Stonecutters could pound at a single rock 100 times without seeing any result, but on the 101st blow, it could split in two. Sometimes, business feels like pounding away at a rock without any progress. Bradley encourages listeners to remember the Stonecutter’s Credo and apply it to their own business practices for resilience and perseverance.
The Efforts Before The Result
Bradley has always been a fan of analogies and metaphors to process things in business and life. He finds that pulling insights from various industries, and even from areas unrelated to business, helps him organize his thoughts more effectively.
Recently, during a meeting with his small group, a member shared an idea that Bradley found particularly resonant. This idea, which Bradley later researched and found referred to as the “Stonecutter’s Credo,” emphasizes persistence. The credo goes: “When nothing seems to help, I go and look at a stonecutter hammering away at his rock, perhaps a hundred times, without as much as a crack showing in it. Yet at the hundred and first blow, it will split in two. And I know it was not that blow that did it, but all that had gone before.” This powerful imagery from Jacob Riis encapsulates a key principle Bradley believes in—the cumulative power of consistent effort.
The Stonecutter’s Credo In Action
Bradley relates this to his experiences in business, where countless efforts seem futile until they finally yield results. Often, people only see the success and not the persistent effort behind it. He recalls Alex Hermosi’s idea that “volume negates luck” and emphasizes the importance of resetting expectations about what it takes to grow a business. Simplistic advice can mislead one into expecting quick results, but the reality is that significant progress takes time, costs more, and looks different than anticipated.
Bradley acknowledges the entrepreneurial challenge of needing momentum to keep going. Reflecting on his own recent weeks, he shares the difficulty of staying motivated when his Sunday night planning reveals more setbacks than successes. To counter this, he developed the skill of finding wins from the past week, quarter, or year. This practice, he says, is crucial for maintaining confidence—a key element for entrepreneurs.
He describes the natural tendency to focus on what’s not going well—like bad sales, high customer churn, or team issues—and the effort it takes to counteract this by actively seeking out positive outcomes. This is why he stresses the importance of having mechanisms in place to celebrate small victories.
Bradley illustrates this with a personal example: running online workshops. Initially, his workshops had low attendance and registration, which shook his confidence. After running only a few, he gave up. However, he later revisited the idea with a renewed commitment and a fresh perspective, determined to improve with each session. His commitment paid off, transforming his workshops from occasional events to regular, highly attended sessions. The slide count grew, indicating a richer, more developed presentation. (You can experience an upcoming WebClass when you register free here.)
What This Means For You
This experience embodies the Stonecutter’s Credo. Despite early struggles and a lack of immediate results, persistence and incremental improvements eventually led to success. By mid-2024, Bradley has increased the frequency of his workshops significantly, going from a few per year to weekly sessions. This consistent effort, he notes, has made all the difference.
If you feel like you’re endlessly hammering away without seeing results, remember the Stonecutter’s Credo and the flywheel concept from Jim Collins’ “Good to Great.” Continuous effort eventually creates unstoppable momentum. The key takeaway is clear: persistence and commitment, no matter how small the progress seems, ultimately lead to success.
The Quarterly – June 25, 2024
Ditch month over month growth and begin to design the systems and processes your business and team need to create growth and scale. Quarterly planning empowers you as the owner to set the vision, direction, and key targets that you need to reverse engineer the business you truly desire.
The Best Part? This 2 Hour Workshop with Bradley Hamner and other business owners is totally free. Save your seat!
Grow Your Leadership
Bradley has many resources to grow your leadership in the area of vision and priorities. Check out a few of them:
Let’s talk about something super important that often gets overlooked – shifting from being an operator in your business to truly owning it. Trust us, this change can make a world of difference. Keep reading…
In this free WebClass, learn how to design & install an operating system that runs like clockwork. Learn more…
It’s difficult to get to your destination if you aren’t sure where you currently are! After all, the path from Minnesota to Canada is very different than the path from Mexico to Canada. If you aren’t certain where you’re at today in business, you need to take the Rainmaker to Architect assessment. It will gauge your strengths and weaknesses as a leader and in your business. Then, you’ll get detailed, specific suggestions for improvement. Take the assessment here.
MEET YOUR COACH
BRADLEY HAMNER
Bradley is a Business Growth Coach and Value Builder consultant, empowering entrepreneurs to become architects of their own success. He shares his revolutionary BlueprintOS methodology, unlocking businesses’ true potential and driving remarkable achievements.