Ideas Worth Millions

Tough times don’t last–but tough companies do. Even with venture funding falling off a cliff, a handful of companies with great ideas, money-saving products or ideas just too great (or cheap) not to fund can attract enough loot to keep their doors open and their servers warm.
In 2008, venture capitalists poured $28.3 billion into more than 3,800 companies. That was lower than in years past–about 8% less in dollars and 4% fewer deals, according to the National Venture Capital Association, PricewaterhouseCoopers and Thomson Reuters. Money got much tighter at the end of the year too, with investments down to a mere $5.4 billion, a 26% decline from the third quarter.

In Pictures: 10 Ideas Worth Millions

When money is scarce, what a smart venture capitalist will pay for says plenty–the pressure is on for products and services that can get to market quick with either a relatively solid revenue stream or something a big acquirer just can’t live without.
Venture capitalists are in the business of placing money, so they have to bet on something, even in scary times. With a mandate like that, the occasional cheap enough speculation has its place too.
So what grabbed people’s attention? Some deals, of course, are big number investments that are continuations of efforts started several years earlier. For instance, Nanosolar, which is developing novel techniques for making thin-film photovoltaic cells, announced in August it had swept up $300 million in additional funding, bringing its six-year start-up kitty to more than $500 million.
Smaller solar companies, such as Xunlight, which has a rollable film of solar cells, also won additional funding. (Last year Xunlight added about $15 million to its funding, bringing its resources to $40 million).
Other energy-saving ideas also gained momentum. Project Frog, based in San Francisco, has designed modular, snap-together structures for classrooms or offices, a nice improvement over trailers or “portables.” Better than just cheap, however, the structures aim for energy efficiency and use non-toxic building materials–two features that make this a good “green tech” fit. Project Frog won $8 million in funding from investors, including Rockport Capital Partners.
Saving money is on everyone’s minds–including venture investors. YouLicense created a Web-based marketplace for contract music that gets used in ads, movies, Web backgrounds and any place where a tune will help. The company gets a 9% commission on deals, which typically run $20 to $150 apiece. YouLicense won $1 million in support.
Others are trying to mix the popularity of social networking with the desire to save a few bucks. Start-up iList lets people post and search classified ads on the Web for free–and add them to whatever communications stream you like best–such as Twitter, Gmail, Facebook and so on. Investors, including Draper Fisher Jurvetson, figured this was worth a $1.5 million bet.
This year probably will not start out much better for funding, but take heart: This is still the 21st century, with more opportunity for great ideas in more places than any other time. Tough times do not last forever. While they are here, think cheap, think convenient, and keep your chin up.

Source: http://www.forbes.com/2009/01/29/innovations-venture-capital-technology_0129_innovations.html

By: Quentin Hardy, Forbes Staff

Estée Lauder | Famous Entrepreneur

 

Estée Lauder was born on July 1, 1906 and died on April 24, 2004. He was an American famous entrepreneur who was the co-founder, along with her husband, Joseph Lauder, of Estée Lauder Companies, her eponymous cosmetics company. Lauder was the only female on TIME magazine’s 1998 listing of the 20 most important business prodigies of the 20th century. She was the receiver of the Presidential Medal of Freedom. She was inducted on the Junior Achievement U.S. Business Hall of Fame in 1988.

She was born Josephine Esther Mentzer in Corona, Queens in 1906, one among nine children born to a Hungarian Jewish mother, Rose Schotz Rosenthal, along with a Czechoslovak Jewish father, Max Mentzer. When she was a child, her parents want to name her Esty, following her mother’s most loved Hungarian aunt. When it was time for the clerk to write down at the certificate of a birth, her mother decided to go with Esther rather than Esty. She did so for the reason that Esty was too uncommon and no one learned how to spell it. Esty was her parents’ play name. When her father pronounced Esty, it was like Estée, resulting from his accent. Most of her child years were spent working to make ends meet with most of the 9 children assisting out at the family’s home improvement store.

It was whilst working in this retail store that Lauder got her first preference of business. Her father’s shop presented her a better knowledge of entrepreneurship and what it takes to become a successful shop. Her childhood aspiration was to grow to be an actress, her name in lights, flowers as well as handsome men.

In 1953, Lauder presented her 1st scent, Youth Dew, a bath oil that doubled as a perfume. Instead of making use of their French perfumes by the drop behind each ear, women were using Youth Dew by the bottle within their bath water. Within the 1st year Youth Dew marketed fifty thousand, by 1984, the figure had improved to one hundred and fifty million. Lauder was a topic of a 1985 TV documentary, Estee Lauder: The Sweet Smell of Success. Describing her achievements, she said, “I have never spent a day in my life without selling. If I have confidence in something, I market it, and I sell it hard.”

The Hardest Working People on the Planet

As entrepreneurs working hard is a given (if you want to be successful that is). Of course, there’s always a question of just what truly is working hard. I’ve found that most entrepreneurs, if compared to the average office worker at a big company, work extremely hard. However, just because you’re working harder than your buddy at some Dundler Mifflin clone doesn’t mean that you’re actually working hard. Instead, you need to be comparing yourself to some of the hardest working people on the planet
To help with that, I’ve assembled some inspirational stories of hard-working entrepreneurs with some non-business folks mixed in for good measure. Two caveats. First, hard work is completely irrelevant is you’re not working smart and being productive. Second, hard work is also counter-productive if you’re sacrificing your health to an extreme degree and if the increase in quantity of hours worked is leading to a decrease in your creativity (often the case!). With that being said, here’s some stories of people who’ve worked about as hard as a human being can.
Jeff Immelt – A few years back I read a story about Jeff entitled The Bionic Manager which reset my thinking about what hard work is. Here are a couple of passages from it:

Immelt, 49, says he’s been working 100 hours a week for 24 years. That does not take him back to his 1978 graduation from Dartmouth, where he was football team captain (as offensive tackle) and a fraternity president who liked to party….Most hard-charging types have put in a 100-hour week or two. But month after month, year after year—is that even possible? Let’s do the math. If you worked from 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. seven days a week, you’d still be two hours short of 100 hours. If Immelt has been working that hard for 24 years, then he has already done 60 years’ worth of 40-hour weeks.

Here he is on a recent swing through San Francisco: The first meeting is with institutional investors at 7 a.m. Then he addresses some 200 retail investors at 8:30, standing comfortably for 25 minutes with his left hand in his pocket and his right hand holding his PowerPoint remote; after his talk, he answers questions for an hour. Then it’s more institutional investors, followed by GE salespeople in Burlingame, a presentation to customers, and finally a big reception for customers and top salespeople. He seems as energetic at the end of the day as at the beginning. He had run virtually the same routine in Los Angeles the day before.

Mark Cuban – Cuban has written some posts on his most excellent blog on the subject of hard work and loving what you do. Here is one of my favorite excerpts:

The edge is getting so jazzed about what you do, you just spent 24 hours straight working on a project and you thought it was a couple hours. The edge is knowing that you have to be the smartest guy in the room when you have your meeting and you are going to put in the effort to learn whatever you need to learn to get there. The edge is knowing is knowing that when the 4 girlfriends you have had in the last couple years asked you which was more important, them or your business, you gave the right answer…The edge is knowing how to blow off steam a couple times a week, just so you can refocus on business…The edge is recognizing when you are wrong, and working harder to make sure it doesn’t happen again. (from The Sport of Business)

Steve Pavlina and Seth Godin – These guys have written millions of words in their relatively young careers, authored books, spoken at conferences and started companies largely as one-man shows. They do more in a year than most people do in a lifetime and are well worth learning from!
Steve sums up his philosophy towards hard work pretty well in the aptly titled post “Hard Work“:

Hard work pays off. When someone tells you otherwise, beware the sales pitch for something “fast and easy” that’s about to come next. The greater your capacity for hard work, the more rewards fall within your grasp. The deeper you can dig, the more treasure you can potentially find…Your life will reach a whole new level when you stop avoiding and fearing hard work and simply surrender to it. Make it your ally instead of your enemy. It’s a potent tool to have on your side.

Seth has a similar post entitled “Labor Day“:

Your great-grandfather knew what it meant to work hard. He hauled hay all day long, making sure that the cows got fed. In Fast Food Nation, Eric Schlosser writes about a worker who ruptured his vertebrae, wrecked his hands, burned his lungs, and was eventually hit by a train as part of his 15-year career at a slaughterhouse. Now that’s hard work…Hard work is about risk. It begins when you deal with the things that you’d rather not deal with: fear of failure, fear of standing out, fear of rejection. Hard work is about training yourself to leap over this barrier, tunnel under that barrier, drive through the other barrier. And, after you’ve done that, to do it again the next day.

Eminem and Kanye West – These guys have legendary work ethics. Witness:

It is a little-known fact that the only book Eminem read as a child was the dictionary. He pored over it, searching for words that rhymed with each other that could later be pulled out of the bag during the freestyle rap “battles” that provided his education in hip-hop. The years spent studying the English language lie at the core of his technical brilliance. They turned him into the greatest rapper of his time. But they did so at a personal cost: for Eminem could be uncharitably described as an anorak. His life starts and ends with music. He writes constantly, scrawling lines on sheets of notepaper in a crabby handwriting. When he’s not composing new verse, or messing around in a studio, he’ll be listening to hip-hop. “The guy’s a studio rat,” says producer Terry Simaan, the owner of Oh Trey 9, one of the Detroit’s most influential hip-hop labels. “If he feels like it, he’ll spend 12, 15 hours a day in a studio.” (From Eminem: The fall and rise of a superstar)

But West initially had trouble convincing Roc-A-Fella execs to let him make his own album as a rapper. He was able to change their minds only after the accident that inspired his breakthrough single, Through the Wire. Exhausted from working around the clock, West fell asleep behind the wheel of his Lexus and got into a crash that nearly killed him. He was back in the studio three weeks later, recording that hit song with his broken jaw wired shut. (From Genius Is As Genius Does)

(Note to self…take a cab or have someone else drive you if you’re working your tail off!!)
Kobe Bryant and Tiger Woods – While these guys haven’t exactly been choir boys the last few years they’ve definitely worked their tail off to get to where they are. Here are some of my favorite articles about them:
Commuting to Staples Center with Kobe Bryant
Kobe’s well-honed killer instinct

It’s 1995, and Bryant is the senior leader of the Lower Merion team, obsessed with winning a state championship. He comes to the gym at 5 a.m. to work out before school, stays until 7 p.m. afterward. It’s all part of the plan. When the Aces lost in the playoffs the previous spring, Bryant stood in the locker room, interrupting the seniors as they hugged each other, and all but guaranteed a title, adding, “The work starts now.”

(Don’t miss Spike Lee’s documentary about Kobe either!)
Tiger vs Phil Part Two: Work ethic.

I refuse to let anyone outwork me. That’s the reason I log so much time on the practice range. Besides, hard work is the only way to maintain a competitive edge, and I enjoy the process. The key, though, is to practice with a purpose.

Tiger’s Daily Routine and Workout Regimen
The Beatles – Gladwell made their Hamburg-era work ethic famous in Outliers. Here’s the passage in case you missed it:

“All told, they performed for 270 nights in just over a year and a half. By the time they had their first burst of success in 1964, in fact, they had performed live an estimated twelve hundred times. … Most bands today don’t perform twelve hundred times in their entire careers. The Hamburg crucible is one of the things that set the Beatles apart.” (From this blog post about the band)

Yolanda and Rogelio Garcia Sr. – You’ve never heard of these two and I hadn’t either until I stumbled across this article talking about how they put their kids through college:

For 21 years, the Garcias have supported their family by picking through garbage, often cutting their fingers on broken glass while searching for cans and bottles. Late at night they make their living on the darkened streets and back alleys of Los Angeles, recycling other people’s trash for cash. They’ve collected more than 8 million cans and bottles to help put two children through college. Their youngest is still hitting the books, so Yolanda and Rogelio still hit the streets every night.

OK, perhaps this doesn’t fit the definition of working as smart as possible but nevertheless, reading stories like this reminds us that our “hard work” probably isn’t as hard as we think.

http://jonbischke.com/2009/12/30/hardest-working-people-on-the-planet/

10 Most Successful Businessmen

A list of the ten most successful businessmen of all time includes some of history's most industrious workers and innovative entrepreneurs. In most cases, these men invented entire industries and changed the course of history.

    John D. Rockefeller. Rockefeller is the richest man of all time when adjusted for inflation and is certainly one of the ten most successful businessmen. He created Standard Oil and completely monopolized the oil industry, controlling every level of production from start to finish.
    Henry Ford. Ford created the Ford Motor Company and essentially, the automobile industry. His developments changed the way factories ran, the way society operated and the face of the country. His company remains a major world force today.
    Bill Gates. Gates became one of the ten most successful businessmen of all time in the 1980’s when the software he developed—Microsoft—took over the computing world. Nearly all computers run Microsoft, and Gates is a major player in world economics.
    Thomas Edison. Edison not only invented an item nearly every person in the world uses everyday, the light bulb, he also was the holder of over 1,000 patents at the time of his death. A symbol of innovation, persistence and entrepreneurship, he is definitely one of the ten most successful businessmen in history.
    Soichiro Honda. Honda is certainly one of the ten most successful businessmen in world history. He began making small motorcycles in Japan in the mid 20th century and then moved into the auto industry. His eponymous car company grew and gained a significant foothold in the United States, opening the way for Japanese exports and establishing a reputation for quality and reliability.
    Steven Jobs. Jobs was co-founder of Apple, the company that introduced a practical personal computer to the world, and is one of the ten most successful businessmen in the country. He has stayed at the helm of Apple, a company that continues to release incredibly popular products.
    Carlos Slim. Slim moved into the spot of “world’s richest man” and obviously, one of the ten most successful businessmen in the world. He has made his money in the telecom industry and is the CEO of three companies.
    Andrew Carnegie. Carnegie was an immigrant bobbin boy in a factory as a child, and decades later, he became the biggest steel magnate the world had ever seen. In his later years, he gave away a large part of his vast fortune.
    JP Morgan. Morgan, one of the ten most successful businessmen ever, was one of a handful of corporate titans on the American scene at the turn of the 20th century. He was a banker and oversaw industrial consolidations in major industries, such as steel and electronics. He stepped in during a financial crisis and saved many New York banks in 1907.
    Michael Dell. Dell was an engineering whiz as a youngster and started a computer building business while in college. His company, today, is one of the biggest tech firms in the world, and most Americans spend their time online using a Dell computer.
Source: http://www.mademan.com/mm/10-most-successful-businessmen.html

Michael Dell’s Success Story

Here is a very inspiring success story about a billionaire who became a very successful entrepreneur at a very young age. Just like every other success people, he started with almost nothing but the ideas in his head.
Michael Dell is a very committed guy, when he created a plan, he’ll pursue it with full strength. And this explains that how he made his $1,000 by just selling stamps at the age of 12! Can you imagine that? Selling stamps at such a young age and make $1,000 from that. Many of us can’t even save $1,000 from our salary. But he made his first $1,000 by just selling stamps.
He later sold the newspaper subscription for Houston Post, which developed his confidence making him even more money. It is told that he made enough money to buy a BMW by the age of 16. Most people can’t earn enough money to buy a BMW even with their entire life saving. But this guy, Michael Dell, made enough money to purchase a BMW at the age of 16.
Michael then planned his life well at the age of 19. He knew exactly what he wanted to achieve in his life and eventually, he achieved it. Knowing what you want in your life is one of the most important success strategies that you must adopt. If you don’t know what you want to achieve in your life, you’ll never achieve it. First set your target, then keep on pursuing it. Just like what Michael Dell did at the age of 19, he planned his life and set his goals to achieve higher success.
Michael later went to college to study biology as his parents want him to be a doctor. However, a year later, he quit his studies and continue to pursue his dreams. He wanted to be a successful entrepreneur. This is what you have to do as well if you know exactly what you want. You need to have the courage to pursue your dreams.
Michael developed his intense passion in computers when he was 15. When his parents got him an Apple computer when he was 15, instead of using it, he dissembled the computer into parts to find out how it worked. After that, he bought an IBM computer and studied more about assembling computers. Which he finally mastered the technique that made him a billionaire at a very young age (Millionaire Habit #7 – Be 100% committed).
In 1984, Michael started his dream venture with $1,000. He followed through his business plan and keep on working on it. In his room in the university, he assembled computers for customers according to their requirements and sell them directly to his customers.
His business idea was new because he assembled all the computers according to his customer’s preferences and sell directly at a low price. He was the first to introduce the direct sales method in the IT industry. The direct sales clicked and there was huge demand for computers. Dell knew that he could beat computer dealers by selling a lower price with good technical service (Millionaire Habit #1 – Always Exceed Expectations).
Just like every other successful people, Dell started small. Most of his orders were placed through friends and acquaintances who spread the word around. And by steadily developing his business, he moved to a small office and hired a few people to take orders and upgrade machines. Avoiding a third party to sell computers turned out to be profitable and the company grew at a seriously fast clip.
Later in May 1983, Dell incorporated the company as Dell Computer Corporation. In 1985, Dell started to design and make computers with components sourced from outside. His focus, right from the beginning, was on customers and good service. He kept his vision and move toward his dreams step-by-step.
All his hard work paid off handsomely. By 1992, Dell Computer Corporation entered the Fortune 500 list of the largest companies in the world. At the age of 27, he became the youngest CEO of a Fortune 500 company. And the rest is history.
Another one of the success strategies that Dell used is that the company was one of the very first to sell computers on the Internet. This too became a huge hit. In 1999, Dell launched Gigabuys.com, an online store featuring computer-related products.
Not only that, his business kept on growing and become the No. 1 player in the American market. Can you see it now? How Michael Dell started from $1,000 and built his giant IT business worth more than $100 billion. It has been a very successful journey for Dell.
In 1999, with his wife, he formed the Michael and Susan Dell Foundation, which has an endowment of more than $1 billion and focuses on children’s issues. This shows that Dell knows the miracle of tithing. If you want to be a successful i your life, you must first make other people successful. If you want to be a millionaire, donate and help more people to become richer. This is the law of the universe.
Source: http://www.themillionairesecrets.net/michael-dells-success-story/

Starting a business from scratch

Ntuthuko Shezi's journey as an entrepreneur started when, as a schoolboy in rural Ndwedwe in KwaZulu-Natal, he sold vetkoek and fried fish. After that he mowed lawns in Bedfordview. He now runs a multimillion-rand vehicle repair business out of two of the country's busiest airports.

It is not any old vehicle repair business -- Scratch Mobile is one of a kind in Africa, if not the world. Shezi's company will fix the dents, scratches and chipped windscreens on your vehicle while you fly. On your return to the airport parking bay, your vehicle looks as good as new.

"Fix a scratch, collect the cash," Shezi said with a broad smile. It sounds simple, but his journey shows that great entrepreneurial ideas often take considerable time in the business school of hard knocks.

But behind Shezi (30) stands a global entrepreneurship incubator, Endeavor, which has two mentorship programmes to help emerging entrepreneurs to develop their innovations and to build them up regionally -- or even globally.

Endeavor was founded in South America in 1999 -- its roots are firmly embedded in the developing world -- and has offices in 11 countries in South America, the Middle East and Africa.

It opened an office in South Africa in 2004 and since then has incubated 43 start-up businesses that between them have generated more than R1-billion in turnover, created more than 12 000 jobs and grown at a combined average of 30% a year. In the 2009-2010 financial year alone, amid a global economic recession, these companies generated R300-million in turnover, up 67% on the previous year, and created 588 new jobs.

Difficulties
Entrepreneurs in developing economies face unique difficulties, according to Malik Fal, Endeavor South Africa's managing director and a former head of Microsoft's operations division in Africa.

A relaxed Fal, shirtsleeves rolled up to his elbows, said that entrepreneurs like Shezi were "the missing middle" of the economic pyramid in developing countries who had "traditionally been given the short end of the stick".

Sandwiched between the large, self-sufficient corporations operating worldwide and the "poorest of the poor", who were the focus of most government attention, entrepreneurs were often left to muddle along on their own.
Endeavor's South Africa office has a network of more than 120 business leaders who mentor entrepreneurs on a voluntary basis. Partnerships with local and international business schools allow entrepreneurs to study locally and abroad.

Their businesses provide case studies for MBA students who in turn provide feedback. Other partner organisations such as Deloitte and Ernst & Young donate free accounting and consultancy services to entrepreneurs that they could not otherwise afford.

"We do almost everything a private equity fund would do, but without providing capital," Fal said.

He said that, although access to funding was a hurdle for entrepreneurs in developing economies, that was easier to overcome than a lack of access to networks and knowledge. "The natural networks of friends and relatives in business, which exist everywhere in developed economies, do not exist in economies where business in its current form has been conducted only between people for two or three generations," Fal said.

'Accentuating the positive'
An entrepreneur has to raise his or her own capital, which eliminates many chancers, even before the arduous 12-month Endeavor selection process begins. Endeavor's philosophy is to replace the idea of poverty reduction with that of wealth creation.

"We aim to accentuate the positive, not the negative, and to undo the deep psychological impact implicit in such negativity," Fal said.

What support does Endeavor get from government? Fal's relaxed demeanour slips: "None, man! Don't get me started! In Brazil, the government contributes 30% of Endeavor's budget and has created its own agency to incubate entrepreneurs on a massive scale. In South Africa? Nothing!"

That was despite South Africa being awash with entrepreneurs whose skills could be developed, with a huge impact on job and wealth creation.

Shezi spoke fondly of his mother, a teacher, and his maternal grandparents in Ndwedwe, whose business acumen had seen them prosper beyond the limitations of their paltry government salaries and grants. Shezi said he learned how to "grow money" from their example.

When he bought a new car, which acquired scratches and dents over several months, it cost him thousands of rands in repairs. He sensed his opportunity. He bought a van and the registration number 083 SCRATCH, which he daubed on the side, and set out to undercut the competition.

Although working full-time at Accenture, Shezi would receive phone calls requesting his services during the week. He would rustle the pages of a magazine near the phone speaker and say, "We're fully booked this week, ma'am … let me see … oh, wait, someone's cancelled on Saturday morning".

Shezi, with no panel beating or painting experience, would collect another company's off-duty panel beater, give him a pair of Scratch Mobile overalls and get the job done.

In the first month -- November 2006 -- he turned over R30 000. Shezi quit his job, sold his flat and was soon living the life of an entrepreneur -- quarter the salary, four times the excitement.

"If I could make 30 gees sitting in the office working for the boss, I knew I could triple my revenue working full-time," he said.

"When you work at a company, you get a performance assessment once a year. Here, I do one every morning in the shower … what's the bank balance? … when are wages due? … oh no!" he said, rubbing the back of his head in mock anguish.

The airport idea came to Shezi while he was using the valet parking service during an Accenture business trip. "I noticed that customers spent a few minutes filling out paperwork to park there and, in that time, a Scratch Mobile agent on site could assess a vehicle's condition and provide that customer with a quotation for repairs on the vehicle that was being left behind."

But Scratch Mobile only grew into the medium-size business it is today -- with a turnover of R6-million, a staff of 26 and branches at OR Tambo International Airport in Jo'burg and King Shaka International Airport in Durban -- thanks to the input provided by Endeavor.

Shezi has received free financial audits by Ernst & Young, which have enabled him to approach other companies for loans, and a marketing strategy created by Draftfcb, which has helped put Scratch Mobile on the map.

His advice to other entrepreneurs is to "find the one thing that's unique about your business -- a selling point -- and exploit it as much as you can". He calls it "the magnet pulling customers your way", which, in the case of Scratch Mobile, is that "anyone can panel beat, but we can do it while you fly".

Shezi's location -- at airports -- is symbolic. It is unlikely that anything short of the sky will stop his rise as an entrepreneur.

Source: http://mg.co.za/article/2011-01-07-starting-a-business-from-scratch

How to Get Lazy People to Work

"How can I get lazy people to work?"

As a coach and consultant, I've also been asked, so I know it isn't an isolated or fleeting question.

Will all due respect to those who have asked me and to those of you reading and nodding your head in agreement, you are asking the wrong question.
What is wrong with the question you ask? At least three things:

• You can't "get" or "make" people do anything (at least not for very long or without unintended consequences).


• "Lazy" is a relative term - one person's lazy might be another person's normal (or even motivated).


• "Lazy" also is a word full of judgment and baggage. Including it in your question reduces the likelihood that you will have success anyway.

So let's see if we can explore what you can do, and in the process see if we can help answer this all-too-prevalent question. OK?

The real question

I'm pretty confident the real question, regardless of how I'm asked, is:
"How can I get people to do more, or do what I think is important?"
Or, stated in a more accurate way, based on what is actually within your control and influence:
"How can I influence others to do more or to do the things that are most important to me (or the team or the organization)?"
Hopefully this accurately re-describes what you or anyone really means when asking the question.

Consider the other person

This question is about two things - someone else's behavior and your perspective on it. Let's start with the other person - I'll get to you in a minute.
Over time, people tend to do what is in alignment with their goals and their view of the world. In other words, people do (or don't do) what makes sense to them. If you want to understand better why other people are doing something, you must first understand their perspective. This isn't a novel concept, and while you probably aren't (and this article won't make you) a psychologist, most people forget this basic premise.
If you would like someone to exhibit different behaviors and make different choices (i.e. work harder, you lazy bum!), consider why they are doing what they are doing. Ask yourself questions like:

• What is important to them?
• What do they see that I don't?
• What does success look like to them?

Consider your perspective

Your perspective is likely different than that of those you are leading, or you might not be asking this question or reading this article. You see the world differently; you understand the purpose and needs of their work differently. Your perspective makes complete sense to you - as much as theirs doesn't!
However, your values and ethics also impact your perspective. What you define as lazy, how you define a work ethic, what you believe is the right work/life balance for you - all of these and more play into your perspective - and judgment - about whether someone is "lazy" or not.
Not having ‘your' work ethic doesn't in and of itself make the other person ‘lazy.'

Influence strategies

Consider this a starter set of influence strategies for the situation we're discussing. While these alone may not "solve the problem," they likely will make a big difference, and help you determine what the next steps might be.

Let go of your preconceived notions and labels

Understanding your values and beliefs about work is a good starting point. Recognize that however firmly you believe in these values they are not absolute truths. Recognize too that everyone is willing to work hard for things that truly matter to them. Lose the judgment and focus on influencing based on the other person's perspective.

Talk to the other person - and understand his or her perspective

This step is more about asking non-judgmental questions. Questions like the ones asked above are a good starting point. Ask for understanding, not proof or as the starting point of a debate or argument. Remember you can't change the behavior; only help the person make a new choice. Ask the questions to help both of you understand his/her motivations.

Connect to their 'why'

When people have a big enough why they make choices to accomplish just about anything. In order to influence others, you must understand and tap into their deepest motivations. When you can help them connect their work to their why, everyone wins.

Set clearer expectations

Often the gap in behavior, and therefore your frustration and judgment, stems from a difference in expectations. Most people feel like they are doing a good job and accomplishing what is expected of them. Sometimes that is a deluded or distorted view. More often, in my experience, there is a gap between what you expect and what others think is expected of them.

Focus on results, not activity

Often I have found (and I work on it myself) that we look at how many hours people work or how diligent they appear to be as a sign of their "laziness factor." I mean, if people are busy that's good, right? Likely, the better measure is results, not time spent. Perhaps one of the reasons we don't use that measure for others is that we don't want to hold ourselves to it.

Source: http://hodu.com/lazy.shtml