In business, dreaming is serious business and the driving force for transformation. Without vision companies fail, and without our personal vision, our dreams, our lives, can become mundane, redundant — even stagnant. When we are in touch with our passion we have more energy, enthusiasm and creativity.

In a business context “passion sells.” Wouldn't you rather do business with people who enjoy what they are doing rather than someone who is just doing a job?

Passion and productivity go hand in hand. Happy people make happy employees and happy employees go the extra mile, producing greater results.

How do you turn passion into profit? Do what matters and has meaning for you and the money will follow. Do the same thing, but with passion, and it may become easier to accomplish. Also, passion is a time-management tool because when you are doing what you love, it often gets done faster. Passion inspires people to do great things, to go beyond normal limits and to soar to new heights.

Passion is the fire in your belly. It is when you are compelled to action. Passion is the juice that will help you move mountains to accomplish your dreams and goals, personally and professionally. However, passion without a plan can be wasted energy, yet when used to move your dreams forward, it is

dynamite.

During a recent Oprah appearance (the show was about encouraging people to start their own businesses), a panel of experts agreed that passion in business is the critical component for success because you are bound to have difficult days when your passion can help get you through.

When I asked Oprah about her vision for her company, she said,

“I wanted to create a company where people could have fun.”

The richest self-made woman in American said her passion is about having fun. Wow! She went on to add, “My dream was to create a company where people

would come together, make a contribution and then we would give back to the world.”

Needless to say, the audience went wild as they passionately responded to her vision.

Find your passion and bring it to your work and life.

Here's how:

1. Use passion as the barometer to say “No thank you” when you have a choice. Clear away clutter and make room for your dreams.

2. Passion Quest — take a period of time a day, week, month (you don't have to put the rest of your life on hold) to discover exactly what it is you are passionate about.

3. Think of three times in your life when you truly felt passionate. Find a common thread. Were you learning, teaching, risk taking, helping others, having fun, problem solving? What was it that you were passionate about in all three memories?

4. Explore how you can bring more of this quality to your work. How can you make your work more fun, educational or adventurous? Bring more of what you love into your everyday life.

5. Proactively inspire your team to do the same. Encourage people to bring their passion for fun, success, creativity, helping others or trying new things, to their business.

Consider these tips for success:

• The people who are the most successful and satisfied with their work and life know that passion lives inside of us. The secret is to intentionally bring more of what you love into your daily life.

• Bring your passion to your work, and you'll manage your team differently.

• Tune into what excites you and you will show up differently in your relationships with others.

• Bring your excitement and enthusiasm to your customers and they will buy more from you.

• Focus your passion and use it to compel your business forward. Passion without focus can be wasted energy, but passion with clarity and commitment can be an unstoppable lifechanging formula for success.

Find your passion, inspire those around you, live life to the limit, and enjoy your success. When all is said and done, it is the passion-driven life that has few regrets and many rewards.

“The happiness of a man in this life does not consist in the absence but in the mastery of his passions.” - Alfred Lord Tennison