Brandon Frere, CEO, Reveals His Secrets to Success: Be Open. Be Vulnerable.

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Vulnerability is an essential part of growth, especially for business leaders. In general, they have to balance expectations, scaling, new technologies and how to keep satisfaction high among employees and customers while also trying to reduce costs. The growth mindset philosophy has grown in popularity in recent years and can be very helpful for CEOs trying to balance it all. The central theme of growth mindset is learning to focus on finding a person’s highest potential. The opposite is the fixed mindset, which is more rigid. People who apply a growth mindset to their work lives are more flexible in the face of change and persevere more when obstacles arise. They are also not afraid to fail or receive criticism. Brandon Frere, CEO and growth expert, advocates the growth mindset in the workplace as a means for positive change and lasting success.

“This environment demands you to be vulnerable,” says Frere. “You’re going to get pushed to grow, and then you get rewarded. But not everybody wants to grow.”

This environment demands you to be vulnerable. You're going to get pushed to grow, and then you get rewarded. But not everybody wants to grow.

Brandon Frere, CEO of Frere Enterprises

In the past few years, more authors have written about the rewards of growth, including Dr. Brené Brown. Her 2010 TedTalk on “The Power of Vulnerability” has 35 million views on YouTube, and she also published four New York Times bestselling books on her research into personal growth and leadership. “Rather than sitting on the sidelines and hurling judgment and advice,” she writes, “we must dare to show up and let ourselves be seen. This is vulnerability. This is daring greatly.” Thought leaders like Brown are bringing to light the strength in learning and expanding one’s mind without fear or shame.

Brandon Frere understands that these are limiting beliefs, similar to determinism: they will only hold a leader back. They reflect the fixed mindset inherent in many bureaucratic systems. Symptoms of this type of thinking include being closed off to criticism, negativity, pessimism and the underlying belief that intelligence is “fixed” — hence the name fixed mindset. CEOs cannot plan on great success if they believe that their imaginations and abilities are static. How can sustainable expansion take place if leaders and their workers believe success comes from being finite, confined and restricted? As designer and author Debbie Millman said in a commencement speech: “If you imagine less, less will be what you undoubtedly deserve … Do what you love, and don’t stop until you get what you love. Work as hard as you can, imagine immensities.” Perhaps fixed mindset had its place in business in the past, but Brandon Frere thinks it is high time for leaders to focus on ways to enhance innovation.

“You can’t avoid failure,” noted Frere. “Setbacks are a natural part of the path to success. Trying to hold yourself to a level of perfectionism that is unrealistic and impossible won’t win you points with me. I value people who keep trying and forging ahead, despite obstacles. Be open. Be vulnerable.”

About Frere Enterprises
Brandon Frere is an entrepreneur and businessman who lives in Sonoma County, California. He has designed and created multiple companies to meet the ever-demanding needs of businesses and consumers alike. His company website, www.FrereEnterprises.com, is used as a means to communicate many of the lessons, fundamentals, and information he has learned throughout his extensive business and personal endeavors, most recently in advocating on behalf of student loan borrowers nationwide.

As experienced during his own student loan repayment, Mr. Frere found out how difficult it can be to work with federally contracted student loan servicers and the repayment programs designed to help borrowers. Through those efforts, he gained an insider’s look into the repayment process and the motivations behind the inflating student loan debt bubble. His knowledge of the confusing landscape of student loan repayment became a vital theme in his future endeavors, and he now uses those experiences to help guide others through the daunting process of applying for available federal repayment and loan forgiveness programs.

FrereEnterprises.com

Source: Frere Enterprises

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