Here’s a challenge for you: stand in front of a mirror and look at the person facing you.
Do you see someone who is crystal clear about what they want from life and from their business or someone shrouded in a haze with no clear vision of where they want to go?
Do you see someone who is driving the business forward or someone being dragged along in a meandering ride, occasionally forwards but often backwards or sideways on a distraction?
Try asking these questions:
Do I have the right mindset to make the business really successful?
Do I understand what my business needs me to change for it to grow?
Do I have the business skills to create the right processes for good business to happen?
Have I ever properly set out objectives I want it to achieve to make me happy?
What were the answers that came back, did they make you feel uncomfortable?
As you take your business through its growth and development, there can be many points that will trigger cause for concern and discomfort, some even leading to business failure.
Somebody famous once defined an entrepreneur as someone who jumps off a cliff and tries to work out how to build a parachute on the way down, scary prospect! We are all familiar with the old military adage Ready … Aim … FIRE but sometimes in business we need to change this to Ready … FIRE … Aim!
Business growth goes through cycles. When you start up a new business, you will have an idea of where you want to go but it is not until you have been trading for a while that you may realise that the path forward is not as clear as you first thought. We must also acknowledge that the world today is a different place from the world twelve or even only six months ago! Whilst it is OK and sometimes even necessary to be reactive (Ready … FIRE … Aim), we do need to get back to a structured, planned approach (Ready … Aim … FIRE) as quickly as possible for our businesses to survive, grow and flourish.
There can be no doubt that your mindset is the key driving factor in making your business successful. Passion, belief and drive may be enough for you to start up but by themselves will not create a sustainable business. You must also have in place the tools, the skillset, that will enable you to carry out the fundamental processes that every business needs for it to survive and flourish.
The problem is working alone, most of us are not able to change our mindset and develop those skills or even understand what they should be! The good news is that if this describes your situation right now, you should know that you are not alone! Not alone in the sense that others are facing similar difficulties and more importantly not alone in the sense that there is help out there, you just need to reach out, look for it and ask.
Do it!
David DiCara is Director of Bokken Business Coaching and Millionaire Mindset Practitioner