You Don’t Need More Time — Just Ask This One Question [Who Not How]

most entrepreneurs are under constant

stress they work a lot and have no time

to relax but still they earn very little

the most commonly used sentence is

I am very busy or I have so much work to

finish today

if this sounds familiar then today's

book summary is for you the book I will

be summarizing is titled who not how by

Dan Sullivan Dan is a famous business

coach who has worked with hundreds of

entrepreneurs and business owners an

interesting thing about Dan is that even

though he is the author of the book he

didn't write a single word of it I can

almost hear you saying how can someone

write a book without actually writing a

book

well the answer is hidden in the title

of the book Dan says that whenever we

have a goal such as writing a book or

whenever we Face a problem the first

question most of us ask is how how can I

solve this problem or how can I achieve

this goal according to Dan this is a

terrible question to ask the right

question is who not how you need to ask

who can solve this for me or who can do

this for me not how can I do this

asking how comes naturally and

automatically we are almost programmed

to ask how questions and this becomes a

huge problem once you start a business

in the following minutes I will explain

how asking who questions can help you to

have more time and money I have 11

questions from the book so let's get

started lesson number one freedom of

time

it was summer vacation and like any

other teenage boy 16 year old Richie

wanted to earn money so he could buy

things of his liking and he didn't have

to ask his parents for money

so naturally Richie started thinking of

how he could make money he decided to

work in a grocery store or gas station

but his father didn't want him to work

at this young age

but Richie was adamant he wanted to earn

money so his father suggested he go to

the nearby watermelon farm and buy

watermelons that were small and oddly

shaped Richie took his father's advice

and went to the farm where he bought all

small sized different looking

watermelons to his surprise he got them

at a lower price because Farmers usually

throw them away as no one buys them due

to their irregular shape so Richie

bought them then he picked up the phone

book and called all his neighbors and

offered them to buy watermelons from him

he offered them at a cheaper rate

compared to the nearby store and

marketed those watermelons as fresh and

irregularly sized because they were

produced organically within a few hours

all of his 100 watermelons were sold and

he made a profit instead of working all

summer he ended up enjoying his vacation

and used his earned money as per his

wishes

this is the story of all of our Lives

just like Richie when we want something

we ask how how can I buy this or how can

I achieve this Etc asking how would have

cost Richie his entire summer vacation

in Richie's case the who was his dad he

gave Richie an idea that helped Richie

to earn the money he wanted in a

considerably shorter time and enjoy his

summer vacation

that is the power of working with who

you instantly get access to knowledge

insights and expertise that you

currently lack working with who reduces

your effort increases the quality of the

end result and most importantly freeze

up your time

freedom of time is the number one goal

that an entrepreneur needs to achieve an

entrepreneur is the main engine of the

business and one of the most important

things he needs to do is to think and

that can't happen if you are busy with

many tasks you need free time to relax

and start thinking

research shows that only 16 percent of

creative ideas happen while we are

working the rest come when we are in a

state of rest you've probably noticed

that creative ideas come to you while

you're taking a shower traveling or

doing something relaxing so involving

whose will free up your time give you

time to think and increase the quality

of the result lesson number two find

who's for all aspects of your life Dan

says you should find who's for all

aspects of your life from cooking and

fitness to business maybe you don't

realize it but you already have many

who's in your life for example the

person who delivers your letters is a

Who and the person who takes care of

your garbage is a who you are also a who

for the people in your life such as your

partner your boss and your child life

would be impossible without whose can

you imagine how difficult it would be if

you had to do every little task by

yourself

so we need who's in order to survive and

thrive unfortunately once we start a

business many of us forget this simple

truth and start doing tasks that are

equivalent to taking care of the garbage

or delivering letters if you want to

grow and prosper you need to involve

more who's in your life and business and

sometimes you will need to find several

who's to get the final who that you're

looking for for example if you need to

hire a logo designer but you have no

idea how to hire one then this is a

strong signal that you need another who

to help you find the who you are looking

for

this sounds so simple and obvious but I

personally struggled with this a lot

whenever I wanted to hire someone I

would spend hours trying to figure out

how to do it after a while I would

either quit searching and go back to

doing the job myself because I couldn't

find the person I was looking for or I

would find someone but he wouldn't be

the right fit for the job after reading

this book I realized that what I needed

to do was find the person who knows how

to hire the person I needed so if you

don't know how to find the who you are

looking for then it means you need

another who

lesson number three procrastination is

wisdom

if what we covered so far got your

attention and you would like to find

Whos for different aspects of your life

but you have no idea where to start then

here's a very useful tip for a few days

pay attention to the tasks or goals you

procrastinate the most Dan says

procrastination is wisdom it's a signal

telling you that you need another person

for example it's been years since you

wanted to write a book start a business

get in shape get rid of those annoying

tasks or start a YouTube channel but

somehow these goals never get

materialized they are always in the

corner of your mind but somehow you

never work on them instead you

procrastinate

procrastination is a psychological

phenomenon that occurs when you want

more for yourself but don't have the

knowledge and capability to do it

procrastination means your goal and

ambition are great but you're not the

right person to execute them

procrastination means you need help you

need to involve whose now finding the

right who is also an art you can't hire

the right person until you are super

defined on what goal you want to achieve

Dan has a one-page document that he uses

every time he looks for a who he calls

it an impact filter it comprises seven

questions number one what is the project

number two purpose what do you want to

accomplish number three importance

what's the biggest difference this will

make number four ideal outcome what does

the completed project look like number

five best result if you do take action

number six worst result if you don't

take action seven success criteria what

has to be true when this project is

finished by completing the impact filter

you will be equipped to explain to other

people what you want and why it is

important so next time when you are

procrastinating remember that it is a

signal for you to start looking for the

right who so complete the impact filter

get clear on the vision and start

finding the right who to execute the

vision lesson number four Technical and

adaptive problems all business problems

can be divided into two categories

number one technical problems number two

and adaptive problems technical problems

are problems where the answer is already

known you just need to find out how to

do it for example if you want to have a

website for your business there are tons

of free YouTube tutorials or businesses

that can do it for you with technical

problems you always need to ask who can

do this for me now let's talk about the

Adaptive problems these are the problems

for creators anything that has ever been

created or invented has been done by a

Creator you can't hire someone to

generate ideas that only you can think

of no one can have access to your brain

on your behalf so to grow your business

and acquire freedom of money you need to

engage in tasks that only you can do and

leave all the technical problems to the

respective who's this makes complete

sense and sounds easy right

but the problem is that very often the

first question the entrepreneur asks is

how can I build a website and here's how

this question leads to problems our

attention is 100 focused on the task we

are doing even if that's a distraction

by asking the question of how to build a

website you are allowing yourself to put

your 100 attention on learning and then

executing the newly acquired knowledge

for a long period And even if in the

future you do decide to find someone to

hand over this responsibility to you

will have to first train that person to

do the job as per your liking in all of

this your main goal of growing and

potentially achieving your big dream

took a second priority there is only so

much that a person can do on his own

asking how impacts the way you spend

your time and the freedom of money

freedom of money happens when you focus

your time and energy on activities that

have higher impacts on your business

you are in the business because you want

to make more money not to build a

website so focus on doing things that

help you make more money

and find who's for the rest

lesson five decision fatigue another

problem with asking how questions is

that they lead to decision fatigue this

is a state where your mind gets

exhausted and your willpower and energy

decrease by taking multiple decisions

decision fatigue is one of the main

reasons Dan rejected the idea of driving

so he could focus his time and attention

on the things that matter while he is in

the car

inspired by Dan's approach an attorney

named Jacob also stopped driving instead

he started calling Uber every day and

this is what happened he freed up 90

minutes of his time which he used for

higher quality tasks his stress levels

decreased he didn't have to pay

attention to the traffic he never

arrived late to the office he didn't

have to look for parking space and so

much more by paying fifty dollars for an

Uber Jacob was able to create 10 times

the impacts on his meetings because he

showed up with a fresh mind and that

impact often turned into tens of

thousands of dollars

when you free yourself up from various

tasks you not only free up your time but

also free up your mind and with the free

mind you will have time and energy to

focus on tasks that matter you will have

time to expand your vision and work on

Innovations freeing up your mind isn't

just about thinking it's also about

showing up with energy and Performing

great at work because the stage has

already been set for you and not by you

so next time you feel exhausted in an

important meeting and don't know why try

finding a who for the tasks that do not

need your involvement

lesson six who is an investment not a

cost now you might look at the things we

discussed so far and think that it will

cost you a lot of money if you start

finding who's four different aspects of

your life if the amount of money you

will spend is the main concern that is

in your mind then probably you have a

cost mindset Dan says who is not a cost

it is an investment it is an investment

in yourself and in your business

changing from a cost mindset to an

investment mindset will also positively

impact your relationships with the

person you are hiring because you no

longer see them as a cost unfortunately

many entrepreneurs can't get rid of this

cost mindset and as a result even if

they have plenty of money they still end

up doing things that they shouldn't be

doing and refuse to spend money

lesson number seven if you have money to

solve a problem then you don't have a

problem

there's a story in the book about an

entrepreneur named Wes that explains

this lesson very well West built a

company and sold it which made him a

billionaire two weeks after selling his

company Wes found out that the air

conditioner in his house was broken he

got a quote from a repair person and was

proposed seven thousand nine hundred

dollars for a new air conditioner being

a former contractor West decided to

handle fixing the air conditioner on his

own by reducing the load on the fan to

cool down the house and then he would

wait for winter when the price of ACS

would go down to buy a new one this

would require him to invest a few hours

on the roof but would save him a lot of

money so he climbed the ladder to reach

the roof and the next thing he knew was

that he was lying on his back on the

ground Wes ended up spending 11 days in

the hospital two of which were in a coma

he was lucky to have survived this type

of impact on his skull but he stayed in

bed for two months he had to walk with a

walker couldn't talk and had to relearn

basic skills these two months made him

recall to saying Dan used all the time

if you have enough money to solve a

problem then you don't have a problem if

only he could have stuck to this

principle when it was needed

lesson number eight always be the buyer

imagine you are negotiating with a

potential client after a little bit of

discussion you realize that this can be

a very profitable deal for your business

however you don't like the way the

client is behaving he's very rude to you

and to your employees and he keeps

making more and more demands pretty

quickly you realize that despite the

profit it will be very tough to deal

with this client

now if you are in a position where you

can refuse to work with the client then

you are a buyer being a buyer means you

get to choose people you work with not

the other way around in every situation

the buyer can reject the seller but not

the other way around being a buyer means

you can reject people who are not

aligned with your principles and values

by the way it is very hard to become a

buyer if you don't have the freedom of

time and money that is why you need them

first Dan says almost in all cases as

soon as an entrepreneur frees up his

time the revenue goes up and once

Revenue increases the quality of the

relationship increases as well because

you are no longer dependent on money to

accept clients or people who don't align

with your values lesson number nine

eighty percent rule you can get eighty

percent of the project done quickly from

zero to eighty percent usually takes

less time from eighty percent to ninety

percent is very difficult and going from

ninety percent to one hundred percent is

more work than going from zero percent

to eighty percent that is why you need

to know what you can do as a who then

quickly pass it on to the next hoop the

longer you take to perfect the idea by

yourself before the feedback the slower

the transformational process will be

nothing is ever truly finished so get to

the eighty percent and pass it on to the

next who

this is one of the mistakes I did

personally whenever I was creating

scripts for videos such as this one I

would always send it for feedback once

it was 100 complete as a result very

often I would end up deleting several

paragraphs that I spent hours perfecting

obviously this was a waste of time plus

sometimes I would get great feedback but

couldn't implement it because I had so

much progress that implementing it would

mean starting almost from scratch

lesson number ten if it is not a hell

yes

then it is a hell no

you know sometimes you meet a client or

potential business partner and you have

this mixed feeling about whether you

should work with that person or not on

one side you know that working with that

person can be very profitable but on the

other side you sense that he or she has

a difficult personality or different

values than you do Dan says if you are

not excited about the relationship with

that person in other words if your

reaction is not a hell yes then you

shouldn't start that relationship in the

first place it is either hell yes or

hell no

lesson 11 competition is for losers all

of us have been taught in school that

getting help from others is cheating it

is the education system that promotes a

competitive culture where one needs to

prove they are better than the other

based on a test this mentality often

leads us to live an isolated and

self-centered life with limiting views

about others and ourselves

the same thing happened with Karen Karen

was an attorney and she wanted to honor

her grandmother who is a recognized

National activist in the 1900s by

writing her biography she was working on

this biography for the last two years

but was only able to write 100 pages one

day she received an email from Dr

Whitmore who was a history Professor who

wanted to write a biography on her

grandmother and wanted to gather some

information from Karen the professor had

already written some other biographies

on other famous women Karen's first

reaction was to not share any

information with her and complete the

book before she did this classic need to

compete has been engraved inside us

since kindergarten but since Karen had

no experience writing a biography before

she was struggling to complete the book

and the constant stress of completing

the book before Dr Whitmore was not

helping either

one day when she was discussing this

problem with Benjamin he asked her why

not collaborate with Dr Whitmore and

co-author the book

Karen was stunned for a moment how come

she didn't think of this first

yes she could do that and the professor

would be better able to handle the

writing of this book because of her

experience

Karen felt relieved and sent an email

immediately proposing co-authoring the

book and Dr Whitmore was more than happy

to do so Karen now had her Who and the

end result was much better than if Karen

wrote it alone

as this story explains collaboration not

only enables you to create success in

your life but also gives you a deep

sense of meaning and belongingness

this is it for this video thanks for

watching