Small Business Revitalization Blog

 

This time of year is flush with people posting their ‘year in review’ thoughts, dissecting everything that went right or wrong with the year before, and promising themselves they’ll do better.  Because I am always seeking a greater return on the energies I invest in my businesses, my personal ‘planning’ strategy is to explore the energies that are going to make the greatest difference in the upcoming year.

Why don’t I look at the previous year?  I review where I’m at about 25,000 times a year… my choices are made daily, based on what is possible in that particular moment, not on what was possible last week, last month or last year.  Have you noticed how fast the world is changing?  Is it time for our planning processes to catch up with the space we actually are operating from?

This radical difference in my ‘planning process’ led me to create these Ten Commandments for Dynamic Business Growth.   So, #1 became “Treat your business as an asset – create FOR the future, not FROM the past.”  What does this mean in practical terms? Lots of change and lots of choices!

Firstly, what I don’t do…

• I don’t assume that just because I did something in a particular way in 2012 (or before!) that it will create the same result in 2013.
• I don’t assume that products I have created before will continue to produce results.
• I don’t assume that previous ideas that I haven’t got to yet are the ones for this year.
• I don’t assume that I must build on what I did previously.
• I don’t assume that anything will be the same, including me!  (I did over 60 days of training in tools and techniques to create change during 2012… I use the tools daily and constantly create from a different space as my awareness expands!)

Instead of doing business from the ‘rinse and repeat’ cycle, I do business from a universe of possibilities – I ask lots of questions about what will allow me to ‘outcreate and grow’.  Which one is more fun for you?  Do you love creating more and more and greater?  Or do you love doing the same thing over and over and over, with ever-diminishing results, as your competitors catch on and copy you?  It’s just a choice.

And that choice is how you build your business assets from future possibilities rather than past performance.   To build your business assets you need to be present with your business.  Aware of everything connected to your business performance.  Willing to change any of it in any moment.  

Most businesses are so committed to the past that the present disappears in the overwhelm of keeping up.  What if you never had to keep up?  What if you could just keep choosing whatever would create the greatest possibilities for the future?

That’s what commandment #1 offers… a choice to build the future from the now, not the past.

Curious?  Want some more examples and practical tools so you can use these commandments in your business?

Download your free poster and find out more at www.revivecoaching.com/growth

And one more thing…these commandments are a moveable feast… they are what’s working right now!   I’d love to know what YOUR commandments for growing your business are… do you have a favourite you can share?    Lisa

 

I have a mentor who sees the world totally different to almost anyone on the planet.  His unique views on business make a lot of sense and he creates his businesses from an energy that is all about out-creating rather than problem-solving.  Why?  Because it works!

“Problem-solver” is a label much touted as a good thing in most businesses. The funny thing is, if you are a problem-solver, then you are always going to be creating problems to solve.  Oops!!  How is that working for your business?  Are you a little tired of fixing the problems in your business that you are creating? (Truly, if they are there, you are creating them somehow!)  Is it time to create a greater possibility?  One that could be fun for you?

A business truly focused on growth will create from an energy of out-creating, rather than problem-solving.  Look at how Apple began – they weren’t solving a problem, they were creating something totally different.  Richard Branson doesn’t solve problems; he out-creates the really average stuff that is on offer by his ‘competition’.

Two weeks ago I asked my mentor a few questions about people copying me (there seemed to be a  trend on that!) and he showed me an energy of out-creation that was far beyond what I have been playing with.  Out-creation is ALWAYS a more generative strategy than copying or competing (just in case you were wondering!!)

This week I came up with a new business model for one of my businesses that has the potential to make it into everything I have been asking it to be!  On a much larger scale… with a lot less of my time… that no-one else is doing… and in a way that would be way more fun for me!  How does it get better than that?

Here’s how it gets even better… I come up with another 10 business models that are game changers.  It really is that simple.  I became aware that the only ‘problem’ I had been creating in this business was not allowing it to be big enough… or amazing enough... or creative enough… or DIFFERENT enough!  Cute… not bright.  Changes are afoot!  

So, you could ask your business this question… and be willing for inspiration to come from anywhere…

“What could I be or do today that would allow me to outcreate myself right away?”

 And if you would like to know more about how to create a whole lot of this in your business, here are some choices:

• A free 30 minute business coaching session.
• Join us for the Business Beyond Limits telecall each month.
• Come to Creativity Lab LIVE!™ and outcreate everything you thought possible.

If you have been thinking too small, now is the time to outcreate everything you have ever dreamed of.  Go Play!

I woke up obsessed with taking a walk through Noosa National Park to Hells Gate.  When I got into the car it was raining (again!)  By the time I was halfway there the rain was coming down in sheets and visibility was pretty much zero.

I almost turned around, but I really, really, really wanted that walk! I could see the tiniest piece of blue sky to the south and I wasn’t allowing a bit of water to stop me.   Arriving at the National Park the rain stopped and midway to Hells Gate it was sunny again! I truly was one excited little bunny!

So what's a walk in the rain got to do with doing business consciously? 

Have you noticed how often we are tempted to give up when we are just a few moments from the thing we truly desire?  What is it you are almost about to give up on, that if you would keep going, would come to fruition faster and sooner than you can imagine?

It’s easy to give up in business.  Sometimes so much has to change beneath the surface before we can see our creations come to life…  That wait can be longer and harder than we desire if we are trying to force something into existence.  If, on the other hand, we go with the flow on the projects that are moving forward and we keep creating and generating lots of different possibilities, our choices expand exponentially.

If I had gone home this morning, I would have spent the whole day looking out the window, wishing I’d been for that walk.  Instead, my willingness to go with my instincts (despite gloomy surface appearances) gave my body some much needed creative impetus and I’m settling in to write for a while!  

And that’s the other part of moving forward to be conscious of… I’m once again working on my book The Mojo of Flow – which I thought would be out last year… but sometimes the flow just isn’t there… so I’ve done a few other projects in the meantime and the last pieces of information that I was ‘waiting’ for have shown up this week – how does it get better than that??

I could have beaten myself up for not finishing when I said I would… but really I always know there is a reason if something isn’t moving forward in the way I would like.  This last chapter will make it the book I knew it could be… that it wasn’t… until this topic came into my conscious awareness!! I am so grateful for consciously allowing the joy which made it all flow with ease (rather than going into the wrongness of me)!

So, let’s do something together…  Would you be willing to stop beating yourself up for anything that’s not working in your business right now… and start playing with whatever has some energy and some momentum? 

And would you put the 'stuck' or 'stopped' projects aside and keep contributing your energy to them, without a point of view as to what will happen next?  What if they could create and generate themselves with an ease you haven't experienced before?

As you do this, ask each project to let you know when it is time for you to play with it again… and know that everything happens with perfect timing.  

I see this ease of moving forward show up over and over with my business coaching clients.  We talk about a strategy, there’s no action, then all of a sudden everything falls magically into place, with an ease that is still astonishing each time it happens!  When we let go of our expectations and just keep moving forward, so much more becomes possible.

Are you willing to operate your business consciously?  Or would you rather do it by force?  How is that working for you?

Have you ever experienced how this flow creates such ease? Tell us about it below!  Or if you are wondering what the hell I am talking about... feel free to ask a question!! 

 Love your work! xox Lisa

For most of 2011 I found time and I to be on totally different calendars.  Time disappeared faster than I could keep up and I found that more than a little frustrating!  2012 dawned and I had the awareness I needed to create a different possibility – or I would be forever feeling ‘behind’ on everything.

When a challenge shows up, do you do what you have always done, go into ‘fix it’ mode, or do you take it as an invitation to create something way beyond what you’ve ever done before?  

What if your challenges are designed to stimulate you to a greater level of awareness of new possibilities?  What if you approached your challenges with a sense of curiosity and adventure instead of the usual sense of dread or despair?

This is how I’m playing with time right now… and I’m the most productive I’ve ever been – with more joy in my work than I’ve ever had!

So what has changed?

• I am having more time off to play which is creating space and clarity.
• I am only doing that which is bringing me joy.  No joy = later (or not at all!!)
• I am being way more creative.  The massive changes I have embraced in being more of me over the last few weeks are allowing solutions to show up faster and more intuitively.
• I am moving with what is moving – projects that feel stuck have been put aside for the moment (it’s that Mojo of Flow thing I like to talk about!)
• I am working in shorter, more intense and spontaneous bursts – more 20 minute blocks than 3 hours of being blocked!
• When I’m done, I’m done!  No suffering, no sticking it out just a little bit longer, nothing except the question ‘what else would be fun to play with right now?’ – And that is creating a sense of ease and speed across all of my businesses.
• I’m willing to change anything and everything… even approaches that have worked in the past… there are no sacred cows!!
• I’m saying YES to more and creating far more!  Strange how this works… but work it does!!

And in case you’re wondering… I’m running three businesses as well as producing a lot of specialist writing for a client.  So everywhere that you have decided you don’t have enough time, would you be willing to know that you can change it?  In an instant?  Just by making a different choice or discovering a different perspective??

I know it sounds way too simple… but sometimes the simplest solutions make the biggest difference!!

What if you could outcreate you?  What would that look like for your particular business challenge?

Have you noticed how most people are obsessed with getting business ‘right’ – as if there is only one right answer and once they find it they will have the perfect business for the next hundred million years?

What if, instead of getting business right, we start looking at what is relevant and what random brilliance we could create which would contribute to creating something greater than we have ever generated before? Could that be more fun than having to be the control freak from hell to make it all perfect?

One of my favourite tools is having everything be ‘out of control’… so that I can create from the random chaos of everything that is shifting and changing around me rather than the fixed and limited structures that people like to describe business as (you know... like the strategic plan, the business plan, the swot analysis, the competitive advantages, and all the other buzzwords…. yeah yeah yeah… is that just one big yawn for you??)

What if it could be more like shaking a kaleidoscope and creating a new pattern of possibilities every ten seconds…? ‘Oh this looks fun, what could that look like if I institute it into my business?’ rather than ‘Here is a structure that everyone uses and it has been proven to work for them so I know it will work for me…’  Which one of these makes you feel lighter? Which one makes you feel like you’d rather die??  What if business is truly fun and there can be a lightness with it that allows for infinite and playful creation?  

When I operate from the energy that I will put into place only what is relevant to the impact I desire to have on the world, it makes it easy to come up with randomly brilliant and adventurous ideas at astonishing speed... and the implementation is ease and joy too.  When I do it all by the MBA textbook (of which I have a few!!) there is a heaviness which soon translates into boredom and a lot of unfinished projects… oops!  Cute… not so bright!

Is any of this making sense to you?  What if your true state of being in business is a combination of relevance and randomness, rather than someone else’s idea of rightness?  

What if you were to Houdini yourself out of the definition and limitation of what business ‘should’ be? What could you create as your business?? And how much fun could you have?

(Image:  Pinterest)

Many startup business owners confide in me that they feel like a fraud.  They feel like they are pretending in this game of business and one of their motivations for having a business coach is to get more confident in knowing what they are doing.

Then there are other people who take the ‘fake it til you make it’ approach.  Often jumping from strategy to strategy, idea to idea, shiny object to shiny object… hoping desperately that something will work and they’ll become the highly successful business owner they fantasize is possible.

I was enjoying a great conversation on Facebook this week about the differences between ‘acting’ and ‘acting as if’ in business and when it’s okay to fake it.  To me they are two different energies. 

When we act we are being an energy – we are inhabiting a presence that comes from somewhere deep inside of us.  We are being the energy required to have a successful business, even if it feels a little different to our usual persona.  Just like a great actor does in a movie… when you really believe it could be true, that is acting!

When we are ‘acting as if’ we have started on the journey towards acting, but we are still in the zone of pretending we know what we are doing.  Underneath our ‘acting as if’ we still feel a bit like a fraud, we are still feeling like someone is going to find out we don’t have a clue any moment now…  the self-doubt comes to the fore. That’s more like being a C grade actor… everyone knows you are pretending!!

So what’s your strategy?  Are you going to ‘fake it ‘til you make it’ or are you ready to embody a presence that makes people sit up straight and take notice of what you are doing?  If you are choosing to have presence, you need an underpinning of knowing (rather than knowledge!).  

This is that sense within yourself that you know intuitively what is right for your business and you are willing to move forward with confidence.  You may not have all of the specific knowledge required (that is where a business coach or mentor comes in), but you do have an innate knowing that you have what it takes and your business is positioned to succeed.

This doesn’t mean you won’t take a few detours along the way – these often take us to places not imagined, but useful in an unexpected way!  There will be tweaks and about turns… new paths and the occasional crash to a stop… None of these things mean you are faking it! Discovery and growth is part of the adventure of being in business!  What will keep you going is that underlying presence that you bring to your adventures.  When you are clear and calm within yourself, so much more is possible!

So would you like to explore the essence of having more presence?  Join us at New Energies of BusinessTM – we are including some coaching hotspots this time… so a great opportunity to ask your questions of people who really understand presence! Bookings and more info at www.NewEnergiesOfBusiness.com 

Upcoming dates:  30 November 2011 in Brisbane and February 2012 on the Sunshine Coast.

(Image: Pinterest)

Like many perfectionists, for many years I chased the ever elusive ‘fix your weaknesses’ story, always putting myself in places where I could work on my weaknesses. Sadly this strategy did not bring me or my employers a whole lot of joy and I eventually got smart enough to avoid choosing the jobs that were too focused in those areas of weakness.

At one point I graduated to telling my employer why it would not be a good idea to give me certain tasks… I explained these tasks were not a natural talent and ability for me and they would be wasting their and my time given my capacities in other areas!  Of course, most people ignored this, preferring to squash the square peg into the round hole until they created a big mushy mess of misery for them and me.  Imagine if Frank Gehry had become a bricklayer instead of the magnificent architect he is?  The world would be much the poorer and he would be finding a whole lot less joy in his work!

I see this often with business owners – instead of allowing our team to shine in ways that are natural to them, we create a set of expectations and conditions that create the exact opposite.  And then we wonder why the business is not performing!!  As a business coach, it’s my job to sometimes deliver a little tough love to either the employee who is not loving their work or the business owner who is not creating the possibility for that in the workplace.  

Performance issues are almost always a result of the manager and the employee not being present with the strengths of the person who is not performing.  When we are truly present with our own strengths, talents and capacities it allows us to choose or create a role that is perfect for us (rather than twist, bend and mutilate ourselves to become perfect for the role!!)  

When we are present to our capacities, we work with ease and can easily outcreate and outdeliver almost anyone else… When you have a whole company full of people being present with their capacities and those people are in the roles best suited to their strengths, competition becomes irrelevant because you have a massive peak performance advantage!

Having this presence embodies a confidence, a connection with self and the willingness to be a contribution far beyond what most people see as possible.  Owning this inner presence individually and as a business builds in a set of distinctively different competencies that are incredibly difficult to copy well.  If you desire to build a sustainable, peak performing business, this is a great place to start! 

At the next New Energies of Business events we are bringing you two amazing speakers who live this strategy in their workplaces and beyond… what if we could have peak performance as the norm, instead of wading through the challenges of performance management way too often?  Would that make your business more blissful??  

If you’d like to know more, join us for an adventurous day of uncommon insights into what’s working right now!!  Bookings and more info at www.NewEnergiesOfBusiness.com  (Upcoming dates:  November 2011 in Brisbane and February 2012 on the Sunshine Coast)

(Guggenheim Bilbao image via Pinterest)

 

This morning a friend sent me a text message saying she was in a café and could overhear a business coach chewing out a client.  Wow - I was more than a little surprised!!  I have never needed to add to a client's stress levels like that and I never will.

Yes, I do believe in tough love when appropriate.  If you ask me to hold you accountable I will – very clearly -  once we agree on the parameters.  But I would never do it in a way that is unkind or disrespectful to you as a person.  I care too much about my clients to behave like that, and I care too much about our planet to bring anger or frustration into my coaching.  What if our earth is erupting because there is so much anger everywhere and she just can't contain it anymore?  Do any of us who are aware and conscious truly need to add to that?

Caring takes a lot more courage than chewing someone out.  What contribution can you be to our beautiful world today? Every energy we create has an impact far wider than just the person we are talking to.  The frustrated energy that coach was splattering around that café was felt by many more people than just her unfortunate client. 

I am more and more mindful of how far energy flows and what my total contribution is to the entire planet - in every interaction I have - with clients, friends, foes,and people I see in living everyday...  So, here’s what you need to know if you choose to work with me:

• Because I care, I will tell you when I feel you need to look at other options.
• Because I care, I will find a way to show you when it’s time to step it up a bit and shine your light more brightly into the world.  
• Because I care, I will tell you when I see greater possibilities for you than you can see right now.
• Because I care, I will be very clear about what it will take for you to have a successful business, even if you don’t want to hear it.
• Because I care, I will create the potential for you to discover the joy and bliss in your business, and sometimes, on the surface, that may not look like what you want it to!

Because I care, I will do this with humour, kindness and playfulness - not judgment, anger or frustration.  I will do it with sensitivity to where you are right now.  I will do it with awareness that you may not like me for a few moments because you weren’t expecting to hear what I have said (and I’ll never take offence, even if you do for a moment or so!!)

It’s this simple.  You need to care more than I do about your business.  If I found myself in a place where I had to chew you out over something, then I would be caring more for your business than you do.  If I ever find myself caring more than you about your business, then you need a different business or a different business coach.  (Of course, if you are one of those rare souls who love getting chewed out, it would be way easier for you to get a job and get paid for it, rather than paying a coach!)

Your business will thrive when you really really really desire thrival to show up.  When you make the demand of YOU to do whatever it takes!  I am here to mentor you, to contribute to you and to show you what is possible…what are you willing to receive?  What are you willing to contribute... to you, to your business, to the planet?

Love Your Work!
Lisa 

P.S. If this resonates with you, you are welcome to join us for the New Energies of Business events where we explore how we can change business consciously... or if you are looking for a business coach, you could enjoy a free 30 minute business coaching session to see if my business coaching style works for you!