Strategy and growing your business

I talk a lot about strategy, and that’s because it’s truly one of the most important foundations to your success. What is strategy and why is it so important? How can it help you?

Strategy is having an idea of how something will help your business before you start doing it. This applies both to big, sweeping changes like adding a new marketing technique and it also applies to one-time things like attending an expo. Having a strategy makes it so much more likely you will succeed, and even if you don’t you’ll know it sooner and not get sidetracked for as long as you would without strategy.

New business owners often have a fire to get started, and as a result they start off running hard and just doing as many things as they can to build their business. The idea of actually asking if something is a good idea to be doing in the first place seems pointless. It’s easy to get into such a frenzy of doing that it’s hard to even find a few minutes to ask if you should be doing something.

Strategy helps you decide what to do and set some goals around what you expect to accomplish. Most business activities have increasing sales as their ultimate goal but there are many intermediate steps. One strategy might be to increase traffic to your website using social media. This would ultimately increase sales (all other things being equal), but it’s an intermediate step. If your strategy is to increase sales by increasing traffic using social media then you know what your social media activity is supposed to accomplish before you even start doing it. Using some traffic measurements, you can tell how well it is working by measuring how much traffic you sent to your site before and after you started using social media.

One of the best things strategy can do is to steer you when you are off course. What if you social media strategy, as you’ve defined it, isn’t paying off? That’s not as good as it working great, but it’s much better that you know and can change course. If your efforts aren’t working, you need to change what you are doing or find something new to do.

Strategy doesn’t have to be a big deal. It doesn’t have to be formal or complex. Just make sure you know why you are doing any business activity and what you hope to get from it. Have a way to measure if your efforts are working, and know when to change course or pull the plug.

How do you use simple strategy in your business? Tell me about it in the comments.

Solopreneurs and burnout

Burnout is a very real risk for solopreneurs. We wear all the hats in the business, and it’s so easy to just get caught up in the treadmill of never ending work. It’s easy to buy into the myth that if you just work harder somehow it will all get done. However, it’s simply not possible to ever get everything done. No matter how much you do, there’s always more you could be doing so the work is never actually done.

What you can do is set limits on how much you work and make good choices about what to leave undone. Otherwise, burnout is a very real possibility. Over the long haul, burnout can sap your enthusiasm for your work and leave you tired, worn down and unable to focus.

The long term effects are tragic, but what about the short term effects? Sure it’s fine to push yourself for a short while but working long hours and not taking time off has a very real risk in the short run. In the short run, not taking time off can cause you to temporarily lose focus. You might find yourself forgetting why you walked into a room, going to the store for 3 things and not being able to remember them, sleeping poorly or feeling lethargic. These minor effects might not seem too serious, but expanded into other areas of your life the lack of focus might mean you don’t pay attention while driving, miss appointments, or skip medications. These effects can be serious or even deadly.

One of the recurring themes I come across in my work is that business owners work too hard for it to be sustainable. As I’ve mentioned, a short push is okay but when you get into months of long weeks there are very real risks. Sometimes when I point this out, I get the impression that the other person thinks I’m patronizing them or trying to butter them up about being such a hard worker. The truth is when I see someone working too hard for their own health and safety I feel like it’s important to point it out. I feel like sometimes I spot it because I’ve done it to myself as well. I’ve never had a serious incident, but have had more than my share of absentmindedness due to burnout. Two people close to me have had car accidents because of burnout.

I talk about burnout and working too hard a lot. Please don’t think I’m patronizing. It’s a very real risk in the long run. If you burn out and leave your business, the world won’t get what you have to offer. You also put yourself and others at risk when you can’t focus. Take regular breaks, take days off and take vacations. Always remember that the work will never be all done.

Have you had burnout? How did it impair you? Share it in the comments, and tell me how you’ll prevent burnout in the future.

Step 1, Set a Deadline

I’ve recently made a significant change in the way I manage projects and it has helped my productivity greatly! In this article, I’ll share the change with you and how it’s helping me.

First, some background…

I used to decide on a project to complete for my business, figure out the scope of it, outline the steps to complete it and then set a target completion date. I based the estimated completion date on how long I thought the project would take and how much time I could put in daily or weekly. This worked pretty well, but I found that it didn’t always lead to spending the right amount of time on a project. How much time you spend on something should be proportional to the importance of it, and not necessarily proportional to how long it could take if done perfectly. Deciding what to do and how to do and THEN setting a time target meant that I could easily decide to spend weeks making a small website tweak that didn’t increase sales, profit or customer satisfaction. I didn’t really put this together at the time I was doing it. In the years I was a corporate project manager, this is more or less how we did it and it worked great.

The impetus for change…

I’ve had a big project I’ve wanted to complete since last fall. When I say big, I mean big both in terms of scope and in terms of how it will change my business. (Stay tuned, details coming soon!) It just dragged on and on, and in the meantime it isn’t available for people to buy so nobody is benefiting from it. It kept growing in scope as I worked on it (sound familiar? : ) ). I kept finding more and more to include in it. Finally, the exasperation got too great and I took a hard look at the project and decided to make some changes and get it done.

What I changed…

I picked a day on which to complete it and then downsized the scope so that I could meet that deadline. I realized that this project was something that could grow without any natural limit, so I had to place a limit on it myself. Once I picked the day it would be done, I worked backward to put some milestones in place. I’m just a few days away from that first milestone, and it looks like I’ll make it but only barely.

The Result…

The results of this one very small change (picking a deadline and adjusting the project to meet it) have been amazing. I feel so much more energized on this project because I know it will be out in the world soon rather than at some distant date in the future. It’s easier to get to work on it knowing my time on it is finite. Somehow, just knowing I’ll get the satisfaction of having it done in a short time makes it so much more enjoyable to work on.

Conclusion…

Even though I had years of experience as a project manager, this was a big shift for me. If you aren’t managing your projects at all, I invite you to try setting deadlines and milestones to help you get some big things done.

What do you have lagging that you need a boost to complete? Share it in the comments and tell me if setting a deadline helped you get it done.

Deciding what to work on and how much time to spend on it is one of my favorite things to coach on! Click here to set up some time for us to sort through everything that’s on your plate.

What are you saying no to?

I see a lot of attention being paid to the idea of saying yes to opportunities that come you way. A lot of people see this as a path to success with ease – watch for opportunities to come you way and then take them. I agree with this to a point – jump right in when the opportunity is right! What about when the opportunity isn’t a good fit? Should you still accept a chance to do something simply because it showed up without you working for it?

Business opportunities are everywhere, and some show up because you worked for them and some show up without any effort by you. There’s more to do in your business than you could ever possibly get done, so by necessity you will have to turn down some projects you may want to do. Given the imbalance of the how much discretionary time a business owner has and how many things they could be doing, they will have to turn down a lot in the course of their business life.

In these discarded opportunities lies one of the keys to success – choose very carefully what you will and will not do. It’s really important to say yes and jump into the right projects, but it’s equally important to say no and move on from the wrong projects.

Your time and energy are finite, and you can only get to a finite number of projects in your business. Starting too many or having too many going at once is a surefire way to get none of them done, have them take too long or have the quality suffer. You’d be better off picking a few and completing them at a level of quality that your customers will appreciate. Partially done, poorly done or abandoned projects never made anyone’s bottom line grow!

Throughout your business life, you’ll be bombarded with things you want to create, products you want to sell, content you want to write and more. If you’re like many entrepreneurs, you can think of more ideas in a day than you can do in a year. That means that you’ll only ever be able to actually complete a very small portion of all those projects. The bad news is that those numbers can feel really disappointing. The good news is that you can cherry pick only the best ones to implement. Keep an inventory of all those great ideas and things you want to do and when it comes time to add something new to your work, pick the best and leave the mediocrity behind.

Don’t be afraid to say “I don’t know”

Why are we so hesitant to say these 3 words – “I don’t know?” I see this all the time. People often express an opinion after saying they know nothing about the subject. One of the contractors we used on our fixer upper house created a huge problem because he didn’t know something and advised me on it as if he did. I myself have been pressured to offer an opinion on subjects which I simply had no knowledge of or not enough information on.

This topic is on my mind now because weeks later, I’m still cleaning up the mess the contractor caused. His credibility is shot in my mind. I can no longer trust anything he says because now I know whether he knows something or not that his answer will sound the same. If I make decisions based on his input, those decisions can be made on faulty data. Had he simply said he didn’t know I would have been able to ask someone who did and there would have been no problem.

I’ve been pretty careful up until now to qualify how well I know something before I give advice to a client. I might know something really well, and I’ll tell them so. Or, I might only have read a bit and never done something in my own business and I’ll tell them that too. Sometimes my clients have done things that I haven’t and I’ll tell them that I can’t add much to their experience at this time.

When I hear someone say “I don’t know,” it raises their trustworthiness in my eyes. I now know that they will admit when they don’t know something rather than snow me. It also points to a level of discernment in their learning – nobody can know about everything, so it’s important to decide what you do want to know about. It indicates a precision in speech and thought I find admirable.

One thing “I don’t know” rarely does is lower my opinion of someone. I’ve had mentors who have said it, and I appreciate their honesty. I’ve heard people in social settings say it and it just means they can’t offer an opinion or assessment on the subject at this time. I say it regularly myself.

The only time it does lower my opinion of someone is when the thing they don’t know falls squarely into what they claim as their expertise. Sorry to pick on contractors again, but there was a plumber who wanted me to tell him what size pipe to use under the house to make the plumbing up to code. I had specified in his contract that the work had to pass a code inspection so this was a big gaffe by him and I obviously never hired him again.

How do you handle it when someone asks you something you don’t know? If you’ve tried to cover up or change the subject, I invite you to say “I don’t know” without reservation.

An owner’s manual for YOU

This post may not seem totally business focused because it’s about personal well-being and taking care of yourself. However, for solopreneurs personal well-being is inseparable from business success. You can’t give others your best when you feel lousy and are running on empty. You can’t fill someone’s cup if your pitcher is empty. So if your want a successful solopreneur business, your self-care must be a high priority.

One of my favorite concepts in self-care is the idea of creating an owner’s manual for you. You have an owner’s manual for every car, appliance, electronic device and major purchase, so why not have one for your biggest asset – YOU? By the way, your owner’s manual doesn’t have to be written out but it does help to think of it just like the documentation that comes with big purchases. It’s also important to remember that your owner’s manual is full of recommendations, not laws. You can decide how closely to follow the manual, but if you at least know whats in it you can make informed choices. What goes into your owner’s manual? It’s a personal list of best practices for YOU. It’s the habits, choices and practices that make you perform and feel best. It’s those things that life feels incomplete without. Here’s a few points to get you started on your owner’s manual, and some examples from mine:

Bedtime routine – what do you do before bed to help you sleep? Here’s one of mine: If I watch TV in the few hours before bed, I have to avoid high-intensity shows or I have restless sleep.
Sleep – how much? When? Naps or not?
Food – which foods work great and which are not so great? Which foods do you love but know are not supporting your health?
Exercise – how much? What activities? How often? One of my favorite exercises is to do heavy weights at the gym. I feel like I can do anything when I leave!
Environment – what do you need around you to feel your best? I find when my space is not in order, it is mirrored in the way my brain works.
Social time vs. alone time – how much time do you need with other people? How much time do you need alone? Both are important to well-being.
Unscheduled time – how much time do you need with nothing planned? I was surprised to learn how important this one is. I need at least a few hours a week with nothing scheduled when I’m free to do whatever I want.
Quiet vs. noise – How much of each is best for you? I love background music, but I do need to spend some time in total silence.
Other – are there any things you need that might not be so important for someone else? Don’t negate their importance just because other people don’t find them relevant.

What do you need to be your best? Start your owner’s manual today by leaving one item from your manual in the comments.

Solopreneur boundaries, part 2

(This is the second of a 2-part series. For part 1 click here)

Part 1 of this 2-part series was on the first type of boundaries solopreneurs need – boundaries on what you let out. Click here to read about some of the ways solopreneurs can hurt their business by allowing too much out.

The second type of boundaries every solopreneur needs is boundaries on what you let in. This refers to opinions, information and news, and expert or non-expert help you allow into your business, into your life and into your head.

Opinions are ubiquitous – everybody has one and many times people are happy, or even too happy, to share what they think. The problem is that the opinion of a particular person is not necessarily appropriate, valid, helpful, relevant or fact-based for your situation. Unless you have a relationship with the person, you don’t know what their motivation is or whether they are even qualified to render an opinion that is helpful to you. For example, I know nothing about wine. I don’t really like it, I’ve never taken a class or had any tasting experience so I would not be a good person to give an opinion on a specific wine. This is where boundaries are important. When an opinion is offered, take it as just that – something offered which you can accept or decline.

Many of the same things can be said about information and news. It’s everywhere and there are massive amounts of it. Some of it is helpful to you, some of it is not. As with opinions, some of it should be let in and some shouldn’t. It’s important to check out the source and see if it lines up with your goals, your values and what you already know. For example, if you’ve been having great success with a certain technique of generating leads and a news story comes out saying that your technique doesn’t work anymore you can feel free to ignore it. It doesn’t line up with what you already know.

The final area is help, both expert and non-expert. As with information and news, there’s loads of help from experts and non-experts available. Non-expert help is particularly tempting because it often can be had for free (ever have a friend offer to set up a website, blog, or social media site?) The problem is that you don’t know if they know this subject because you have no way of checking them out since they don’t have a business. I’ve seen so many times when someone get terribly off course because of free help. With expert help, you have the chance to check the expert out to a much greater degree before signing on. Even with experts, it pays to do your homework before hiring. Check the person out, and make sure they have mastery in whatever they are going to help you with.

Be very selective about what you let into your business. Not every input is a good one even when it can be had for free.

What are somethings you’ve kept out of your business?

Access the gold in your head

If you are like most entrepreneurs, you probably have a gold mine inside your brain right now. One of the things that makes entrepreneurs different from people not drawn to that path is IDEAS! We live ideas. We work ideas. We’re addicted to or at least strongly drawn to new ideas. We can come up with more ideas in a day than we could implement in a year.

Unless you have a process for capturing and processing these ideas, chances are they are pinging around in your head going to waste. Nobody benefits from them and they don’t make you any money unless the ideas are out of your head and implemented.

I recommend having ways to capture all your ideas on a regular basis, but sometimes it might still help to do a big clearing out. Even in a well-kept home, clutter can still accumulate, and your brain is no different. Lots of ideas and thoughts are coming in on a regular basis, and if you don’t take some time to clear out your brain will become overly full and you may begin to feel like you can’t think.

I know when I’ve got too much in my head. It feels like one of the machines that mixes the lottery balls before they are picked – there’s just hundreds of things clamoring, bouncing and demanding my attention. I know when that happens I have to clear some space.

So how do you clear your head and get your golden ideas out?

I call it a brain download. Some people call this process a brain dump, but I don’t like the implication of the word “dump.” It’s where we take trash and hazardous waste, not valuable things like great ideas. A download on the other hand implies value. We download songs we like, books we want to read and information to improve our lives and businesses.

The only rule is that you can do this process however it works for you, but here are some tips to get you started.

I like to use old-fashion paper and pen. Yes, you lose the advantage of having on a computer document, but there’s something about connecting pen to hand to brain that really fuels my thinking.
Start with a full, blank sheet of paper. A big easel pad (2 feet by 3 feet or so) is especially inviting, but anything letter sized or bigger works.
Use colored pens, markers, crayons, or just a plain pen – whatever works for you. One warning – don’t get caught up in color coding or making a design with your writing.
This is about quantity and completeness, not quality or accuracy.
Gather your paper and pen and start writing! Anything that’s in your head, whether it’s recorded elsewhere or not is fair game. Include ideas, to-do items, things to research, things that bug you right now, anything else you think of.
This is just for you, so spelling, grammar, neatness, etc. don’t count.
You’ll know you’re done when several minutes pass and you can’t think of anything else to add. Your brain might feel light, empty or like something’s missing.

When you’re done, you’ll have a big, sloppy page and a neat, empty brain ready to tackle the next big thing.

I recommend that you put away your paper for a day and see if any stragglers pop up that you can add.

The last step is the one most often overlooked. Most entrepreneurs will be on to the next thing and their massive to-do list right away and this paper will be forgotten and that’s a huge waste! The last step is to process everything on your paper and put it in the correct place where it can be acted on at the right time and the threat of forgetting is gone. Some examples: ideas can go onto an idea list, to-do items in your task manager, an upcoming birthday added to your calendar, additional thoughts on a current project added to that project material.

Do you see how it works? Get your valuable ideas out of your head to where they can be acted on and in the process clear your magnificent mind for bigger and better things.

Tell me how you clear your head in the comments. What positive results do you get from your process?

Featured article in emPower Magazine

Head over to emPower Magazine to check out this article I wrote on a simple time management tool I use every day:

A Simple But Effective Tool for Solopreneur Time Management

Leave a comment telling me how you might use this tool in your business.

Guest Blog post on Karen May Dy’s Social Media Marketing blog

Here’s a post I wrote for Karen May Dy’s Social Media Marketing blog on strategy, business and social media. I’d love to know what you think about it!

Do Nothing Without a Strategy