Management vs Leadership Part III – Clarity to be Achieved

 PART III

CLICK FOR PART I

CLICK FOR PART Ii

In the previous installments, we discussed how leadership is one of the biggest problems in business. Not because leadership is bad but because there is a lack of management leading to the leadership. Next, we discussed that for your business to achieve its desired results, your team must have the clarity to perform. Does your team know how to perform their job well? Do they actually know what their job is?

As we mentioned previously, first we make sure they know what their job is, give them a good job description, a checklist or system, and micro-managing or mentor to make sure they do the job correctly.

Now that there is clarity of what they are responsible for, they need to create a daily list of what they need to achieve each day to stay on target to the end goal. This should be done at the end of every day. It's something that every person in every position in the company should do from the owner to the janitor. 

If you want higher productivity out of your people, literally make sure that before they leave the office, the warehouse or where ever they work, they leave a list of what needs to get done and achieved tomorrow. If they are not doing that, their productivity will be much lower. We have found that there is about a 30% increase in productivity with employees when we start doing that. 

Now as a manager, you can review this list to make sure they are focused on the most important and profitable tasks. The daily lists are one thing, you want them to learn how to prioritize, put each task in a time frame and prioritize it for the next day. This all starts with the list.  

Think about it, before you went away on vacation you made a list of what needed to get done. Checklists, todo lists work very well as part a management system. If you want to manage your people better, definitely have them know their job but also that you know what they are doing each day.

Now the daily list becomes a weekly list. Why do we need a weekly list? 

Simply put, we are going to have 2 meetings with all our employees to get away from being a reactive manager to being a proactive manager. (We will discuss these two meetings in the next segment) 

Reactive management started with the whole open-door policy. You can always come and ask me a question. What happens is they end up coming at any time of the day and ask you stupid questions and you give them an answer. These interruptions make you less productive and less profitable.

Answering questions are one of the biggest things that managers have to stop. If you are going to train someone, you are going to have to stop answering them and start asking them questions. Stop being the Super Hero and being the one to solve every problem. Train your team to be problem solvers.

In the next segment, we are going to discuss how to get out of the Super Hero syndrome and begin to become the leader.

Management vs Leadership Part II – Clarity to Perform

Part II
Click for Part I

In the previous installment, we discussed how leadership is one of the biggest problems in business.  Not because leadership is bad but because there is a lack of management leading to the leadership.  In reality, most people are just lazy managers.  They just give someone a task but they don’t give them a time frame or a schedule or plan to get it done by.  Then we complain that they don’t get it done on time and correctly.

So let’s take a look at how we can become good managers as well as how we can operate as good leaders.

There are 4 keys to a good manager are…

• Creating clarity on how to perform  their job
• Creating clarity on what needs to be achieved
• Asking Questions
• Provide ongoing Training

In this article, we are going to focus on the first key.  Does your team know how to perform their job well?  Do they actually know what their job is?  If you were to ask your top 10 employees to write a list of what they think their job is and at the same time you are writing you list of what you think their job is, do you think the list would be the same?

Most employees don’t actually know what is specifically required of them.  Their job description is too vague and there is no reality about what they are actually doing and why they are doing it.  Or if they know what to do, do they know what the actual outcome is that you are expecting? 

Management starts with a really good job description or positional agreement. 

A good manager will be sure his staff knows…

·        What they are responsible for

·        Who they are accountable to

·        How to do it

·        Why they are supposed to do it.

·        What is the expected outcome when they do their job well.

Give your people checklists and systems
This will allow them to be competent in what they are job doing so they deliver the actual results that you expect. 

Good management starts when people know what their job is, what they’re expected to do, and at what level they’re expected to do it (performance standard), the time frame it should be done in.  They should also be told why they are doing it.

When you give someone a job and you don’t agree on a time frame of when they need to finish that job that’s just lazy management.  Some people call it micromanaging.  Yes!  Some employees need micro managing until you built their competence and their ability to do it.  You don’t have to do it forever but this is part of the coaching, training, the managing, and mentoring of these people so they can actually become good and productive at their job.

Next, I will continue to be covering the 4 keys of a good manager.  The 2^nd key we will be discussing how to create clarity on what needs to be achieved.

Management vs. Leadership Part I - Are you a lazy manager?

Leadership is one of the biggest problems in business. Not because leadership is bad but because there is a lack of management leading to the leadership. I would like to share with you what I’ve learned from my business mentor and ActionCOACH founder Brad Sugars about the differences between management and leadership. Many of us are trying to find the golden goose of leadership. We’ve read the books; we’ve been to the seminars, we’ve watched the latest TEDtalk on leadership. If you go to the bookstore or go on Amazon, there are a massive amount of books on leadership but there are very few books on management. If we think about it, the last bestselling book on management was the One Minute Manager from the late 70s or early 80s. Let’s take a look and define what the differences are between leadership and management. Management is about creating competent and productive people. They have a level of competence, they know what they are doing and they know how they’re doing their jobs. If a company has a group of people that don’t know what they are doing, there’s a lack of competency or productivity going on in the organization, that’s a management problem or issue. Let’s flip to the other side of the coin and take look at leadership. Leadership is about creating passionate and focused people. If the people in the organization lack passion and motivation to do their job and they’re not focused on what they need to be doing, that’s a leadership issue. The challenge that I see most businesses have today is that the business might have been built very well from a leadership perspective, but because of the lack of management, we got people that are not good at their jobs, they’re not that productive. They’re passionate and excited but we’re not getting the results that we want. So how do we get the results that we want to get in our business? This is not brain surgery. It’s not actually that complex. What I have seen throughout my career if someone gets promoted to be a manager in a company they don’t get much management training. In most cases, they got promoted because it was assumed that they had those skills. One of the biggest challenges they face is the transition from being “one of the guys” to being the boss. In this day and age, the lack of management training is extortionately high. Now, why is that? Simply, it’s because businesses don’t give management training to their staff. Maybe management got a bad rap somewhere in the 90s or early 2000s. The mantra was that you don’t need to manage your people you need to lead them. It was like leadership was saying that management was a bad thing. To get the job done, we need competent and productive people if we want to get the job done in any business. We do need to learn management skills; we do need to understand what those management skills are and how they work. Let’s now focus on both leadership and management. Management is where we start because if we see negative behaviors in an organization normally it’s a lack of management. When there is a lack of management I see that they’re in denial of how competent they are. They think that they are better than they are. There’s a lack of responsibility, people are blaming others and there is no team cohesiveness. A lot of these issues are around lack of management. In reality, most people are just lazy managers. There I said it. They give someone a task but they don’t give them a timeframe or a schedule or plan to get it done by. Do you have a system to manage your people and tasks or do you just wing it? As a friend once told me winging it is not a strategy. Over the next few installments, I will be covering the 4 key of a good manager that you need to be focused on.

Steve Goranson has owned and operated the North Florida office of ActionCOACH since 2004. He is also a certified team engagement specialist and a social media educator with Luv4 Marketing.  Contact Steve to discuss how he can help your business in the areas of Team Engagement, sales & marketing, and operational efficiency.

Break Out of Your Comfort Zone

Do You feel stuck? 

Do you feel that there is a glass ceiling that is holding you back from reaching your potential?

Check out this short video where ActionCOACH Steve Goranson will share with you a simple formula that will help your break through the barriers that are holding you back and keeping you in your comfort zone.

How will you break out of your comforts zone?

If you are ready to break out of your comfort zone and want to take your business to the next level sign up for a Complimentary Break Through 1/2 hour phone coaching session and discover the power of coaching

CLICK HERE to Register

Case Study: How Three Moves Quadrupled the Value of this Business

Are you stuck trying to figure out how to create some recurring revenue for your business? 

You know those automatic sales will make your business more valuable and predictable, but the secret to transforming your company is to think less about what’s in it for you and more about coming up with a reason for customers to agree to a monthly bill.

Take a look at the transformation of Laura Steward’s company, Guardian Angel. Steward had gotten her IT consulting firm up to $400,000 in revenue when she called in a valuation consultant to help her put a price on her business. Steward was disappointed to learn her company was worth less than fifty percent of one year’s sales because she had no recurring revenue and what sales she did have were dependent on her personally.

Steward set about to transform her business into a more valuable company and made three big moves:

1. Angel Watch

The first thing Steward did was to design a monthly program called Angel Watch, which offered her business clients ongoing protection from technology problems. Steward offered her Angel Watch customers ongoing remote monitoring of their networks, pre-emptive virus protection and staff on call if there was ever a problem.  

Steward approached her clients with a calculation of what they had spent with her firm over the most recent 12-month period, including the cost of her customer’s downtime. She made the case that by signing up for Angel Watch, they would save money when taking into consideration both the hard costs of her firm’s time and the soft costs associated with downtime.

90% of her customers switched from hourly billing to the Angel Watch program.

2.      Doubling Rates

Next Steward doubled her personal consulting rates. That way, when one of the customers who decided not to opt into Angel Watch called her firm, they were quoted one rate for a technician’s time or twice the price to have Steward herself. Not surprisingly, most customers opted for the cheaper option and others chose to re-consider their decision not to sign up for Angel Watch.

3.      Survivor Clause

Steward also credits a small legal maneuver for further driving up the value of her business. She included a “survivor clause” in her Angel Watch contracts, which stipulated that the obligations of the agreement would “survive” a change of ownership of her company.

Steward went on to successfully sell her business at a price that was more than four times the original valuation she had received just two years prior to launching Angel Watch.

Steve Goranson has owned and operated the Northeast Florida of ActionCOACH since 2014. ActionCOACH is the World's #1 Coaching franchise with of 1000 offices in 50 different countries. They coach over 15,000 business each week.

Steve's commitment is to assist small business owners, to spend less time working "in" their business and more time working "on" their business so they can build a more valuable and sellable business. In the end, you’ll be spending less total time working, will be making more money and will have truly created the company and team you always dreamed of. In addition we will help you put the FUN back in your business and your life.


If you would like to learn more about how you too can get an "actionable" business education to improve your business's operations, sales,& bottom line contact ActionCOACH Steve Goranson to schedule a free 1/2 hour Phone Strategy Session  at 904-739-0200. www.actioncoachjax.com

Thinking Vs. Doing: The Owner’s Dilemma

There’s a steady breeze from the northwest, which cools the warm Caribbean afternoon. Framed between a palm tree and the turquoise water, you notice a man reading. He appears to be working, which seems strange given his appearance: shaggy blonde hair, linen shirt, surf shorts and flip-flops.

You squint and realize the man is Richard Branson and he just happens to be running Virgin Group Ltd., a multibillion-dollar conglomerate. He is working where he usually does, at Necker Island, a 74-acre retreat he owns in the British Virgin Islands.

Branson, of course, is far from a negligent founder, he has managers running the various businesses that make up the Virgin Group and visits his companies regularly, but he does not manage the day-to-day operations of any of his businesses, which frees up his time to think.

The train conductor vs. the thinker

Your role as a CEO/owner can be divided into two buckets: one for managing and the other for thinking.

The managing bucket is where, metaphorically speaking, you ensure the trains all run on time. In this role, you’re establishing goals for your employees and holding them accountable for achieving their targets. You’re making sure your products and services are of a high quality and that your biggest customers are happy.

When you’re wearing your manager hat, you’re scouring your company looking for small enhancements every day. This obsession with continuous improvement is what big companies call “six-sigma thinking,” but you probably just think of it as building a great company.

The other bucket is reserved for thinking and it’s where you create the future of your company. In this visionary time, you get to design new products, imagine new ways of serving customers, or contemplate where you could take your business in the years ahead. 

Your visionary hours are spent dreaming and imaging what your business could be, instead of worrying about what it is today.

The most valuable companies

The question is, how much of your time should you devote to each role? If your goal is to create a more valuable business—one that someone might like to buy one day—our data reveals that you should start gradually increasing the time you spend on thinking and hire someone else to do the managing.

Studies have shown that companies of owners who know each of their customers by first name (i.e., managers) trade at just 2.9 times their pre-tax profit, whereas the companies of owners who do not know their customers’ first names (i.e., thinkers) trade at closer to 5 times pre-tax profit.

Further, companies that would suffer if their owners were unable to come to work for three months, receive significantly lower offers when compared to companies that would not feel the absence of the owner for a month or two.

Finally, in a recent survey of merger and acquisition (M&A) professionals, we asked who they like to see an owner hire if they can only afford one “C-level” executive. The M&A professionals overwhelmingly identified a general manager/second-in-command as the most important role a founder can fill ahead of a chief revenue, marketing or financial officer.

In short, the owners of the most valuable businesses have found managers to ensure the trains run on time while they spend an increasing amount of their energy thinking about what’s next for their business.

If you are interested in getting a free preliminary business valuation estimate of what your business is worth call our office at 904.739.-0200 or start your free evaluation right away by Clicking Here

Steve Goranson has owned and operated the Northeast Florida of ActionCOACH since 2014. ActionCOACH is the World's #1 Coaching franchise with of 1000 offices in 50 different countries. They coach over 15,000 business each week.

Steve's commitment is to assist small business owners, to spend less time working "in" their business and more time working "on" their business so they can build a more valuable and sellable business. In the end, you’ll be spending less total time working, will be making more money and will have truly created the company and team you always dreamed of. In addition we will help you put the FUN back in your business and your life.


If you would like to learn more about how you too can get an "actionable" business education to improve your business's operations, sales,& bottom line contact ActionCOACH Steve Goranson to schedule a free 1/2 hour Phone Strategy Session  at 904-739-0200. www.actioncoachjax.com

5 keys to get your business working harder so you don't have to

Business ownership is one of the American Dreams; being able to be in control of your own destiny and have the freedom to choose want you want to do and when.

But for many entrepreneurs, that dream has escaped them. They have fallen into the business trap. The dream of freedom has fallen into the daily challenges and frustrations that struggling entrepreneurs face every day.

1. No Cash – You may be selling, but there’s never enough cash to pay the bills at the end of the month. There no cash left over to invest in new technologies or to upgrade equipment or put into your pocket.
2. No Time – You’re not running your business, it is running you. You are spending most of your day solving problems and putting out fires. Instead you should be planning your company’s next big venture, or just have time to do things you want and spend it with the people you love.
3. No Team – Instead of having a team of professionals that are working together toward a common goal, you have a group of employees that are looking out on how to better themselves. It’s more about “I” than “We”.
4. Feeling Stuck – Your Company has hit the glass ceiling. You can see as clear as day where you want to go, but something or someone in your organization is holding you back from crashing through that barrier. Nothing you have tried has worked.

If you find yourself struggling in any or all of these areas you are not alone. These are very common challenges for most businesses. Though very common, successful businesses have learned to overcome them by focusing on these 5 areas to get there businesses working hard and they can enjoy more life

1. Planning & Vision – Having a common focus & goal that everyone can buy-in to.
2. Leadership Development – The business is not working because you are. You need to develop leaders within your organization that are aligned to the company’s focus and goals that will run organization.
3. Test & Measuring – What gets measured gets improved! Each leader and team member in the organization needs to have an activity based score card to help them stay on track towards reaching the company’s goals.
4. Systems –Leverage is about doing more with less. To get your business working as hard as you do, you need to create written systems for your team to follow to drive consistency throughout your organization.
5. Implementation – Without Action nothing happens. This is where accountability and discipline come together. This is where most businesses get struck and spin their wheels.  Your organization must agree on 3-7 priorities that they will focus on. Each team member must know and be responsible and accountable to how their role leads the company towards achieving your top priorities.

Want to learn more about how you too can get your business working harder so you can enjoy more life? Contact ActionCOACH Steve Goranson at 904-739-0200. www.actioncoachjax.com schedule your free 1/2 phone coaching session.

Steve Goranson has owned and operated the Northeast Florida of ActionCOACH since 2014. ActionCOACH is the World's #1 Coaching franchise with of 1000 offices in 50 different countries. They coach over 15,000 business each week.

Steve's commitment is to assist small business owners, to spend less time working "in" their business and more time working "on" their business so they can build a more valuable and sellable business. In the end, you’ll be spending less total time working, will be making more money and will have truly created the company and team you always dreamed of. In addition we will help you put the FUN back in your business and your life.

Call his office to schedule a free 1/2 hour Phone Strategy Session 904-739-0200

Employee Engagement is the New Leadership

Our 6th President John Quincy Adams once said that if your actions inspire others to dream more, learn more, do more and become more, you are a leader.  

Those are powerful words.  Notice that he didn’t say dream or learn or do, he used the word "and".  Another sign of a good leader is one who can create leaders.  For any business, this is the first step toward creating a more valuable and sellable business.  

Good leadership develops an engaged team.  Today employee engagement is the new leadership.  Employee Engagement is the emotional commitment the employee has to the organization and its goals. Without developing engaged employees, you’re trying to move your business forward with an anchor hanging out the back.  

How much is employee disengagement costing your organization?   Here are 5 anchors of poor employee engagement that are costing your business growth, profitability, and your free time.

1. Poor Employee Engagement Creates a “ME” Culture.  Instead of working together towards the company’s common goals each employee is looking out for their own best interest.  You hear “it’s not my job” a lot and you get a lot of finger pointing.  They lose the perspective that when we work together as a team we all can achieve more: Together Everyone Achieves More.
2. Poor Employee Engagement Creates Wasted Time  When employees are not fully engaged they are not helping the company move forward.  They are doing things the way they think is best instead of looking out for what is in the best interest of the organization and what you strategically decided is best.  Without being focused on the company’s common goals, you get a lot of chaos and frustration which causes a lot of wasted time and money.
3. Poor Employee Engagement Creates More Missed Work
   When employees are working in an environment of chaos and frustration it takes toll on one’s personal energy and health.  This additional stress causes us to not get to work on time, to take more breaks, to leave early or just take unplanned days off.  This consistent interruption of work flow causes loss of productivity and profits
4. Poor Employee Engagement Creates Poor Quality of Work  If your employees don’t have their heart into it, they lose focus, they make mistakes and quality of output suffers.  The cost of this is enormous; loss of customers, wasting time doing work over, more overtime to cover the extra work involved, and increases in COGS.  These are the small hidden holes in your business that is sinking your ship and you don’t even realize it.
5. Poor Employee Engagement Creates Higher Employee Turnover  Good employees are looking for worthwhile work.. They want to be part of something big.  It’s hard to get motivated and engaged when you just feel that you are just a clog in a wheel.  The way to keep good employees is not always about the money

You can’t train employee engagement but the first step is to determine how engaged your employees are.  

Take our free employee engagement survey.  We will send an anonymous survey to your employees and provide you with a free employee engagement report.    

To sign up for your free employee engagement survey and report. 

CLICK HERE NOW!

If you would like to learn more about you too can get an "actionable" business education to improve your business's operations, sales,& bottom line contact ActionCOACH Steve Goranson at 904-739-0200. www.actioncoachjax.com

Steve Goranson has owned and operated the Northeast Florida of ActionCOACH since 2014. ActionCOACH is the World's #1 Coaching franchise with of 1000 offices in 50 different countries. They coach over 15,000 business each week.

Steve's commitment is to assist small business owners, to spend less time working "in" their business and more time working "on" their business so they can build a more valuable and sellable business. In the end, you’ll be spending less total time working, will be making more money and will have truly created the company and team you always dreamed of. In addition we will help you put the FUN back in your business and your life.

Call his office to schedule a free 1/2 hour Phone Strategy Session 904-739-0200

Confessions of a Business Owner: The business was driving me instead of me driving the business

Are you driving your business or is your business driving you?  You can continue to be stuck in the owner’s trap and stay on the treadmill or choose to get your business back on track.

That was the 2^nd confession from Jeff Clarkson, a former client of mine of where he was at before we met.  He wanted more than a job; he wanted a business that would work without him but wasn’t sure how to get there.

It was while having a cold beer during a gripe session with a friend of his (a current ActionCOACH client) that his friend recommended that he speak to me about how the ActionCOACH system could help him through his struggles.  .

Jeff had been the owner and President of Florida Bonded Pools here in Jacksonville for over 10 years.  It was the oldest pool company in Jacksonville started by his father over 50 years ago.  He had success in turning their struggling family owned business with 1 million in sales to a profitable company with sales ranging from 4.5 million to 6.5 million in annual sales.  Even with this success he was frustrated &wanted more.

As John Warrillow wrote in his book Built to Sell,  Jeff was caught in the owner’s trap. He was doing a lot of the selling and business always got slow when he was away.   Customers only came directly to him when there was a problem and his employees couldn’t make a decision without asking him first. 

He definitely felt trapped.  He was afraid that he was going to fall into the same trap that his dad had fallen into when he was spending more time at the business than at home.  Jeff wanted more than a job he wanted a business that could work without him.

It all starts with ActionCOACH’s definition of a business … with the simple idea that as a business owner you started or bought yourself something that’s more than just a job …

I see a business as … A Commercial, Profitable, Enterprise, that Works, without You … Let’s look at this more closely;

Commercial means that you sell something that people value, they want to buy;

Profitable means that you understand enough about business finance that you can possibly increase your profits without even increasing your revenue or lowering your expenses.

That Works and can work without you means that you have a system and a team that you can trust.”

You can’t have a business that works without you as the owner until you first have a business that works. Prior to that, it’s got to be both commercial and profitable … 

So, let’s take a look at the 6 Steps that Jeff learned to create a business that could work without him.

Step 1 - Mastery: 
This is about going from Chaos to Control … it’s about going from breaking even or losing money, to truly making a bankable cash profit.  It’s about making sure delivery happens so you don’t get customer complaints and, it’s about taking back control of your time

Steps 2 – Niche
Now this is where you start to make the real money … working your Niche is about getting a bunch of new leads, quickly reworking your sales conversion rates, getting your repeat business numbers up and then, boosting your average dollar sale.  This is truly about building a marketing machine that drives profit straight to your company’s bottom line. 

Steps 3 – Leverage
The next step is all about Systems … it’s about working ‘ON’ your business and not just ‘IN’ it.  Here you’ll start to see your business going from being people reliant, to being systems reliant …truly starting to free up your time and give you control over the growth of your business.

Step 4 – Team
They say team stands for ‘Together Everyone Achieves More’. When you’ve already got your Mastery, Niche and Systems in play, it’s time to lead a team that will ultimately run the company without you.  At the team stage you start to get a true business by getting it to begin to work without you.

Step 5 – Synergy
Here you’ll start to step back from the day to day, start handing over control. You really begin to ‘turn up the volume’ as they say … now that everything works, it’s time to do it bigger, better and more often … all the while keeping an eye on your team, your systems and your company making sure it can handle the growth.

Step 6 – Freedom / Results
This is about you – First, it’s about you enjoying the fruits of your labor and then it’s about diversification and investment.  Now that it’s all working, you can start to invest more time with your family, at your hobbies (or, even to find a hobby), or even work on investing your income or buying other companies where you can use everything you’ve learned all over again.

Confession # 2:  The business was driving me instead of me driving the business

Solution:  Jeff stopped and asked for help.  He was able to develop a more valuable company that was system based and not dependent on him by learning ActionCOACH’s 6 Steps Business Success System.

Over the next few blogs we will look a bit closer at each of these 6 Steps to create a more valuable and sellable business.

If you would like to learn more about you too can get an "actionable" business education to improve your business's operations, sales,& bottom line contact ActionCOACH Steve Goranson at 904-739-0200. www.actioncoachjax.com

Steve Goranson has owned and operated the Northeast Florida of ActionCOACH since 2014. ActionCOACH is the World's #1 Coaching franchise with of 1000 offices in 50 different countries. They coach over 15,000 business each week.

Steve's commitment is to assist small business owners, to spend less time working "in" their business and more time working "on" their business so they can build a more valuable and sellable business. In the end, you’ll be spending less total time working, will be making more money and will have truly created the company and team you always dreamed of. In addition we will help you put the FUN back in your business and your life.

Call his office to schedule a free 1/2 hour Phone Strategy Session 904-739-0200

Confessions of a Business Owner #1: The “I Know” Attitude

Being an entrepreneur and business owner is not easy.  Most people start a business because they

think their current boss is an idiot and they could do it better.  Or maybe they’ve just taken over the business from a parent or family member.  In either case they are now in charge and they get to do things their way.

One of the first traps business owners fall into is not asking for help because they “know it all”, no one can do it better than I can.

In a recent conversation with a former client of mine Jeff Clarkson, he confessed to me that’s where he was at before we met.  He had been the owner and President of Florida Bonded Pools here is Jacksonville for over 10 years.  It was the oldest pool company in Jacksonville started by his father over 50 years ago.  

He had success in turning their struggling family owned business with 1 million in sales to a profitable company with sales ranging from 4.5 million to 6.5 million in annual sales.  But when the recession hit and the company started to feel the effects, he confided in other smaller business owners his struggles.

It was while having a cold beer during a gripe session with a friend of his (a current ActionCOACH client) that his friend recommended that he speak to me about how the ActionCOACH system could help him through his struggles.  Because as Jeff now confesses, he had the “I KNOW” attitude, it took him over a year to respond to that advice.

Success guru Jim Rohn summed it up best when he would say that you got to “Learn before YOU Earn”.  Man is like a tree, if he is not growing he is dying.  To grow we need to consistently fill our minds with new information, otherwise we get stuck doing the same thing over and over again while expecting different results.  If our cup is full and we feel we know it all, there is no room at the top of the cup for new information and new ideas.  This is where most of our struggles begin.

A lot of times when working with business owners it’s not about helping you do something new and different, it’s about helping you to get focused on the things that made you successful in the first place. 

In the day to day struggles of running a business it is easy to get off track and lose your focus of doing what you do best.  I can’t tell you how many times I hear my clients say after we discussed a new strategy, “We use to do that”.  The sad part is that they could never remember when they stopped doing that strategy.

When you hear yourself say I’ve heard that before or I know how to do that, you need to stop and think to yourself, “isn’t that interesting”.  When we say “isn’t that interesting” we are opening our minds to new ideas and new solutions.  My goal as a business coach is to get you to look at your situation from a different perspective to help you create powerful and actionable ideas to improve your business.

Once Jeff stopped and asked for help, he gave himself a bigger cup to fill.  He was able to initially start implementing and improving the things he knew about but hadn’t taken action on.  Plus his company began to get an “actionable” education that allowed them to measure, monitor and make better informed decisions that improved the business operations, sales and bottom line.

Confession #1:  Get rid of the I KNOW attitude

Because Jeff stopped and asked for help he was able to develop a more valuable company that was system based and not dependent on him.

If you would like to learn more about you too can get an "actionable" business education to improve your business's operations, sales, & bottom line contact ActionCOACH Steve Goranson at 904-739-0200. www.actioncoachjax.com

Steve Goranson has owned and operated the Northeast Florida of ActionCOACH since 2014. ActionCOACH is the World's #1 Coaching franchise with of 1000 offices in 50 different countries. They coach over 15,000 business each week.

Steve's commitment is to assist small business owners, to spend less time working "in" their business and more time working "on" their business so they can build a more valuable and sellable business. In the end, you’ll be spending less total time working, will be making more money and will have truly created the company and team you always dreamed of. In addition we will help you put the FUN back in your business and your life.

Call his office to schedule a free 1/2 hour Phone Strategy Session 904-739-0200

Creating Personal Breakthroughs to Achieve More

Most of us are aware that the Jewish holiday of Passover occurs this time of year because the TV networks seem to always replay one of the most successful epic motion pictures, of all time, The 10 Commandants starring Charlton Heston.  It’s the biblical story of how G-d took the Jewish people out of Egypt and took them to Mt. Sinai to receive the 10 Commandments and Torah.  This week Jews all over the world come together to remember and relive this historical event but if understood properly there can be many lessons in which we call all take away.

As I am sitting here exhausted from all the preparation getting ready for the Jewish festival of Passover, I am reminded that success and happiness is not easy.  There are many lessons for all to be learned from this holiday.   It’s not a holiday commemorating an ancient event but a lesson to achieve true success & happiness in our lives.

The biggest lesson to take away from the holiday of Passover is that success takes hard work and preparation.  There are no short cuts to true success.  Passover is the holiday of freedom.  Jewish mystics teach us that Passover is not the holiday of freedom because the Jewish people were freed from their slavery in Egypt at that time, but that the holiday occurred then because it was a “time” of freedom.

If that is the case, every year there should be a universal energy that occurs now that we each can tap into.  This is a time for each of us to search deep inside ourselves to find the things or limiting beliefs that keep us in our rut or comfort zone and is keeping us from being as successful as we can.

When we search deep inside ourselves we will find the true source of our power and energy, and when we truly connect to this energy, we will be amazed in the abundant amount of good we can produce.

The Passover holiday is over week long.  The first days are about preparation and beginning on your path of success.   Change is not easy.  Whenever we try to change, it’s very easy to fall back into our comfort zone.  Making change last is what the last days of the holiday is all about.

The 7th day is when the Jews crossed the Sea of Reeds or commonly referred to as the Red Sea. Before they crossed and achieved their true freedom they faced a big obstacle.  They felt trapped; Pharaoh and his army where in hot pursuit and they were trapped at the Red Sea.  At this point some even thought that they should go back to Egypt (back to their comfort zone).  It was not until they refocused on their mission to go serve G-d on the mountain that things changed and it wasn’t until the water reached their nostrils that the sea began to split.

The lesson here is, when you are focused on your goal, what appears to be obstacles will split & provide you with a path to reach your goals.

Our biggest obstacle is our own limiting beliefs. Don’t focus on what you can’t do but what you can do. You’ll see the miracles appear in front of your own eyes.  How many times have we quit just before the moment of a great break though?  It’s almost scary to think about.

Jack Canfield sums it up in a formula from his book “Success Principles”.

E + R = O   Event + Response = Outcome

We all know the outcomes we want to achieve (though some of us have a clearer picture of that outcome than others).  But, there always seems to be some event or barrier that comes along and keeps us from journeying forward to our desired outcome.  Most of the time, we have no control over this event or the personal barrier that is put in front of us by ourselves or others.

The only thing we are in control over is how we respond to this event.  When we focus on the event or obstacle we lose focus and our desire to move toward our goal.  But, when we are focused on our outcome or goal, those obstacles that may appear to be as big as a whole sea that will soon split and allow us to truly break free and move toward our goal.

May this season of freedom allow you to break through to your success that is just waiting for you.

Please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below…