Seth Godin had an interesting short post oh his blog yesterday. Here it is:

Small business success

Three things you need:

• the ability to abandon a plan when it doesn’t work,
• the confidence to do the right thing even when it costs you money in the short run, and
• enough belief in other people that you don’t try to do everything yourself.

That’s it. Short and sweet and pretty hard to argue with.

For many business owners and CEOs, the last point is the hardest. That’s because Americans love cowboys.

One of our strongest national myths is the story of the cowboy, the rugged loner who rides into town and saves the day. It permeates our literature, our films, our music. (Remember, not all cowboys wear cowboy hats). And it’s really dangerous and misleading.

Most good things aren’t accomplished by lone individuals, though we tend to believe otherwise. People usually can’t change the world all by themselves, though we’d like to believe they could.

And let’s not forget the horrible cost to the cowboy. Shane walks away in the end. The lone hero has to remain alone.

You may be the boss, and that may mean that, in some sense, you’re responsible for everything. It doesn’t mean you have to do everything. If you try, you’re probably going to hurt yourself and your company.