We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Ben Reynolds a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Ben, so many exciting things to discuss, we can’t wait. Thanks for joining us and we appreciate you sharing your wisdom with our readers. So, maybe we can start by discussing optimism and where your optimism comes from?
It’s easier to be pessimistic than optimistic. Pessimists don’t have to deal with the pain of disappointment because they already expect negative outcomes. But pessimism is self-defeating. Why try if you don’t believe something has at least a decent shot of working?
Many people aim to be realists instead of optimists. By aiming to see reality for what it is, you are more likely to make rational decisions. But realism can be self-limiting. It discourages ‘thinking big’. It means eschewing low probability, high payoff situations.
I aim to be a rational optimist. A rational optimist does their best to understand reality, but is also willing to take changes and push themselves to greater challenges. Being realistic curbs absurd behavior, while adding optimism means giving yourself more encouragement – and believing in yourself.
I’m not a naturally optimistic person. It is something I work on. I want to be increasingly optimistic, while remaining rational. It is the optimist who believes they can make a difference. If you don’t believe in yourself, you are unlikely to try at all.
Appreciate the insights and wisdom. Before we dig deeper and ask you about the skills that matter and more, maybe you can tell our readers about yourself?
My professional career is focused on Sure Dividend. Sure Dividend helps individual investors build high quality dividend growth stock portfolios for long-term rising passive income.
Our ~15 person analyst team serves more than 8,000 members of our premium services. We help individual investors minimize investing expenses and build income portfolios for retirement.
It’s exciting to get to be a part of so many people’s retirement investing strategy. It is a role myself and the Sure Dividend team takes very seriously.
That’s why we analyze more than 870 income securities every quarter, over the same metrics. This analysis allows us to compare securities to one another on an apples-to-apples basis.
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
Looking back, the three skills that I believe have been most impactful in my journey are below.
#1: Written Communication.
I am an introvert by nature. And I am certainly not a salesperson. One-to-one selling is not my strength. Being an introvert, I naturally gravitate to writing instead of speaking. Clear written communication has been central to my career.
#2 Passion
I am fortunate to work in a career that is interesting to me. I find investing in general to be incredibly compelling. The stock market is always changing, and there’s always new business developments, as well as investing research.
#3 Desire To Provide Value
From the beginning, I’ve always thought about how I could provide value with Sure Dividend. It’s a cliche, but business is done best when it’s ‘customer-centric’. You do the most good when you maximize the number of people you serve multiplied by the gap between the value you provide and the cost you charge.
Okay, so before we go, is there anyone you’d like to shoutout for the role they’ve played in helping you develop the essential skills or overcome challenges along the way?
The one thing that has been, by far, the most valuable in starting and running Sure Dividend is gaining knowledge from reading.
I am an avid non-fiction book reader. Reading broadens your horizons and teaches you new skills and ideas. But beyond that, it sharpens how you think. Books are the best thoughts of a (typically) highly intelligent individual, polished and written down for the reader.
It’s incredible that something so valuable is so inexpensive. The wisdom you can gain from a book can be 100x or 1,000x as valuable as the price of the book itself.
The real cost of a book is not its price tag, but the time it takes to read. But even accounting for this opportunity cost, there are few activities as valuable on a time-adjusted basis as reading.
Contact Info:
- Website: suredividend.com
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/benreynoldsiv/
- Twitter: https://twitter.com/SureDividend
Image Credits
Shina Reynolds
