Dare to reach for the stars

By VIKKI BLAND

Alistair Ferguson, businessman and author, has 2000 weeks to live. That's if he gets to 80. But Ferguson has worked out how to extend that time.

"If I rise an hour earlier each day I'll get another 9 1/2 weeks of life," he says.

The calculation exemplifies Ferguson's attitude to life: make the most of every minute because life is not a dress rehearsal.

Ferguson is in the throes of promoting his book, Stand up and Shout, a collation of interviews with 15 successful New Zealanders, including Mad Butcher Peter Leitch, real estate guru Michael Boulgaris, journalist Genevieve Westcott and research scientist Justine Kidd.

In Stand up and Shout, Ferguson asks each icon how they define success, how dreams are achieved, and which people and values have shaped them as individuals.

"There are so many people in society not fulfilling their potential," says Ferguson.

"We let what society thinks we should do and how we should behave dictate how we think and behave. As long as you abide by the law, how you live your life should be your decision."

Redefining success, and achieving it, is a subject close to Ferguson's heart.

The former workaholic, businessman and property owner took a hard look at himself and his life when in May 2001, his then 7-year-old daughter Emma was diagnosed with a brain tumour.

With a realisation common to those who suddenly face their own mortality or that of a loved one, Ferguson discovered the things he thought mattered most in life, mattered least.

He disposed of a $550,000 mortgage in favour of a home that didn't require one and closed his two thriving businesses in favour of family solidarity, philanthropy, inspirational thinking and writing.

Ferguson interviewed, wrote, networked, solidified relationships, spent time with his children and started cooking three nights a week.

By the time 9-year-old Emma Ferguson successfully underwent surgery to remove her brain tumour in May of this year, her 41-year-old father had a new life.

Ferguson says writing Stand up and Shout was cathartic and a positive distraction from his fears for his daughter.

However, he says he has always been passionate about success and New Zealanders.

"We admire other countries for what they achieve, but we can achieve more than most other countries."

Interviewing our icons reinforced his realisation of the true nature of success, and how to achieve it.

"The first thing you need is unshakeable self belief and a passion for what you do. That inspires those around you, whether bankers, employees or customers."

Helping other people also leads to personal and professional growth and thinking about the needs of others ultimately helps people to help themselves.

"We have to stop blaming ourselves or someone else for a set of circumstances in our careers or lives. We need to be accountable, to take responsibility for change and to look for learning and growth opportunities in everything."

Ferguson is impressed by the number of people he interviewed who determine their success using internal measures.

"If you set internal benchmarks, you define your own success. Success for some people is raising children, clothing their family and keeping a roof over their heads. For someone else it is having a net worth of $10 million, living in Remuera, and having a happy family.

"If you use benchmarks set by external means you'll often feel dissatisfied."

Participation was another key element for those he interviewed.

"There's no such thing as failure unless a person fails to participate. The one thing reiterated in Stand up and Shout is not to let anyone tell you it can't be done, or you can't do it."

Supporting international research that suggests mentoring is critical for personal motivation, Ferguson says almost all his interviewees believe mentorship was crucial to their success. And he's extrapolated that to a simple premise: if kids have access to good mentors, New Zealanders will raise a generation of happy, self-confident people who will achieve personal and professional success.

"I know of a very successful businessman and entrepreneur who gives 20 hours a week to mentoring teenagers in schools. That's so important.

"A kid may have gone through school and received a low NCEA score, but then be inspired by a TV documentary to be a doctor. If they form a plan which suits where they have to start from, and have the right mentors behind them, it's possible. Anything is."

Ferguson gets his share of detractors - after all, the shelves of libraries and book shops are groaning under the weight of self-help titles. Then there's the infamous Kiwi attitude that to stand up and shout is not the done thing for a New Zealander.

Ferguson has no time for the Great Kiwi Clobbering Machine.

"I get very pissed off with people who say it can't be done. Everybody has choice and opportunity. The people interviewed in this book were not born with silver spoons in their mouths."

He believes anyone can realise a dream. You're a woman with a career dream but you want to be there for your children? No problem; chart a course for what you want to achieve and start taking incremental steps towards it.

You're a guy who would like to make changes, but fear failure and feel inadequate expressing yourself? Face your fears through counsel; and try writing your thoughts and feelings out.

Ferguson says most people, and men in particular, struggle to make changes through fear. "Some fears are deep seated through, say, being abused as a child. But they also can be as basic as a fear of losing money following one bad investment.

"Guys will basically screw up their lives because they won't do what most women have no trouble doing - sharing and asking for help. Yet family health and relationships need looking after before other kinds of success can follow."

So what does an average day look like for the new Alastair Ferguson?

"I get up around 6am and spend an hour with myself. I go through my personal goals, values and beliefs. I think about all the things I am grateful for. I take my kids to school.

"The rest of the day is spent in my office at home or out with prospective clients. And I cook three nights a week."

Determined to help the hospital that helped his daughter, Ferguson is donating $2 from every copy of Stand up and Shout sold towards the purchase of a diathermy machine (which stops blood vessels from bleeding in surgery) for the neurological unit of Auckland's Starship children's hospital. He will have to sell 50,000 books to meet the $100,000 cost of the machine, a goal that doesn't faze him.

"I've got other ideas for other books and products. I could be the Anthony Robbins of Australasia. Those inspirational guys are no different to you and I, you know - they've just had a life-changing experience as I did."

Practising what he preaches, Alastair Ferguson is busy pursuing a new dream.

Tips from Stand up and Shout

* Take time to understand yourself. Spend an hour a day with yourself; going to the beach, reading a book or a paper, go fishing; look at your life as a whole. Decide what you want.

* Try writing; sit for 20 minutes. Dont think about what to write just clear your mind and start writing.

* Try CDI (continuous daily improvement.) If you improve 1 per cent of your life each day, in one year you have improved your life 365 per cent.

* Put personal and family success ahead of, and in tandem with, financial success.

* Be passionate about whatever you do; doing it only for the money wont fulfil you.

* Stand up and Shout, Williamson Publishing, RRP $29.95

Stand up and Shout