When I launched my business with NSA over 25 years ago, I had a couple of very important things going for me. I had great sponsors—Curt and Jackie Beavers—and I heard superb training that made clear what I needed to do to be successful and to make money.

Today, I love to speak about our business culture as a culture of encouragement—a culture where people are taught to dream, be intentional, make a difference in others’ lives, stumble and get up again. To never quit. To grow and develop as a person and as a leader.

Back then, we didn’t talk much about our need for a culture of encouragement.But I experienced it almost every day.

What we did talk about a lot, however, was our need for a “plan” or a “strategy” that I could understand, teach and explain to others in a simple way. In a way that made sense—that gave them enough confidence to believe that they could do it.

That strategy included right up front how a person would get to the Sales Coordinator position as soon as possible and start qualifying his business every month.

The particular numbers have changed a little bit over the last two decades. During those 25 years, I’ve tried out a number of different bells and whistles. Fast Tracks and Bonus programs have come and gone. Sometimes we lost our way and flirted with some fancy ideas, but we’ve always kept coming back to our core strategy.

Get to Sales Coordinator. Build a Qualified Business. Teach everyone how to do that. 

We desperately need a culture of encouragement. Thankfully, we do belong to a culture committed to “inspiring healthy living around the world.” We value leaders who really know how to teach, motivate and inspire us. We are blessed to have men and women who make us feel good about what we’re doing, the company we keep and the values we embrace.

We also need clarity of purpose and a transferable plan of action for every person who wants to “build a stable and lasting business that will help as many people as possible realize their dreams.”

And never doubt this fact: People on our teams want to learn not only how to make a difference, they also want to learn how to make money.

We need to think in terms of strategy as much as we do our culture. We need strong “whys” that inspire and motivate, but we also need to connect the dots for folks so that they know the “how-tos” of achieving the income and success they were inspired to pursue in the first place.

We need a culture that encourages our hearts AND a well-defined strategy that empowers us to achieve personal and financial success.

We all need cheerleaders to keep us fired up, to bring up everyone’s energy and rally the team when the game is on the line. But we also need coaches who know when to call time out, pull us aside, then calmly and confidently show us what plays to run when a first down is needed to keep moving the ball down the field until we cross the goal line.