Setting Up Your Acting Business

Corporation Executive OfficerCEO/President

The CEO is the Chief Executive Officer of a company. The CEO is the person in charge. It’s where the buck stops. You are the product the company. Your physical body is the package of the product and your life energy is the product the company sells. As CEO and president, you are the driving force behind the company’s direction, growth and development. You speak for your company and you must represent it with style, grace, professionalism and charm. You know the responsibilities of CEOs and presidents of other types of companies. You know they are responsible to the company, for the company’s product and for every other aspect of their life as well. The big 7 areas of your life expect the bread winner to provide the means that allow them to function. With that in mind you set your goals. Set yourself up as president and CEO of your life. What are the things necessary to make your president feel good about his job and the perks he gets for having this important job? You should feel empowered knowing that you have, instantly in your awareness, been promoted to president and CEO of your acting and production company. You might want to start considering the need of forming your own corporation, LLC (Limited Liability Corporation), or just perhaps a separate bank account and business materials not connected to the other areas of your life. You want to make sure your personal goals and your professional goals support them. Now that you are president and CEO of your company with you might want to set short and long-term goals to organize your company staff and major departments. Make sure that each department and business area has clearly defined rules and responsibilities. Your company is not just about acting. Many actors have abilities for directing, writing, producing, singing, dancing and other special non-presentational talents which fall under the responsibility of your President and CEO. Even your subsidiary companies, those totally diverse areas of your holdings where monies are made and spent, are the responsibility of your CEO. Therefore, if you are a waiter, your income is the result of a subsidiary effort. Even though the money from this company will not be used to enhance and move up the ladder of the waiting business, it will be used by the parent company, you, to promote, develop, and strengthen your primary company. Again, that would be you, the actor. Your primary success goals are to make your financial and emotional security be built on solid ground for becoming a successful professional acting company. Do not confuse your responsibilities as a company president and CEO with your responsibilities as the product itself. As your business becomes more and more successful you will hire others to replace the department heads of your business that you have maintained yourself. That’s good. It’s called progress and, not to know what these department heads do or what their responsibilities are could lead you to big-time trouble down the road. The last thing you want to have happen would be to work consistently for years as a successful professional actor and then discover that you have no money or investments. Remember, it has happened so often. It can happen if you leave these responsibilities to someone else… someone who might betray you. Empower yourself now with the respect and expectation that come from being the president and CEO of what will be a major company. No matter how many of your department heads should actually be hired to fulfill the needs of your company’s contracts, never and I repeat never, give up your president and CEO position to anyone else. Surround yourself with strong advisers, not self-serving middlemen whose best talents may be making you believe you are incapable of making decisions for your product and business without their guiding hand. This does not mean you will not need agents, managers, lawyers, etc. It means you must prepare yourself to be able to hire them from strength, not weakness. You may find that your president and CEO have never really given any of these concepts serious thought. Without these clear concepts your company may have no direction. You may be putting yourself at the mercy of an agent, or manager etc. to do your work for you. This may happen but, as history has told us over and over again, anyone who is in this business not as a performer is in the business for one reason and one reason only. They are in your business to make money for them. The only way they can make money is with you, the actor. They should not end up with more than you do.

Administrative Assistant

The major department for your president and CEO will be your administrative assistant, your right hand man, your adviser and confident. It is your Mind. This is the liaison between your other department heads. This position is responsible for being the eyes and ears of your company. Your administrative assistant will keep track of the needs and achievements of all the areas of your company. This position will constantly keep you updated about the other areas of your life. Its job is to ask questions of you, the president and CEO. Your administrative assistant will keep you alert, focused and aware of your responsibilities to the company, the product, and your life and everything that includes. That is why this is the logical mind position. This position maintains contact information with names and addresses of all persons your company deals with on both professional and personal levels. This position is aware of all the goals of the other departments and their ability to achieve those goals. This position understands the importance of the four D’s; desire, dedication, determination, and discipline. And, this position realizes that of the four D’s, discipline is the key to the value of the others. Discipline, as you know, is the use of time, on a consistent and scheduled plan, for the purpose of completing a goal on a timely and structured path. It is the administrative assistant’s job to make sure that 80 hours are being filled. It will be the administrative assistant who knows that 40 hours a week may be needed to secure the funds necessary by the CFO (chief financial officer) to meet the financial needs of the company. One constant goal of the administrative assistant is to make more money in fewer hours. The goal is to shift the hours per week needed for money making work to the hours per week needed for company business. That will require an income supporting job to make more money in less time. This income will be needed until your outside, non-acting, work can be terminated and your company can be solely supported by the efforts of your acting company and its product… you. What are some goals you might set for your administrative assistant? What long-term goals as well as short-term goals can you create? How about a goal to set up a space and make sure that each department has what it needs to begin its work? I call it the war room. The war room is different from an office. It is a strategy area. It is a place where you hang a Plexiglas board and map out plans of career attack with details and overviews. It might use a black light to illuminate florescent markers of different colors. It’s a think room. It allows you to see the progress you are making with all of your goals… long term and short term. It is a place where you track upcoming auditions and interviews. It is where you keep your progress chart, which has been included in this series. It is a place where you can move about your efforts as they become more proficient and talent based. It is a place where you can monitor your current talent levels and observe the progress through process of new talents. It is a place where you control your positive moves toward a successful career. What about a goal to organize the president’s life by separating his personal responsibilities from his professional responsibilities? What about a goal to meet with the president and go over his plan of attack for the company, his vision for the company, his projections and bottom line for his expectation of profit margins for the company. Make sure your administrative assistant makes a “Mission Statement” for that position that both of you agree on. The more specific the mission statement the more likely the goals will be to support it.

Sales Department

The sales department is your most important department. In every company the sales department is the engine that keeps the company moving. Without a strong sales department product cannot be sold and the product quality and value can not increase. At a certain point in your career you will need to hire a sales director. A sales director is someone who knows your product abilities and can create new and more valuable uses for your product diversity. That person would be called an agent. For the agent’s knowledge, reputation, clout, and ability he will receive 10 percent of your income. When dealing with your sales department, realize you are your number one sales representative. In short, it’s the knowledge of what you can do and what you cannot do that is going to make your product of value. A note here, if you run your company from ego you will surely run into problems. Your ego can be exploited to trick you into circumstances that down the line you may regret. Your ego is a way people can read you and therefore, manipulate you. You do not want your number one sales person manipulating you. When your career begins to move forward it will find many hangers-on who will say anything you want to hear in order to continue to hang on. Be prepared for this by being clear about your responsibility to your product quality and commercial value. Your sales department must make sure you do not support your efforts by claiming artistic freedom. Artistic freedom is never an excuse for behaving badly. What is at issue is working in a career field and understanding how money is made and how your assets and liabilities translate into debit and credits. If this sort of thing gets in the way of your creative juices then your sales department will have a problem. If dealing with this type of information makes you anxious and frustrated then your sales department should realize that these areas are controlling you. These areas of frustration, anxiety, annoyance and other negative pain inducing emotions will always be capable of controlling and manipulating your efforts. There are many people in this business just waiting to tap into this weakness. Many actors and other types of artists share fear of this area and, therefore, have suffered the fate of being used and controlled for personal gain by trusted agent, managers, lawyers, or financial advisers. Your sales department must know what your product (energy) and package (type). Your sales department must know what your type and physical point of reference are to an audience. Your sales department must know your believability level for the mediums of film, television and theatre. Your sales department must know your commercial value to the outlying areas of acting. Your sales department must make sure those you trust give you constructive performance advice. Your sales department has a great respect for your ability to act. Your sales department knows your current range of emotional control. It knows your ability to take the formula for creating a character and using that formula A + B = C (Actor + Book/Script (collaborators) = Character) to get the best results depending on the medium of acting. (The areas of the formula including “B” Book and Character will be discussed later.) Your sales department is clear about the A of the formula. The A represents you, the actor. It represents you physically, presentationally, and socio-economically. It also will determine range ability. Your sales department knows there will be certain jobs that require special abilities of the A. It could require the A to be a leading man who is also, a Southern aristocrat, a warm and compassionate husband and father who is also a treacherous businessman. Your sales department knows the “A” is what the actor brings with him to the part. It is his physical, emotional and presentational uniqueness. Your sales department knows the “A” may be required to be of star level. Your sales department knows the “A” of the formula holds all those things needed by the buyer or producer and possessed by the actor’s company. Your sales department knows your best core/cover combination of dark on dark, dark on light, light on dark or light on light.Your sales department must know what you possess before it starts trying to sell it. Your sales department must know what your “A” consists of. For your goal setting exercise create your“A” awareness list. Define what your “A” has going for it right now. What areas of your acting ability are viable and provable? You want to list the areas of your “A” that you believe are ready for verification. You want to list the areas with which you plan to become proficient. The best way for your sales department to do this is by modeling an actor of professional acclaim that you admire and wish to emulate. List those qualities and abilities this actor possesses in the “A” part of his formula. Take Robert Redford as an example. For the medium of television, is he a leading man? Yes. Was he trained in television? Yes. Was he trained for film and theater? Yes. Was his training extensive? Yes. Is he handsome? Yes. Is he manly? Yes. Is he romantic? Yes. Is he athletic? Yes. Does he come off as warm hearted? Yes. Is his voice strong? Yes. Does his voice match his handsome looks? Yes. Does his face match his handsome body? Yes. Does he move with grace and style? Yes. Does he have a regional accent? No. Is he of star status? Yes. In this “A” category your sales department will evaluate your looks, body type, voice quality, sex appeal, humor, warmth, aloofness, and charm. Your sales department will be aware if you are menacing, loveable, scary, etc. to see how all your parts match up. When your sales department puts the parts together they all must say the same thing. They say leading man, character lead, quirky lead, character quirky, sexy, funny, scary, demented, and delusional or a combination thereof. What about Mr. Redford’s endurance level? Can he sustain a character in make believe for each of the primary media? Yes. How about his believability level in all media? Is he believable in all the areas that he undertakes? Yes. Make sure the actor that you select to study sells the same character types and emotional elements that you do. Get their biography and follow their career from the beginning. A career must have a path. Your sales department must look for the current path that you are most qualified for. Branch out to include areas you think you could do. Branch out to areas you know once you are trained in you can do. Your sales department must know what it sells. It must know the product it sells is the same product that every other actor sells. The product is your energy and how to use that energy. The product’s ability is to go to make believe through “Talent” and to sustain it. Your sales department knows the product is the energy control that comes from taking the energy from the body’s needs to the spirit’s needs. Your sales department knows the spirit’s need is to share your energy with other life forms and give them the feeling of being safe. Your sales department knows your product, energy, is based on your talents. Your talents are your abilities to control the use of your energy for proven outcomes. Your sales department knows talent is a place of energy control that you process as a result of knowledge and physical repetition of that knowledge. Your sales department knows Talent is not an idea. Your sales department knows Talent is a reality. It is provable and either is or isn’t. Your sales department knows the process of taking anything to the Talent level means you have created a physiological change in your body. Your sales department knows this happens by first acquiring the knowledge of a given effort. Your sales department knows your first talent for a character is to learn the lines and put those lines into an emotional reality and effectively communicate the character’s circumstance in a believable and non distracting way. Your sales department knows you can learn how to do this. It must know you had to get a talent for the specific ability. Your sales department knows the ability to act, as a specific talent, is separate from the talents necessary to create an individual character. Your sales department knows there may be many variables about your acting talent. It may know you are able to act in Talent onstage because that is where you learned, through knowledge and repetition, how to do it comfortably. Your sales department knows that you may not yet have a talent for acting on video or film. Your sales department knows there are media that require certain adjustments to presentation that affect believability. Your sales department must know to what degree your product has developed. It needs to know what talents you have so that initially you can go to makebelieve, using balance, passion and cover and then sustain it for the duration needed, based on the medium’s requirements. If your sales department knows what and where make believe is and what level your talents have reached then it will be able to sell you with confidence and integrity. Your sales department must be aware of your understanding of what happens physiologically when knowledge is transferred into muscle memory through repetition. If this understanding of how talents are created in order to go to Talent is not clear, then the results could be disastrous. Your sales department knows the power that energy transfer has to the muscles. Your sales department must know in which areas you have the ability to control your energy. The sales department must know when the energy is being controlled by you. The energy has been removed from its hiding place in your body’s muscles and replaced with the knowledge of a given effort which has now been converted to electrical impulses. The sales department must know that you can take your life energy and, like a radiating beam, project it out of your body through the talent position. The sales department must know when your muscles are filled with the knowledge of a talent specialty and that it can be sustained by you for a given period of time. Your sales department knows this endurance is based on the level of that particular talent in its present stage of development. The sales department knows energy is a healing power. It knows you want to become a comforting and reassuring force that reaches out and touches the energies of other life forces, which are your audience. Your sales department should know that when your energy is in the talent mode it recreates the power of all that is. It knows, as the feeling of that power radiates out and attracts the life energy of your audience, the true miracle of being a story teller takes place. Even though your audience may be in their normal state or protective body position, their life energy will gravitate and mingle with your Talent controlled energy. Your sales department knows this intermingling of energy allows the audience to be free from their emotional bondage. It frees them from their internal dialogue that runs constantly in their minds, not realizing, as do you, that this dialogue is the focus of their body’s need to control the energy with fear and survival instincts. The sales department needs to know that their product, which is your life energy, has the ability to comfort your audience and this is fundamental in order to sell to the buyer. The sales department needs to know how you use your energy, to defocus the audience from their pain and allow the audience, now in a state of safety to use their brain’s ability to check all body systems and correct damaged physical systems, while their life energy is safe and feeling at home. If your sales department understands the fundamental process of talent and how to know what talents of yours are ready to go, then sales can be confident of its results. This department knows the first audiences you must reach are the producers, writers, and casting directors, and that a talent for these specific people must be clearly in place. Therefore, the sales department must have complete knowledge of your company’s packaging of the product. It is the packaging that will initially draw the buyers to the product energy. Your sales department must know that you will have success as an actor if both parts of the company’s merchandise are in place. Your sales department knows you must have control of your product and clarity of packaging of that product. There are many people have developed a talent for the product but not the package. They can control their life energy in certain areas of performance. They can go to talent at will. They have the capacity to maintain makebelieve under certain circumstances. Some of these actors have such a powerful product base that salespeople from buying companies find them. These buyers can take that product, which is energy, and package it so it has a clear point of reference. Your sales department knows not to take this chance. It knows without the knowledge of your energy control, you leave yourself open to any number of fears. Your sales department knows many of those fears can be used by others to manipulate, defocus, and compromise you. Your sales department must be totally honest with the packaging materials your company has available to it. These packaging elements include two facets. The first is purely physical; your weight, hair color, eye color, complexion, physical imperfections, physical assets and liabilities, voice quality, regionalisms, pitch, etc., and the second; how these physical elements correspond to the current audience’s expectations of type. The sales department must be aware of how your personal use of life energy for the purpose of personality presentation supports or detracts from your physical type. There must be a match between these two elements. If the voice, body and face say leading man and the personality presentation traits, (such as walk, use of arms, animated facial expressions) do not say the same thing, then adjustments must be made by demands of the sales department before they can do their job. Your sales department is responsible for telling your company if the two parts necessary to create a blend are not there. Your sales department is responsible to say that the product energy is not under control. Your sales department is responsible to tell the company it is unaware that the control of energy has not been acquired. If these things are not in place it makes for a hard sell. If energy is your product and the ability to harness it to talent is your stock and trade, then you can expect problems in the sales area if you can’t do it. It becomes the responsibility of this department to tell the company president if the assets and liabilities of the company are working or not. Take the time now to set goals for your sales department in relation to product and packaging. If you don’t have solid proof of your sales department’s knowledge of product and package, all efforts to sell become pointlessYou now have an understanding of your sales department’s primary responsibility to your product. This needs to be done before dealing with the sales techniques used by companies that are already convinced of their product and packaging abilities.

Public Relations

Your next major department is public relations. Your first goal is to understand what this department does for a company. You want to understand how you can use it now as your career develops so you have control over your public relations department. When you become more successful you’ll find that picking the right public relations firm for you will be important. Learn about the purpose and value of a public relations department. Know what they do. Know how they affect your career. Know how they guide the public image. Know how they make the public and the buyer aware of what you’re doing and what your availability might be. A star actor is paid for the money their involvement could generate at the box office. That money comes from the audience that follows your energy, the characters you play, and the comfort they feel with the choice of stories you select. A couple of bad choices and you will be looking for a new audience base. Audiences can be fickle but they are quick to forgive if you play your public relations cards right. Once you have a clear understanding of public relations you need to make sure that the head of your public relations department, which at the moment is you, knows how to best represent your personality, compassion, interests, and community involvement to the press. Your public relations department needs something to work with. This means your company must have interest and concern for more than itself. It is easy to get self-absorbed in the survival mode of trying to pay your bills. A public relations department, no matter how good it is, must know the client that it represents. It must know every aspect of your life. It may need to rediscover interests that have been placed on the back burner. These interests may appear to be of little value to your pursuit of an acting career. However, you may find they can be a circumstance that can open the door to coincidence. You might want to make a list of unselfish things you do for other people or have done. Look for those areas where charity is part of the effort. Which charities have you supported before and how can you get involved again. When you become a star your PR department could use a charity that wasn’t selected after the fact. If you select a charity now, one that you truly care about and believe in, you’ll find that you have tapped into an additional flow of positive energy and goodwill. Try making a list of your special skills that could be used for volunteer work and community work. You may be saying to yourself that you certainly do not have time for volunteer work. I suggest that you make the time. Charity and volunteer work are not about letting others see what a nice person you are. It is a way of making you realize what a nice person you are. The benefits are circular and as important as anything you will do with your time, career and choices. You will find there are areas of your life that were once important to you that you now neglect. See what you can do to reconnect with these interests and use them to support your need to be involved as a concerned person. A person concerned about all aspects of the human condition. It is not wise to have all of your goals focused only on you.

Chief Financial Officer

Your next department is your CFO… your chief financial officer. The CFO controls the funds for the various departments of your professional life. It also controls the funds for the other areas of your life. This position deals with all money concerns. These are the job responsibilities paying all bills. Making sure money is coming in on a regular basis. Making sure there is no debt load. Making sure the other areas of your life are financially supported. Maintaining budgets for each of your life areas. Keeping all receipts and records for tax purposes. Maintaining a savings account and keeping funds available for special professional needs. Your CFO knows what money is and how it works. This position enjoys knowing that money is a tool as well as a resource. The position prides itself in knowing how interest rates work for or against you. This position deals with money like your physical department deals with calories. The more you get the greater the responsibility to account for them. Money can be a wonderful asset. The love of it can be your greatest defeat. The CFO knows this. That is why this position knows what money can be made by the various elements of your career and life abilities. This position does not take money for granted. If it did, it would not be doing its job. The CFO knows how to use credit when applicable and avoid credit when possible. The budget the CFO sets for every aspect of professional life is met with the same diligence in the other areas of your life. Many beliefs you have about money are fostered by a poverty justified upbringing. You can change this by letting your CFO deal with the financial concerns. This position sees money only from its positive aspects. It can never deal with the negative aspects. Here are some positive aspects of money. There’s plenty of it. It has a steady and continuous flow. It meets all the needs of the Company and its obligations. It has resources of reserve. It builds on itself and it has new sources of revenue as the company grows and expands. And, here are some negative aspects of money. It may not exist for you. It is an illusion. It is unavailable. If this is true then money is not the problem. Nor is the lack of money the problem. It is the understanding of money that would have to be addressed. Your CFO learns what it needs to know. It knows financial risks are taken only with risk available funds. The CFO knows that money problems cannot be solved with money. Money problems can only be solved with the understanding of money. The CFO understands profit and loss. The CFO understands how money is earned, spent, and nurtured. There’s no such thing as preparing for a rainy day. We need rain, it makes the flowers grow. We do, however, need to be prepared for abundance and sharing. Your CFO will need to make goals, short and long term that will prepare your company to meet the demands of abundance.

Image Department

Your next department is your Image department. Your image department is responsible for your look. This includes your make up, hair and wardrobe. Your image department is always seeking ways to make your package more appealing to the market place. The image department is clear as to your type and knows how to enhance your character presentation for auditions and interviews. Your image department keeps books on fashion and trends. The image department is responsible for maintaining your hair. It knows what cuts work best for you and if necessary has wigs and hair extensions to help create certain characters and illusions. The image department keeps track of your beauty regiment and makes sure you moisturize and keep your skin in its best condition. The image department makes sure your teeth are white and presentable. If you do strange character parts, the image department will have special teeth and makeup prosthetics to add to your bag of tricks. The image department makes sure you have the right clothes for the right occasions. It keeps your clothes neat and clean. It keeps records of what you wore to a given audition. This is done so when you get a call back you wear the same thing. Your image department is always looking for who is working constantly that is your type. The image department will request funds when necessary to upgrade your image needs. You want your image department to set short and long term goals that will enhance the presentation of your package and product.

Education Department

Your education department is next. It is responsible for knowing what information your company needs to pursue in this career. Your education department is aware of your knowledge base and keeps track of your daily repetition efforts. This position is aware of the knowledge base that you already have. It looks at your formal education from high school to college to graduate school. It evaluates the courses you have taken and reviews those things that may be important to your company’s growth. The education department looks at all the areas of your life and cross references those things that will support a successful acting career. It reviews past experiences of acting efforts that led to your pursuing an acting career. It knows the history of your efforts. It knows what positions of play you have taken during your developmental years. For example, My education department would know that I began my first stage efforts when I was six years old. It knew that I wanted to be in front of people and to be center stage. Being from a very small town in South Carolina, my structured acting efforts were confined to school, church and the occasional community theater effort. By the age of 10 I had created my own circumstance by running a backyard theater company each summer. I did this for the next six years. I demanded that every kid in the neighborhood participate. We wrote, produced, and acted in our summer efforts. Audiences were dragged to our backyard summer extravaganzas… many willingly, many not. My education began with an elderly neighbor who had done vaudeville and later taught elocution and stage readings. I called her Aunt May. Her real name was May Pepper Counts Scruggs Anderson. Aunt May was my teacher and coach. She advised our summer productions and was often our only audience. In my teenage years she coached me through four oratorical contest wins. She taught me a love for storytelling and respect for acting. It is an honor to be an actor. Unfortunately, my parents did not share her sentiments. My education continued with a double major in theater and journalism at the University of South Carolina. I performed in many main stage productions and was taught that an actor can play anything. Of course, that did not stop them from always placing my skinny little body in the roles of elderly character parts. By the time I graduated I had played to glowing reviews many characters ranging in age from 65 to 100. Playing my own age never seemed to be an option. I was a character actor. Translated in my time this meant not handsome or physical enough to be the leading man. However, character actors have the ability to alter their voice, body, and face to play a variety of unusual characters. In classical theater this means you get a lot of great parts. But, you get very few that would lead you to a professional career in film and television. If they want a 60-year-old man they get one. Thus began my realization of the dangers of professional training in university programs. They will invariably service themselves rather than the actor. I know, “Bitter, table for one”. The beautiful people get the lead roles, the average people will get the supporting roles, and the ordinary and, often extremely gifted actor, gets the character roles. Make no mistake; character acting is the basis of the very finest performances. And, Character Acting is an ability… it is a special talent. Many working character actors have found it necessary to select one particular character they have created and make that the persona of their acting career for film and television. Your education department knows this. Character acting that moves you to categories of mature, when you are in the category of juvenile, is damaging and distracted. Your education department knows this also. Anyone pursuing a professional acting career must know how their abilities, their physical activities, their special talents and experience are usable within the industry. The education department seeks out this knowledge. During my time with the Air Force, I was liaison between the local community and the Air Force base. I directed theater and, in many cases, cast myself in the lead. It was during this period that I played many characters that fit my age and style. When I took a graduate fellowship for my Master’s in theater, I was once again placed in the character role position. These roles all consisted of characters over the age of 50. My strongest characters were in their ‘80s and ‘90s. I received glowing reviews and a Master’s degree in theater. What I did not receive was an understanding of who I was as a type. I trusted education department to the University. It was a mistake. I moved New York City and for the first five years I took classes and was hired for soap opera work. I still could not find a harmony between the type that I wanted to play and the type that I actually was. My education department was nonexistent. I didn’t run it. I took many classes but I had no understanding of why I was taking them. Later, I began teaching classes in my quest to know why some people made it in this business and others didn’t. It was this quest that made me seek out an objective knowledge base to a subjective career field. I want you to understand the importance of guiding your own educational process. Accept that you are both company and product and accept that your product has to be packaged so it appeals to the buyers. It is not enough to be able to create wonderful characters if you never get the chance. Some people have packages that are appealing by luck of the draw. They have the appealing face, sensual body and the ability to play these assets. Your education department needs to be clear of your company’s assets and liabilities. It is enjoined with the task of using knowledge to enhance the assets. It is enjoined with the responsibility to acquire the knowledge to turn liabilities into assets. Your sales department will sell what is currently available to it. It will depend on your education department to be honest and open with the current knowledge and anticipated knowledge. Your education department sets a goal to acquire knowledge for certain ability. Once the knowledge is acquired the education department must find physical repetitions in order to incorporate that knowledge into a workable talent base. It is your education department that sets up your company’s daily practice workouts. It decides what efforts will be included in your daily acting work out. It will include those talents that are expected of you by a buyer. It will include the talents that are expected of you by the industry. It will include job responsibilities by your buyer base. Your education department will set daily workouts for the process of learning lines. It should know how long it takes you to put a script to memory. It should know how long it takes you to put a scene to talent. It sets a daily workout for emotional note placement in your body. The education department has daily workouts for monologues to be used for auditions and interviews. It has daily practices for knowing the names of industry players in your pursuing areas. It will set up daily practices for character development and core/cover character control. Your education department has daily practices for script analysis as it applies to the actor. It will have daily workouts for TV mimicking of media you wish to pursue. This and other special job needs unique to you (such as dancing, singing, dialects, accents, character work, both physical and emotional) will be set up by your education department. This is a daily practice may only require 30 minutes a day. The ability comes with a clear, objective and design of your daily exercises. The education department will make sure it has gathered all of your learning and efforts to design your career growth so it supports your uniqueness and style. There are hundreds of job opportunities and all of them have a process of achievement. Those that have achieved in those areas are the ones you wish to emulate and study. That is all part of your education departments goals.

Personal Secretary

The next department is your personal secretary. This position is responsible for keeping up with all of your other departments. Your personal secretary is aware of what you need to do in your life to make things work in harmony. Your personal secretary makes sure that all of your personal requirements are taken care of. This department makes sure that it has the birthdays, anniversaries, and special occasions marked for those in your personal life. This department makes sure that you take responsibility for the other people in your life who are within your personal reference. Your personal secretary makes sure that you are aware of the events and happenings in the lives of those close to you. It reminds you of your responsibilities to the other areas of your life in relation to giving and appreciating. Your personal secretary keeps a record of all kindnesses and courtesies offered to you by members of your family, close friends, and significant other. It is the personal secretary’s responsibility to insure a harmony and continued support of your emotional base. Make sure your personal secretary is diligent with keeping you on top of your responsibilities to family, friends and business associates who go the extra mile for you.

Physical Department

Your physical department is next. This department is responsible for your physical well being. Your physical depart is responsible for the upkeep of your instrument. It keeps watch over your diet, your health, your physical appearance, your body and your physical well-being. Remember, acting has no retirement age. As long as you are in mental and physical health you can continue to be a working actor. That effort requires that you start now. The physical department controls your eating habits. It understands how calories and fat work for and against you. It selects foods that you enjoy and that are positive for your physical health. It maintains your weight and your physical tone. The physical department is responsible for your working out on a daily basis. It is responsible to your image department for your grooming and physical appearance. It does not matter that you play large framed characters. It does matter that the large frame that you carry is in the best shape that it can be. Being overweight does not have to mean that you are out of shape. Your physical department is responsible for maintenance. It is responsible for your wellness. It makes sure that you understand how your body works. It makes sure your body is always in top working order. The physical department is also aware of any substances you are using to stimulate your body. It will look for alternatives to the feelings that you are searching for from the stimulants. The physical department is responsible for the way you live your life physically. It will not allow procrastination or laziness to get in the way of its efforts. You know your body is your instrument. It is what you must play in order for the emotions of your characters to come to life. Your body is what you turn over to your characters in the world of make believe. One of the goals that you may want to set for yourself is making sure your physical instrument is in the best shape it can be. You want to have maximum use of your life energy. Any physical need will require certain amounts of your life energy for repair and maintenance. You want to have all the energy possible and at your disposal, so your body is in tip-top working order. Make sure the head of your physical department is prepared to take your body to the mat if necessary. Be sure he will not take no for an answer in your fulfilling the goals set to make your physical world powerful.

Spiritual Department

The next is your spiritual department. Your spiritual department is your spiritual advisor and guidance support. The job responsibilities are personal and based on your beliefs and humanity. The spiritual department controls the actor’s desire for peace, health, happiness and security/wealth. The spiritual department holds the knowledge of the Law of Attraction and the secret of the universe and its available abundance.

Creative Department

Your creative department is responsible for the use of your imagination and gifts. It can only work if you create the circumstances that allow for coincidence. It must be inspired by your spiritual side and once hooked into the flow of universal energy, it knows no bounds. How you look at your life today is based in your past experiences. All of which are controlled by your true values and true beliefs. You know that many of those true values and true beliefs may not be supportive of your desired values and desired beliefs. What you do today will decide how you will live six months from now or six years from now. What you focus on now, the goals you set for yourself and the follow through of those goals, is the foundation of your career success. Make sure that the goals are exciting and challenging without being foolhardy. A foolhardy goal would be “I’m going to be a millionaire in a year.” This is not a goal, it is a dream. It’s beyond the realm of probability. How you’re going to become a millionaire in one year would be a series of goals. These goals would have been processed using the ultimate success formula. The formula has never failed anyone who has followed it. It holds the secrets of talent as well as the defeat of fear. It is a process of goals toward knowledge. It is a process of goals toward repetition of that knowledge. It contains a process by which what you want is made clear to you, your goals through actions are implemented, and the results are evaluated and changed if necessary. The process is never ending. As one goal is achieved it must be replaced with a larger goal. Each goal is getting you closer and closer to your main objective. Remember you have long-term and short-term goals. The short-term are the steps by which the long-term goals are reached. You know how to use desire, dedication, determination and discipline. They are a key to your growth and development. Remember, goals are your way of putting actions to your desires.

Energy Level

You are dedicated to the things in life that will give you success and involvement with living. The dedication is your willingness to focus your discipline to allot the actual time needed for the goal to be realized. The more you use your five senses while working on your goals the better off you are going to be. The higher the energy level used to get your goals realized the faster they will be completed and the more powerful the results. The process of using your senses of sight, sound, touch, smell, and taste together with your goal application will make a world of difference in your results. Create for yourself a place where you work on your career, from goal setting to goal completion. Make that special area conducive to using your five senses. Make sure there is plenty of wall space to write on, cards of knowledge to be moved about, room to move about and vocalize thoughts as well as vocalize characters. Set goals that are what you want. Be absolutely clear as to what you expect to get from the completion of your goals. Purpose is as important as out come. The real reason you set goals is what they will make of you as a person. All you can strive for in this life are those things you accomplish that make you feel good about yourself. No amount of money or power of intimidation will ever replace the achievements of your life that make an impact on other people. Always know that material goals are not as empowering as attitudes and accomplishments. Goals must have the consistency of time allotted by discipline if they are going to have any effect. This is based on the belief that goals, once put into action, have the power to change your life. There has to be a reason why someone sets a goal and then does nothing structured or consistent to make that goal a reality. Something gets in the way of the action. I’ve talked about the duality of life. Your life energy, your part of all that is, becomes the focus of two separate elements of your existence. One element is the physical you. It is that part of you that will return to the earth when the life energy is no longer in need of the vessel. The second you I discussed is the spiritual you. That is the consciousness of all that is, your awareness of being separated from the whole of all that is. Remember, your body will vie for your life energy by distracting your focus, by accessing negative statements, by pursuing values that do not support your desires for life. Your spiritual side must fight for control of the energy through focus, through awareness of the best you, through dedication and determination, with the use of your Mind, to discipline. Goal setting then becomes the name and process by which you move forward on your journey to Talent. Goals are paths of creation. Goals are the way you go about creating your own fate and your own destiny. Find the reasons that have inspired you to set a goal and have the wherewithal to see them through.

Talent for Learning

Control the talents you say you want. You have the right to achieve anything in this life for which you are willing to work hard enough. Pursuing dreams by taking them to actions should not be classified as hard work. They should not be classified as sacrifice. Dreams should have enough value to them that the goals you set and the action you take to talent, should excite and inspire you. You know what gets in the way. Take the energy and focus away from the body and switch it into action. Acquire a talent for learning. Not just a talent for what to learn but a talent for how to learn. The process for learning is the same basically for all things. Look in your past and see those things you learned well. Look at the things you learned to do with talent based results. Isolated the process used. You can then understand how a talent for learning can be achieved. Like a talent for anything the formula is Knowledge + Repetition = Talent.

Reality as a Perception

Reality is based on how you perceive things to be. The goals you set for yourself must include a constant reinforcement of your right to exist. Otherwise you can find yourself defeating your desires with your body’s use of negative beliefs. Focus on something and you will experience it. Setting a goal lets your conscious and subconscious Mind know what you want and expect. It lets the two parts of the analyzing Mind know that where you are is not where you want to be. When you begin setting goals and creating actions to move you in the direction you want to go, the body will not just give in. You will experience discomfort and distraction. Your creature will find areas of your life you were not paying attention to and it will start challenging your space. Once you decide to take your body on for the control of the energy, it will use every available fear and negative belief to stop you.

The Wild Horse

It is very much like breaking a wild horse. Your body will fight you with everything it’s got until it acknowledges that you are not going to give up. At this point it will stop fighting you and. like the horse, your body will be tamed. At least, it will stop fighting you for the talent effort that you are working on. Talent for anything can only be achieved by taking on your body for the control of your life energy. You must be prepared for battle every time to seek to achieve a new talent. Goals will be met with resistance because they are the bucking of the horse. When you find yourself too comfortable, even though you have not achieved the dreams and expectations you have set for yourself, then you know that the only way to change the comfort zone is to make yourself dissatisfied with it. Dissatisfaction is a power of which you want to take advantage. Personal dissatisfaction is recognizing that the way you are living your life is not what you want. It is from this dissatisfaction that change can begin to happen.

Living to Enjoy

Many people are leaving extremely lucrative positions and opting for simpler, more rewarding life experiences. Money no longer is the primary need for these people. These people want to have time with family and friends. These people want to enjoy what they do with their time through work and play. Top executives are leaving their corporate post to become chefs, florists, landscape artists, etc. They are going to careers that have hands on experience. This is happening because they have become dissatisfied with the life they live. They are going for the change. They have set goals and are preparing themselves for the new direction in their lives. The career field you have chosen is the career field “idea” of what these financially successful corporate people are changing too. Not acting, per se, but a career field that gives them a feeling of pride and accomplishment.

Original Design

The goals you set for yourself must be designed with your particular talents in mind. Your goals cannot be generic in design. Your career must be designed specifically for you, by you, and with you. You want it to be an original design. No matter what it takes, you must get a complete picture of the talents you possess and the physical and emotional presentations that you use. Set goals for these purposes. Set goals to open your awareness of what is expected of a performer in each genre and each medium. Set goals to learn what the best paradigm is for you personally to follow. Set goals that give you an objective, fact based observation of you by people you respect in the business. Make sure your knowledge of what is expected is clear to you. Make sure your personal presentation formula is supportive of your desires. Do not let your longing to be something you are not get in the way of your being who you are. Make sure the goals you set are following a progressive order. Don’t put the cart before the horse. You can’t set goals to market a product that is not clear. You cannot expect the buyer to tell you what your product can do and who your packaging is designed for. Because, this is done by you. If not, you may find yourself a victim of unscrupulous people who will guide your career to serve their own agenda. Their agenda has a great deal to do with the money you make for the pocket that it will end up in. Know the primary emotional motivations of your actions. Remember, your feelings, and the intellectualizing of those feelings, result in your emotions. Your emotions are the states of being that either motivate or distract you from your purpose. Acknowledge that your emotional states are your responsibility. Acknowledge that happiness and the joy for living are perceptions and acknowledge you control your respect for you. You are using your talents to make a difference in the lives your energy touches. Be the captain of your ship. Know what makes you do the things you do. Know what makes you act on something you want to do and avoid acting out on things you want to do. Know what makes you follow through on some things and avoid others. Know what internal pressure compels you to act on some areas of your life. Know what suppresses the internal pressure from doing things that will be harmful or nonproductive. You can use the goals that you set to pressure you to action. It is always easy to use follow-through for someone else. You tend to be concerned about how it would look if you didn’t follow through on a commitment to someone else. Find out why you have such a terrible time following thru for yourself. Motivate yourself to follow through on your commitments to yourself. Know how you go about creating goals that will guide you to the knowledge and physical repetition that allow for the miracle of talent to take place. The power of goal setting clarifies the purpose of these goals and then acting on them. Know what goals would make your life better if they were achieved. Know what negative effects will happen if you don’t follow through with these goals? Be prepared to alter or change the goals when, and if, you realize they are not giving you the results that you desire. This is the process for the ultimate success formula. Have daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, semi-annual, and annual goals. The goals must be clear and action oriented. They must be supported by your five senses and evaluated regularly. They must be looked at as adventures and excitements. And, above all else … Be committed to each goal with joy and enthusiasm

Career Goals

As you know goal setting is important to your career success.Goals clarify expectations that you have.Goals become the steps in reaching your next destination of growth.Goal setting allows you to know which actions to take and how to evaluate those actions to see if you are getting close to the results you want.

There are long-term goals and short-term goals. An example of short-term goals would be getting your new headshots done by the end of the month.Short term goals might be interviewing agents by the middle of next month. You might need to get into a showcase by the end of the season.You might need to find a new acting coach by the end of next month.Goals that can be completed in three to six months are short term goals.Goals that can be completed in one to thirty days are short term goals.You might need to save $600 by the end of next month to be able to pay up front for new classes. These are examples of short-term goals.

Long term goals, on the other hand, require more time and effort for completion.Learning a new talent could be a long term goal.Moving to California or New York could be a long term goal.Making sure that your children have a college fund is a long term goal.

All areas of your business need active goal setting plans.Let’s start with the active areas of your business.Remember, As an actor you are an independent company responsible for your own growth and development.You are not just an actor looking for a job and having an employer.You are responsible for the chain of command of the acting business. You are responsible for doing your job.That job has a code of responsibility which is: know your lines, show up on time, and don’t cause trouble.

You are an independent contractor. Your company’s talent abilities, diversity, clarity, marketability, and versatility are all needed to be working in a consistent and progressive direction. Therefore your knowledge of goal setting and its value to you should be explored through the various departments and areas of your business.Fundamentals of business must be dealt with daily with your goal setting. This business knowledge is necessary to get you where you want to be.You want to learn about business as well as the business of this business.

There are many overlapping business principals that will serve you well.Without career goal setting to maintain your forward direction you may find yourself getting caught in negative thinking.I believe career goal setting begins with breaking down your company to its various departments.As I go over the different departments of your company I want you to look at the goals, both long and short, you can make and put into action.You need these goals or you will have no way to pursue the steps of success.

One of the reasons an acting career has such an unfortunate success rate is the subjective and non-disciplined approach taken by those involved.Most other career fields have training circumstances that are clearly defined and structured for a predictable end result.Medicine and law are two professions that have teaching programs that are finite in their guarantee for success.If a student completes the pre-designed course work with dedication and discipline the majority of them will go on to a successful career.

Self employed

Actors are self employed. You job out. They are therefore and employer not an employee. The actor must learn for the beginning of his career to think from the employer position. It is unacceptable that many of the most successful performers find themselves in their latter years financially strapped and professionally unwanted. At the same time their agents, producers, lawyers, business representatives; public relations company employees, etc… are all sitting pretty.Avoid this happening to you.

Many of these support people’s strongest talent are gaining your trust. This talent could later cost you dearly.For that reason, with your anticipation for success in this business, you will structure your company so that you are doing the things necessary to make the ultimate successful formula work. You will work at a level that far exceeds the majority of your competition.

It is important to know the difference between being an employee as opposed to an employer.The difference lies in the number of hours the person is willing to work. Thinking as an employer your results will have more success and your journey will be more enjoyable. Goal setting will give you the knowledge of the jobs you will later need to pay someone else to do. Not only will you pay them, you’ll also need to trust them. Selecting acting as a career shows that you are free-spirited. It shows a nonconformist approach to life. But, it still requires a commitment to the rules of business.It still requires the expectations of independent contractor responsibilities.

These responsibilities include: your ability to make a living for you and your family as well as your ability to feel accomplished and self-sufficient and your ability to respect yourself in this acting game. This respect requires an understanding of how the business works in relation to getting work and making a living. You must understand your product in relation to your package.

The Product

Your product is energy. It is the life energy that you have as a living member of the human race. Life energy is that part of the energy of the universe that has been separated from the whole of all that is and placed into the individual body. It is the force that drives the mind and body through a lifetime. It is precious. The physical use of life energy is primitive and instinctive. It has the sole purpose of defending the vessel/body with which it inhabits. It is drawn to the evolutionary process from which it was created.Its primary responsibility is survival.

The spiritual use of life energy is for the growth and knowledge acquisition of the Mind. Its desire is to become aware of Talent through talents. It is seeking an understanding of compassion, humanity and hope through wisdom. It is divine.

The actor is special in that he is responsible for taking his life energy and, through talent, using it to touch the energies of his audience and give them freedom from pain and suffering. The actor, when doing his job correctly, facilitates the ability of the audience member to heal themselves while their life energy is being distracted from its survival instincts and thereby allowing the body to repair (heal) where necessary. Once the actor understands this his is prepared to seek out the knowledge of the world of business. You want to know what business departments are needed to support you career efforts.

You must see yourself as a real company. A company with expectations and responsibilities.

Have a great week.
I wish you well.
Russ