dwagner

About Doug Wagner

Doug Wagner is an entrepreneur, President and Co-founder of Sunwapta Solutions. Sunwapta's mission is to help businesses transform from surviving to thriving, sustainable growth. From strategy to implementation, this means marketing, sales, managing your brand and delivering consistent value. Get more clients and keep them.
4 May 2015

5 Things to Work on to Protect Your Business Before a Crisis Hits

By |2017-04-03T11:16:03-06:00May 4th, 2015|Categories: Business Strategy, Doug's Blog, Leadership|

Shocked Business Team - Crisis
In this post on I talk about what you need to do to set your business up so that it can survive a personal crisis on your end. The good news is that doing this today will also make your business much better for you NOW.

Read the article at Entrepreneur "5 Things to Work on to Protect Your Business Before a Crisis Hits"

(Note: This post reached number 8 on the most popular list.)

28 Apr 2015

Shifting Your Mindset Opens New Business Possibilities

By |2017-04-03T12:16:20-06:00April 28th, 2015|Categories: Manifast, Mindset and Motivation|

Brain and Mindset

Here at Sunwapta Solutions, the Manifast team and I are big believers in continuous learning and being coached.

In fact, over the past few years we have spent a substantial sum to ensure not only that we can thrive as a business, but that we are able to help your businesses grow by being better ourselves.

One of my recent training calls was with a prominent mindset coach named David Neagle.

He shares a great deal of information on “The Laws” and how to apply them.

Paying the Price of the Gift

One […]

21 Apr 2015

Letting Go When Your Plans Go Sideways

By |2017-04-13T12:25:06-06:00April 21st, 2015|Categories: Business Strategy, Doug's Blog, Marketing, Mindset and Motivation, Sales|Tags: , , , , , , , , |

Horse Head and Eyes - Letting Go and Holding On

Sometimes lessons come from places you don’t expect and still impact you many years later.

About 22 years ago, I was 28 and taking horse riding lessons. I rode English and if you are familiar with the style, the saddle is quite small compared to Western. I mention that because it becomes somewhat relevant later in this story.

I think I ended up in that style in the […]

6 Apr 2015

When Peter’s Problem Robs His Business To Pay Paul

By |2017-04-03T11:16:32-06:00April 6th, 2015|Categories: Business Strategy, Doug's Blog, Leadership, Working on the Business|

Businessman Sheltering From Storm and Crisis

Is your business set up to support you during challenging personal times or will it become an additional burden out of neglect; robbing you of income when you need it most and even potentially everything you've invested in it?

Peter’s Story

My name is Peter. Today I don’t feel like working.

Yet there are a hundred things screaming for my attention.

I should be able to focus but I can’t. My mind is elsewhere, outside of the business […]

30 Mar 2015

2 Questions to Move Your Business Forward

By |2017-04-03T11:00:12-06:00March 30th, 2015|Categories: Business Strategy, Leadership, Manifast|

Vision - definiteness of purpose - business successIt is very easy to get into the habit of drifting from your strategic plan through inattention or chasing the shiny blue ball. We use all sorts of justifications for this but in general, it is better to complete the existing strategy than to change it constantly without thinking.

Before you start any major piece of work for your business you should always ask:

  1. What is the intended result of doing this?
  2. Why does that result matter?

The second question ties your work back to your strategy […]

27 Mar 2015

Entrepreneur: 5 Reasons Why Your Strategy Is ‘ThisClose’ to Failing

By |2017-04-03T11:16:44-06:00March 27th, 2015|Categories: Business Strategy, Doug's Blog|

Strategy Faling Board Knight Takes King

Most entrepreneurs and business owners can pick and set goals. The problem is that without a concrete plan, the likelihood of achieving that strategy is greatly reduced.

"However, the bridge between setting a goal and realizing that goal is the ability to support your vision with a strategic plan. That means devising the plan, focusing on the plan, and executing the plan. And this is where most strategies turn to mush." ~ Doug Wagner on Entrepreneur.com

Entrepreneur Article […]

11 Mar 2015

Unleashing Your Creative Mind

By |2017-04-13T13:06:11-06:00March 11th, 2015|Categories: Business Strategy, Doug's Blog, Mindset and Motivation|

Creativity and Innovation Bigger Results

Sometimes we set goals based on realistic but incremental accomplishments.

Do more of the same except a little faster.

Add 100 subscribers to our newsletter this month. This means hundreds of personal touch points; in person, on the phone or by email.

What if you change the goal to 500? Or 1000? Or 5000?

You won’t get there incrementally.

You have to innovate or get creative up front.

What would you have to do differently to get to the much bigger goal?

Learn some new […]

23 Feb 2015

Success Story: Daraja – Creating Bridges to Zanzibar With Impact

By |2019-10-17T20:39:17-06:00February 23rd, 2015|Categories: Business Strategy, Manifast|

Volunteers

Arsheen Dhalla had a vision to create an organization that would make a positive impact. The Daraja Foundation is the result of that vision.

Daraja means  “bridge” in Swahili.

Which is embedded in their mission:

“To build bridges between communities and work globally to improve living conditions, education and healthcare.”

When Arsheen saw what the Manifast tool could do to help her and her team to accomplish her goals faster she became one of our early adopters… and success stories.

Not because she would not have succeeded without us. They did a lot of things right.

Because her success […]

18 Feb 2015

Squeezing Out The Creative Juices

By |2017-04-13T12:42:37-06:00February 18th, 2015|Categories: Doug's Blog, Mindset and Motivation|

Squeezed orange juice and creativity“Sometimes we try too hard and it is like squeezing an uncut orange, the juices go everywhere.”

I’ve written about forcing creativity before.  But I turned it around and it was actually creative at that time. It doesn’t always happen that easily.

Today I was chatting with my accountability partner Barbara Abramson about focus and scattered thoughts when we both wanted to be consistently writing great articles.

Sometimes The Juices Just Won’t Flow

Sometimes our thoughts are just […]