Business Building Corner

While there is not a 100 percent guarantee that you can garner the same results, emulating your role model helps you shorten your learning curve. You learn to avoid common mistakes and apply the essential steps and strategies that have helped your role model succeed. The idea is that it is much easier to follow a previously proven path to success.

According to Marilyn Price-Mitchell, PhD, author of Tomorrow’s Change Makers: Reclaiming the Power of Citizenship for a New Generation, there are five main qualities of role models. Summarized, good role models have the following:

1. Passion and ability to inspire. Role models are people who are always trying to give back to society, their community and the next generation.
2. Clear set of values. They act in ways that support their beliefs. This helps others understand how their own values are part of who they are. Role models show how their underlying values motivate them.
3. Commitment to community. Their behavior shows they are "other-focused" rather than "self-focused." They are giving and generous with their time and talent to benefit other people.
4. Selflessness and acceptance of others. Role models are generally non-judgmental of those who are different—from varying social backgrounds, religion, wealth—and thus are able to serve one and all.
5. Ability to overcome obstacles. Quoting Booker T. Washington, "Success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which one has overcome."

In network marketing, role modeling is critical because it is the basis of duplication. A network marketing role model is generally a new enrollee’s upline, mentor or crossline. A successful mentor should be experienced, dedicated and able to guide someone new to LifePharm.

Even though in most cases, your LifePharm mentor would be one of your uplines, if you feel that your uplines are not dedicated enough to guide you consistently, then you will have to look for others to be your role models. In some cases, you may not know them personally. If that is the case, what you can do is observe how they run their business and build a network. Try and replicate your role model’s network marketing system.

Once you replicate the behavior and networking strategies of your role model, you will be ready to become a role model for others. That’s what duplication is all about, and the basis for business-building success.