BUILD VALUABLE SKILLS

 

In the early 1940s, a young boy was growing up in the small county of Almhult in southern Sweden. Within a few years, he would impact millions of people. At the time, however, nobody knew his name.

The boy was occupied with a small and relatively simple project. He had recently discovered that it was possible to buy boxes of matches in bulk from Stockholm, which was a few hours away from his small town. He could get the matches for cheap and then sell them individually for a nice profit, but still at a reasonable price.

Pretty soon, he was riding around town on his bicycle and selling matches one by one to anyone who needed them. Once the matches began selling well, the young boy expanded his tiny operation. Before long, he added Christmas ornaments, fish, seeds, ballpoint pens, and pencils. A few years later, he started selling furniture.

The young boy's name was Ingvar Kamprad and when he was seventeen, he decided to name his business. He called it IKEA. In 2019, IKEA had a revenue of 41.3 billion euros. It is amazing what you can do with a few matches!

Selling Matches and Building Valuable Skills

Everybody is obsessed with building their IKEA. Nobody is focused on selling a few matches. We live in a society that values skills, but everyone is obsessed with results. The problem with this is that it can become really easy to get trapped focusing on results when you should really be building your valuable skills.

It is really easy to focus on the dream of building a successful business. Which entrepreneur would not want a company that makes 41.3 billion euros per year?

But that is not how Ingvar Kamprad started. He started by building his skill set. He started by selling one book of matches at a time. He focused on a small problem and then used the skills he developed to solve a bigger problem.

Focus on Getting Good, Not Making It Big

Ingvar Kamprad focused on getting good at business before he tried to get big at business. Think about that for a moment.

Many people want to get big more than they want to become good. A new photographer wants his shots to be published in the National Geographic or win that big photo contest, not shoot in relative obscurity while mastering his craft. The new writer wants to hit the best-seller list, not become an expert of prose. The young basketball player wants to be in the starting lineup, not become the best dribbler on the team.

But if you only focus on these results, then it can be very easy to get distracted from doing the volume of work required to build the valuable skills you need to succeed. And it is the volume that matters. The process is more important than the goal. This is especially true in the beginning. Focus on getting good before you worry about getting big.

In fact, most of what you create early on - even if it is good - probably would not be that good. A research study that analyzed over 70 famous composers revealed that not a single one of these musical geniuses produced a famous musical piece before Year 10 of their career. This period of little recognition and hard work was referred to as the “10 years of silence” and it is very similar to the period that Ingvar Kamprad spent selling matches. Different industries, the same dedication to developing skills.

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