Devoted to the Multi-level marketing (or MLM) industry

In honor of Kim Klaver's post about the biggest lie in Network Marketing, I give you, The Duplication Myth:

A friend of mine made the following post on a message board:

IN MY PERSONAL OPINION, you will want to seek out a company that teaches you to become a true entrepreneur and not a company that teaches duplication. One teaches you how to operate a business and the other tells you how to operate a business. The subtleties are enormous!

New Network Marketers often pull aside their sponsor or upline and ask them the following question:

How do I build this business?

Nine times out of ten the upline guru answers this question by regurgitating how he has built his business, not even realizing that wasn't the question. New Network Marketers could care less how the upline guru has built their business; they want to know what will work for them.

Duplication is an overblown and hyped word that keeps people in line and buying the latest tapes and books from their upline. Network Marketers should consider their own core competencies and strengths and build a business within those areas, while working to improve themselves in other areas.

It is well known that most people don't make money in Network Marketing, perhaps it is time to change that by allowing people to work within their own comfort zones instead of pushing them threw a small hole called duplication.

Since I wrote the about the duplication myth, I have softened my stance on duplication a bit. I believe that people can follow a simple pattern to success in Network Marketing. I don't believe that they need to make themselves someone else to do it.