In a previous post I shared my one line response to a popular question I am often asked — “What’s your advice on achieving fast drivingbusiness growth?”
“Never try to do it alone” is always my response.
If you enjoyed reading about the 3 powerful leadership principles that helped operations manager Beth to bring out the best in her people, here are 3 more powerful leadership principles from my coachingwork with Bob.
KEY CHALLENGE: Sales Growth Stuck at 7M
One of my clients (we’ll call him Bob) is a CEO of a family run technology company focused on growing his 7 Million company into a 10 Million company. For several years he keeps plateauing at the same level.
When asked what he attributed may be the primary cause he pointed to the pattern that he continues to be the primary problem solver instead of his people being able to make swift executive decisions in their day to day work.
Observation: In visiting Bob’s company I noticed his office (and everyone else’s offices) were in an open floor plan. Bob wanted the open floor plan to let his people know he was never too high up that he was perceived as far too removed or inaccessible. He also liked the ease and convenience of being able to monitor people on the floor.
But, because of the open floor plan and Bob’s open door policy, he was bombarded with constant daily interruptions and thereby, pulled into every problem that occurred. His people can see him there, so the easiest thing for his managers to do is go straight to Bob to help them resolve their problems and/or help them make decisions quickly.
Bob’s 3 Leadership Principles That Transformed Positive Change:
A. Effective leaders must create boundaries.
B. Don’t ever forget you’re in the PEOPLE business.
C. Commit to helping your people S.O.A.R.
Actions Bob implemented:
1. Creating boundaries:
We eliminated a whopping 70% of his interruptions by Bob communicating changes to his accessibility. This might sound overly simple, but it just goes to prove how easy it is for business owners to fall into patterns of behavior when you have no one else to report to.
So, Bob posted a few weekly time slots where he could still have his open door policy, but outside of those hours each of his key people were given scheduled meeting appointments instead of the old way of allowing them to approach Bob whenever they wanted.
For the first time, Bob even started posting a “do not disturb” sign on his door (and stuck to it) which allowed him to make huge strides in working “on” his business
2. Reframing what business you’re in. Bob’s technology business took off because his knowledge, expertise and passion was in technology. But, as Marshall Goldsmith famously wrote, “what got you here, won’t get you there”.
During our coaching sessions Bob admitted he really didn’t enjoy managing people. That just wasn’t his area of expertise. But, it was his area of greatest frustration. Because he didn’t like having to manage people, he avoided holding any regular meetings with this team whenever possible.
After discussing the advantages and disadvantages of:
A. Hiring a General Manager to manage everyone for him
B. Creating more effective approaches for Bob to manage his key people or …
C. Keep doing things the same way …
Bob chose option B and began to reframe what business he was really in. And, after some practice, Bob even came to embrace it. One of the tools that helped Bob be more effective and enjoy managing people was holding weekly one on one meetings with his key staff using my simple S.O.A.R. meeting template.
3. Holding weekly 1-1 meetings to help your people S.O.A.R.
In the past, Bob tried to schedule bi-weekly meetings with his team members, but they often got postponed, cancelled and eventually avoided all together. When I asked why Bob vented he felt like he was just babysitting his employees. We discovered there was no set structure to his meetings outside of being a low level Q&A session.
I encouraged Bob to start using my simple S.O.A.R. meeting template and to commit to it for 12 weeks (12 meetings). Only 3 weeks into the challenge it didn’t surprise me how excited Bob was at seeing positive changes in his people’s performance already.
Here is the S.O.A.R. 1-1 meeting template: S = What is your SINGLE motivating purpose that is driving you this week?
O = What OBSTACLES do you need to overcome this week (month, quarter) and how do you plan on overcoming them?
A = How do you want to be held ACCOUNTABLE for key actions you will take full ownership of?
R = Recognition – What are the greatest wins you’re most proud of this week?
Result:
1. Bob’s interruptions decreased dramatically allowing him to be able to focus on CEO level tasks that were sorely needed to drive the company’s revenue growth.
2. Now that Bob embraced being in the ‘people business’ he saw his team getting faster and better at completing client projects, allowing them to handle more sales.
3. The S.O.A.R. meetings Bob instituted developed his people’s critical thinking muscles. They were able to handle higher-level tasks and decisions on their own and needed Bob’s guidance less. As a bonus, his people now use the same process to train their direct reports on developing their own critical thinking skills.
Application Questions:
Who are the people who interrupt you the most?
What kind of boundaries do you need to create?
How effective are your 1-1 meetings with your key people?
Here’s to your success!
QUESTION: What is 1 paradigm shift that made a powerful difference in bringing out the best in your people? … Share your comments and questions below.
*This article was originally published here: https://stage.paramountbusinesscoach.com/driving-business-through-strong-leadership/
Important Tip On Increasing the Value of Your Business
Sometimes it’s easy to get sucked into the busyness of running your business to forget to reflect …. Have your activities this quarter been increasing or decreasing the value of your business?
If you’re not sure … we are here to help you avoid costly mistakes in growing your business. I’ve teamed up with my friend Paul Visokey of Stony Hill Advisors.
As a business broker, exit planning specialist and M&A intermediary Paul gets questions all the time like:
How do I really know what my business is worth?
When is the best time to sell my business?
What is the process of selling my business? … and more
Whether you’re thinking of selling your business in the next 2 years or not for another 10 years, you want to make sure you’re taking the right steps to build maximum value in your business.
In this short video response, Paul highlights the #1 most overlooked secret to doing just that.
Check out here:
QUESTION: what is the one biggest challenge you have in increasing the value of your business right now?
With all the fan fare of New Year resolutions and everyone talking about setting goals, do you ever wonder if it’s an exercise in futility? After all, why keep setting lofty goals you don’t hit in your business?
I find if you just set goals from a place of wishful thinking it can easily set you up for failure in your business. However, understanding your past can help you discover the right goals for your future and set you up for success.
Here are 9 key questions that will help reveal a better approach to goal setting for your business this year:
1. What were the key goals in your business and life you set out to achieve this past year?
It’s important to have these answers right in front of you here to help you better answer the rest of the questions below. If you can’t rattle off this list quickly, it’s because you probably never wrote it down in the first place. If that’s you … reminder #1 — write down your goals this year 🙂
2. Looking back were these the right achievable stretch goals for you at this season in your life and business?
Donald, a new client I started coaching recently, shared a key outcome goal he wanted me to help him with. His stretch goal this year was to grow his 6 Million Dollar business to a 9 Million Dollar business. Donald shared he struggled to stay focused on his daily to-do list. He thought if he got better at focusing on finishing his projects that alone could add the additional 3 Million in growth.
I disagreed.
In my feedback I shared with Donald that it did not seem like the right goal to pursue for the season of life he was in. He already told me his wife wanted him to be home more for her and their three young daughters. Pursuing the goal of getting more tasks done was directly opposite to his family goal of being home with them more.
It was also not the right goal for the season he was in his business. Donald already had 10 employees. He had resources available to him that he was not fully leveraging. After some discussion Donald realized “getting more things done” was an unwise goal for him to pursue. The better stretch goal for Donald was to focus on teaching his 10 employees how to get Donald’s to do list done.
3. Which goals did you achieve this past year?
What were your wins this year? Celebrate those achievements no matter how small.
Think about even those seemingly “small” problems you succeeded in solving. One problem I had a few years ago was that I get way too achy sitting at my desk all day. I asked my husband Tom to rig up my treadmill, so I could ergonomically work on my laptop while I walk. Just celebrating a small win like getting on the treadmill 5 days a week has helped me start each day in a positive direction.
4. What is the biggest factor you would attribute to achieving your goals this year?
Give yourself credit for what you did right. I’m sure you know the wisdom in leveraging your strengths. So, it’s important to take the time to review the strengths you have demonstrated this year. You may even be surprised to discover new strengths that emerged in recent months.
If you can’t come up with at least five strengths ask other people to tell you what they think are your strengths. You can also take a fun strength-finder assessment.
5. What goals did you NOT achieve this year?
If you did not achieve every goal this year — welcome to the club. Make peace with the fact that almost 100% of high achieving entrepreneurs do not accomplish every goal they wrote for the year. At the same time, it’s important to note which goals you didn’t yet achieve and prioritize them higher or lower for this upcoming year.
6. Identify what was out of your control that got in the way of unachieved goals.
While you don’t want to let yourself fall into the blame game, you also don’t want to swing too far the other direction and beat yourself up when you had factors that were out of your control.
For example, a year ago I was excited to roll out plans to launch some brand new programs designed especially for my solopreneur audience. But, then I discovered I had a high toxic level of mercury poisoning. It greatly impaired my vision for five months which Ophthalmologists could not correct. As a result I had to move my launch date goals five to six months later than I originally anticipated.
What about you? What obstacles did you have this past year that were out of your control?
7. What would you do differently, knowing what you know now, to help you achieve those same goals this year?
It is easy to want to hit the ground running as fast you as you can, especially in the New Year. But, if you keep on doing what you did, you’ll keep on getting what you got. As entrepreneurs, it’s critically important to take the time to pause, reflect and evaluate the past twelve months in order to discover how you should best move forward the next twelve months.
8. What valuable lessons did you learn this year?
Here is the opportunity for you to put into practice the famous quote:
[bctt tweet=”Failure isn’t failure, if you learn from it. https://stage.paramountbusinesscoach.com/blog/9-questions-every-business-should-ask-when-setting-new-goals/” username=”yooncannon”]
Likewise, we can also learn from our successes. Facebook guru Amy Porterfield shared on her podcast show, that she noticed the year she decided to invest in herself through a high level mastermind group program is the year her business truly took off. She attributes the valuable lessons she learned came from being in a mastermind group.
9. What can you do now in your business that you could not do one year ago?
It’s important to measure and acknowledge the progress you’ve made. Seeing progress feeds further progress. Employee engagement experts agree that employee productivity is in direct proportion to the level of progress employees felt they were making in their work. As entrepreneurs, we should apply this same productivity principle to our own businesses.
Write down a list of all the areas you have made measurable progress. Maybe a year ago you did not know how to generate leads on LinkedIn, and now you do. Or perhaps a year ago your business did not have the cash flow to hire a marketing assistant, but now you do.
Before you start making new goals for the New Year be sure to assess the old goals you set last year. I invite you to carve out a block of time in your calendar this week or perhaps even right now to take action on answering these 9 questions thoughtfully. Abraham Lincoln once said,
[bctt tweet=”If I had six hours to chop down a tree, I’d spend four of those hours sharpening my axe. https://stage.paramountbusinesscoach.com/blog/9-questions-every-business-should-ask-when-setting-new-goals/” username=”yooncannon”]
QUESTION: What is one“a-ha” you gleaned from these 9 questions? Please share your comments below.
There are many roadblocks and obstacles that stand between you and success. Running a business isn’t easy, but one thing that is for certain is that defeating your demons and overcoming those gremlins that stand in your way can be the hardest part of growing a business.
As entrepreneurs we expect to write out our business growth plan to include things like our marketing strategy, our customer service strategy, our cash flow strategy and our organizational development strategy. These are all important pieces to have in our business growth plans. However, in 100% of all the strategic plans I review from small business owners to CEO’s of mid-size companies, there is a chapter missing that in my opinion, is mission critical to have in place. That is — how do you plan on winning the battle of your mind? (more…)
Imagine for a moment the struggle and doubt the Wright brothers faced as they made attempt after attempt to create a “flying machine”. They financed their scheme with the proceeds from their bicycle shop, they toiled after work hours in oblivion. Later, when the brothers started to have some success with their flying efforts and gained notice from the press, Europeans accused them of lying. Others ridiculed them. It was a harebrained scheme and there were plenty of others with far more resources than they. What gave them the audacity to think they could out maneuver Dr. Samuel Langley, the Secretary of the Smithsonian who had both wealth and the NY Times covering his every move? (more…)
