 5. Am I a fan of the product or service myself? Before Income for Life, I tried to sell products or services that I wasn't using. I struggled. I now only recommend/sell things that I'm using myself. I always go first. This works much better for me. I use the four criteria above when considering opportunity. This hasn't always been the case. I've chased many opportunities and made some big mistakes. After each mistake, I tried to learn from it. I also tried to determine how to avoid making the same mistake again. This led me to creating my own little system for evaluating opportunity. Don't follow my "opportunity" criteria blindly. Use it to create your own "opportunity" criteria. The point is to have criteria. Don't simply chase every opportunity that comes your way.