Stumbling towards irrelevancy…

If I were to start a “National Talk-Show Hosts Association,” how high would the standards have to be to attract individuals already successful in the business to join? How compelling would the information and experience need to be so everyone from Rush Limbaugh to Jim Rome would feel they were missing out if they weren’t a part of it?

Or, an “American Association of Bloggers” with ideas so innovative and discussion so vibrant, everyone from Seth Godin to Perez Hilton, from Chris Brogan to Arianna Huffington, from Scott Stratten of “Unmarketing” to Paul Krugman of “Conscience of a Liberal” would make time on their calendars to attend and participate?

Without a doubt, to enable either of these efforts to become successful, the content would have to be extraordinary…superb beyond description.

I bring this up because I see two simultaneous phenomenon:

1) The lowering of standards by organizations to include anyone
2) The desire to purchase information from unqualified sources

If you are really serious about your writing and posting, would you want to be a part of a national association of bloggers that included no highly successful bloggers? If you’re at a mid-market radio station and want to be nationally syndicated, why would you join a professional society of talk show hosts that only had “want-to-be’s” as members?

Yet, to keep membership numbers up and budgets funded, I see many associations broadening their requirements to open themselves to more potential members. Which, of course, drives away the very member most important to have on board.

When I work with my friends, for example, at the Do-It-Best Hardware company, I find they only allow hardware store leaders at the meetings. Call it elitist, but the fact is that if you own a grocery store – or just are thinking about, perhaps just wanting to own a hardware store – you’re not ready for this meeting quite yet.

Clarity about our business and ourselves (from “Collapse of Distinction”) REQUIRES exclusion. You’ll never attract eagles if you also fill the room with turkeys.

Which leads to the second point: If I want to know about writing, doesn’t it make a lot more sense to buy and read Stephen King’s remarkable book, “On Writing,” than it does to spend hundreds of dollars on a weekend seminar with someone who has never retailed more than fifty copies of schlock?

If I want to be a professional speaker, isn’t it better to go out and practice – either by giving free speeches or joining Toastmasters – than to spend hundreds (or thousands) of dollars at some weekend “become a paid speaker” seminar hosted by someone who isn’t getting booked by major corporations himself?

Of course it is. So, why don’t we do it?

Because the unknowns who inflate both their egos and their wallets by “teaching” want-to-be’s — instead of building their own books, blogs, and speaking business — have realized the successful speaker, blogger…or even Stephen King’s book…won’t tell you what you want to hear.

You want to hear that ANYONE can do it…and the six steps you can take this week to be successful…instead of the hours, weeks, months, and YEARS it requires to truly attain what you believe you desire.

The truly successful will never tell you it is easy. Because, it’s not.

A “You, too can get published!” seminar for $699 (I made up that title, it doesn’t reflect any specific program or individual) can promise to show you the “tricks” of the trade. Do you really think Dr. Ken Blanchard, for example, became the mega-bestseller he is by using mere “tricks”?

Success – at anything – is damn hard work. It’s GREAT work, don’t get me wrong, but we would all laugh at a program promising us to “Become a doctor THIS WEEKEND!” Why do we take this other crap seriously?

Any organization willing to lower its standards – or individual willing to be mentored by unremarkable and unqualified “specialists” – will not improve their chances of long-term success.

It just prolongs a stumble towards irrelevancy…