The Unnamed Storm
I want to start off with something. And that is this. If this email means nothing to you, if it seems to be answering a question you never asked, just skip it. Don’t bother with it at all.
There are certain things in small business, that can be understood from the outside, even when you’re not involved in anything business related. But there are a lot of things that can’t be understood until you’ve gone a certain distance along the business road.
And so it is with the topic of today: the Unnamed Storm.
Just the other day, a chap was explaining to me over a zoom call, how he’d just come out of a three month ‘funk’ in not just business.
But in life altogether.
His mood had been off.
He wasn’t himself around family.
He was training heavy (too heavy, he suggested?), but it wasn't fun.
He asked if I’d had such a thing before?
I shared with him a particularly dark period - that I haven’t shared with too many before - which was in my last year or so of owning our gym in Melbourne. Although, those circumstances had nothing to do with it, probably. Because the strange part of this harrowing period, is nothing was technically ‘wrong.’
I was married to my beautiful wife.
Our business was going well.
I was training and generally pretty healthy.
But for one stinking-hot Melbourne Summer in particular, it’s like each day was shrouded in a sheet of black haze that completely blocked the sun. I was impatient (even more than normal), and my mood was through the floor…
Even when good things would happen!
Eventually, it seeped into our marriage, and things got pretty dire.
And my productivity in my work was diabolical at times.
Now most people that I’ve met, at least in small business circles, have experienced something like this before. Inexplicable darkness, apathy, and disinterest in the world around them.
I’ve spoken to countless business owners who have gotten so far into this…
That they often want to walk away from their business altogether, thinking it's the root of the problem.
While my views on it have shifted a lot now and are much more religious in nature - which I won’t go into here both due to lack of credentials in that arena, and lack of time - at the time, there's seemingly no cause for these times.
They are like an Unnamed Storm.
They sit off the coast, and hammer you with their gale force winds. And you’re not sure why, for how long.
You have little motivation, and, even less clarity.
Regular ‘tools’ and ‘strategies’ seem to be futile in the face of the winds.
I dare say this is probably not too helpful so far. The only thing I can offer - without diving into the spiritual side of it - is that these storms seem to come before periods of change. A big learning, a levelling up…
Or even…
An outright shift in your identity!
And you may not see it at the time (my experience is you rarely do), but around the corner, if you can break out of it, there’s a different identity, or person that you’re becoming. Which is coupled with a slightly different assignment in business, or in life.
Which was certainly the case for me.
It's almost as if the Unnamed Storm strikes some of us when we’re not living in alignment with who we really are, and what we’re really here to do.
Which isn’t to say it’s always a matter of changing a business or moving.
In many cases, it’s simply meant stepping into something with more authority. Or casting off something that I’ve been holding on to.
Anyway, if you’re getting hit by the Unnamed Storm right now...
And things are hard for you, or you don’t know what’s next for your business...
Stay the course.
Business is hard.
And have faith.
Faith is infinitely more important than clarity, which is always so fleeting, and it can help you listen for cues on where to go next.
It might take time, but you will come out the other side, and see what needs to be done.
Grow with less, but better
There’s a point in every business owner’s journey where you realise you’re doing way too much.
And for a period, it felt great.
But activity can be a seductive liar.
Usually, this comes from an overload of all kinds of ideas and information from the internet and books.
The late Gary Halbert called this “carbonised crap” in your mind. Because what happens is you get so many inputs of information and trainings that your brain gets completely filled with junk that you think you have to do… And soon, your skull is full, and all that information starts to ‘carbonise’, or go hard like a diamond under pressure. Eventually, you walk around in your business, doing a million things at once, speaking a million miles an hour and smiling like a Cheshire Cat with a noticeable gleam in your eye. But the gleam isn’t happiness, it’s the light reflecting off of all the carbonised crap that goes into your head.
You find yourself in a trap. Where you’re ‘doing’ constantly.
And yes, you can still grow like that.
After the allure of busyness fades, you begin to feel like there’s no end in sight.
The alternative path to growth - doing less, better.
One pattern I noticed very quickly in my own businesses and with every client, was the more successful the business was, the more time off the person had. A month back, I met a guy Rob who coaches accountants. He’s built a multi-million dollar business at over seventy percent profit. And last year he worked a mere 321 days all year.
Sheesh.
Anyway, I’m going to share with you three ways you can start to do ‘less’ this month, and still grow. But before I do, realise that there is a big identity shift that has to happen to do this.
True story:
I worked with a successful physiotherapist for a while. She grew her business from zilch. Pretty soon she was making decent money. But she was starting to feel burned out. I pointed out how much easier it might be if she had some help. But she was adamant that she would never have a big team, et cetera.
The identity she started the business with was ‘practitioner’, not leader.
Frankly?
I understand that. I’ve had decent teams before, and I prefer to keep it lean as well.
Anyway, she eventually made some hires, first for admin, then another couple practitioners.
Soon?
She hit record numbers and record profit, and took a big holiday to Africa.
But the ‘big deal’ in that shift - and you’ll know this if you’ve been there - ain’t the technicalities of the hire - it’s the willingness to let go, and become the leader who trains and leads a powerful team on the mission. It’s a whole different identity, not just a different set of actions.
We have an identity upgrade to work on, if we want to change how the business feels as we grow.
That said, there are three things you can focus on for the next month if you want this ‘easier’ kind of growth.
No.1 - Simplify and streamline
Cut unnecessary crap and extra complexity.
The number of meetings you have, offers you’re running, or the number of marketing platforms you’re trying to uphold as a new business.
Couple weeks back I sat down with a client and mapped out a big campaign with three offers.
At the end of the day we were out for a walk, and as we were talking we realised we could delete the offer in the middle. This probably saved 50 hours of staff time, plus a whole bunch of complexity with marketing and sales.
The end solution was much cleaner.
But to get there, we had to cut through the limiting belief that you need ‘more’ to grow.
No.2 - Leverage systems and people
This is about having the right people in your business so that your business works for you.
If you’re earlier in the journey, and there ain’t anyone else on your team, then it’s about systems.
And that’s really a complex way of saying that you need a rhythm, with simple steps to follow, in order to do stuff.
A great one to look at is marketing, for example.
Marketing works really well with a monthly rhythm when you’re new. Each month, at a certain time, you can run a campaign. Maybe it’s a webinar, or product announcement, or email.
Well now that you know that, you can set up the steps for the campaign.
And it’s much easier to prepare and execute.
Most early businesses struggle to get a rhythm going, because they have too much stuff going on. Then when the team comes in, the chaos is amplified through more people.
No.3 - Focus on your composure, not just your revenue
How you choose to show up in your business is part of your identity shift.
When your business is set up well, it’s still going to take a bunch of work…
But you’ll be able to show up with some amount of ease and it ain’t going to feel like a grind.
Part of that thought is deciding to sit down to work with a level of grace and authority.
You aren’t a cog in your own wheel that’s about to grind itself into dust.
You’re a leader and a composer of an intentional business that brings value to the world.
Every business will have periods of intense output and work.
As well as periods that are more stable and predictable.
But neither of those are correlated with how you feel in the work that you do. You can grow through these by drinking the hustle culture cool-aid. Or, you can grow through these in a way that’s a little more relaxed and even fun, while you do less, better.
Focus on these three for a month or two and you may be surprised at what can happen.
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Seven questions to help create more 'vision' with your business
A while back, I interviewed a surfer named Takkesh on a podcast.
He had created this company called Surf Flow, which is a little bit of movement therapy, and some manual therapy, mostly for surfers.
Anyway, after he started the biz, they got a little bit stuck.
So he sat down with his partner, and they did a vision exercise.
In Tak’s case, he literally ‘drew’ this vision with pens.
He had a sheet of A3 paper, and drew an picture of their bus (that they renovated and lived in), up on a hill, with waves in the background. Basically they had a vision of travelling around Australia, delivering the Surf Flow work. And starting a family on the road more or less.
Anyway, about five years passed.
Takkesh posted a photo, I think it was on instagram, of the bus, up on a hill, with waves breaking behind in the background. In the second slide, he had his old piece of paper. It was identical. He had become internationally known for the surf flow work, and was helping professional surfers and athletes all around Australia as they travelled, as well as overseas on the world tour.
Basically, it was an exact real life representation of what he’d drawn on the paper.
No small feat.
I don’t think everyone does a ‘vision’ that way.
Not everyone does a vision board. Or ‘sees’ it in their mind’s eye like that.
Some people put some notes into their phone.
I know other people who write out a description on a pad of paper.
Others just do think about it or talk about it.
When I was younger I used to do a lot of triathlon. And I trained with this guy Pete Jacobs, he was a real pro, but also kind of an underdog. Anyway, soon he started to talk about his vision of winning the world title.
He would say how he wanted to win, and that he knew he was capable of it, et cetera.
“How dare he??”
People got all up in arms at Pete. They hated his bravado and confidence. Because he hadn’t really won anything big yet…
Anyway, he used to talk about this vision all the time. Never drew it out, but I think voicing it made it clearer.
Sure enough, couple years later he won the title easily. And the funny thing was that people didn’t like him so much that the odds on him winning were really low with the betting houses. So we put some money on Pete and made a killing.
Point of all this?
Having a business vision can help you stay the course
And keep taking action with your work… However you do it.
As the late Jim Camp used to say, Vision Drives Decision. There is no action without vision. It’s important to take time to step back, and reconnect with where you are going.
So, on that high note, here are a list of questions that can help spark the ideas or thinking, that can lead towards vision.
1 - What kind of work are you doing?
What does your delivery look like? How many hours per day are you working? What type of work are you doing? For us, we do one-to-one coaching, and then the other work is around delivery.
2 - Who is there with you?
Who do you see on your team? Both inside your world, and outside?
3 - What kind of clients are you working with?
This could be the most important question you ask yourself. Who are you working with? How are you helping them? Think about not just their type of business, but also their personal values, how they show up, et cetera.
4 - What do people say about you?
Your business will grow because word will spread when people talk about you. The question is, what stories will they tell? What do you want people to say about you and your work?
5 - What do you love about your work?
What lights you up about your business vision? How will life be more enjoyable, or easier?
6 - What will the hardest part be?
Where do you think the obstacles will be? What part do you tend to avoid? Write this out now so you can know what to expect, and how to work around these obstacles.
7 - Who has done this before?
Who in your world has done what you’re trying to do? If there’s no-one, who can you go and find, or meet? It might feel like you’re in a unique situation, with a bunch of impossible tasks in front of you. But the truth is, all of this stuff in business has been done before. Maybe not in exactly the same way. But somewhere, there’s someone out there that has experience that can help you.
These seven questions ain’t going to ‘give’ you your vision.
Frankly. Nobody can do that. And nobody can tell you exactly how to convert your vision into a business.
However, when we’re trying to create more vision, the first thing we do is nurture. And as we’ve learned from the late Jim Camp, the best way to nurture, is through short interrogative questions. Questions like these help to open up vision, so that you can ‘pull’ it out of you.
And, when we have a vision that we perceive as meaningful, it drives emotion.
And the emotion drives action.
Seeing a 'Vision' for Your Business
“Full-fledged human thought always tries to project new realities. And all knowledge about the past… plays only a subservient role to better project a new reality” - Uktomsky
There’s a short video interview I saw of J.R.R Tolkien, and the guy was asking him about how he came up with The Hobbit.
First, the interviewer asked him if he laid out the whole story, and had it all mapped out?
“The world existed is possé and in a large scale plan before the hobbit was written. The Hobbit was in fact originally an attempt to write something outside of it, and it grew into it. “
“So you invented the world before you wrote the habit?”
Tolkien: “Yes indeed.”
From what I understand, Tolkien had a very energetic mind. Growing up he was already fascinated with different languages. And basically would invent them and speak them at dinner.
And when he was creating his ‘world’, he drew on all kinds of influences and mythology.
Anyway, he did all of this before the story was crafted
When he was building his Ultima series of online games, Richard Garriot did something similar:
“I eventually came to believe that instead of conceiving of a story and then creating a world in which it could be told and make sense, I should create the world first - then let the player have access to all of its capabilities as they negotiate their own story.” - Richard Garriot
The juice for small biz-ness?
A lot of people think about their biz-ness by coming up with an offer that they present to someone, for some cash.
This lets you make money and hopefully build a good life.
And it gives them a solution.
Then, you might want to build more ‘brand’ around your business. So you get some images, or learn to write with more personality. Whatever it might be.
But two problems can come up.
One is the business can always have a ‘self serving’ undertone to it. Which is graspy, and not that attractive.
The other thing, is that the business owner can often feel stuck around what to do next. They spend their time inside of their business, consuming social media, and struggle with new (and good) ideas.
What’s the next offer?
What’s the next move?
And there can be this loop, where they get stuck, because the leading part of the whole thing to begin with was transactional.
And at some point, it is less attractive to clients.
When we create a business vision, we look at it from a different perspective.
We stop thinking about the money in our pocket for a second.
We stop thinking about the offer that we have.
And we think about the world that we want to create. And what that looks like, visually in our mind.
A little while back, I was talking to a woman who runs an NDIS support business. It’s one of the leading businesses in that market in the state, and is growing rapidly.
One thing I noticed, was how many ideas for new offers she had.
There were offers for the client level.
Workshop offer ideas for other businesses.
Training offers.
She had dozens up her sleeve.
I asked her about what kind of future she saw in her mind because of all this? And she proceeded to explain an entirely different world. A world where her clients - people with various disabilities - were participating in life at a deeper level, and doing all kinds of cool things.
Her vision of her world was driving her business and activities.
As the late Jim Camp teaches us, vision drives decision.
Now, this ain’t easy for everyone. In particular, new business owners who are looking for those early clients, because there’s that early focus on money for a lot of people.
But it’s a skill that we can practice, and leads to much more magnetic (and often profitable) services.
‘Thinking visually’, and creating a vision
In the past, we’ve run all kinds of vision activities. Vision boards. Workshops to ‘create’ a vision.
And there are a lot of variations of that which can work.
But the one thing that ties it all together, is that a vision is ‘visual’. It’s something that we can see.
And while this might be different for you, I’ve personally found that there are a few things that can really help to create more ‘vision.’
Step one - Restore energy
When a new business owner comes in, very rarely do they have a strong vision. Usually, they’re burned out, scattered, or bouncing around different offers or ideas. Even if their business is doing well on paper. So the first thing we try to do is, we take the pressure off. We lay everything out, and try to calm things down enough to see what’s going on.
From there, we try to help the business owner see that a) there’s usually time, and b) that the future is bright.
That’s often enough to get a little relief, and take the pressure off themselves for a second. Restoring their own energy.
That sounds corny, I know, but if you can’t restore energy, how can you come up with a vision, given that it demands a lot of energy.
Step two - Have interesting conversation to stimulate the mind
A lot of people don’t know this, but Tolkien was actually close friends with C.S. Lewis. They got together and formed a group called the ‘Inklings’. And Tolkien and Lewis didn’t get along all the time. But still, their conversations would spark more creative thinking, and a deeper vision.
In the end, from what I’ve heard, Lewis was a big reason for Tolkien to actually finish the work.
Conversation with your clients is going to be one of the best options. But also with friends, peers, mentors. Whatever.
Most people stay in their little box way too much, and get stuck behind a screen.
And generally, that isolation combined with scrolling social media ain’t going to lead to a strong vision for the future of a business.
Step three - Look at great old work. Then re-imagine it into something new
I read an article about a guy who started a company that hosts aged care facilities that you can rent out.
So it’s like Airbnb, but for older people who need the aged care side of things.
Anyway, they blew up fast.
The point of this? It’s built on the Airbnb DNA. It’s the same model, resynthesided into something new.
And air b’n’b? A blend of the home rental model, with hotels.
Tolkien’s work?
A lot of his different races and villages, filled with heroes and epic stories, came out of Eddas, a collection of Nordic tales from 1220, by Snorri Sturluson.
It’s new. But it’s build on old work that is great.
We see this with businesses all the time. One guy recently started a business around mindfulness and ‘mental performance’ training for kids. While his new offer saw almost instant traction, it was built on previous work he did with adults, and blended with his personal story as a dad.
How can your vision for your business be ‘augmented’ by looking at what exists, and building on it for something greater and more relevant to today’s world?
Step four - Practice ‘seeing’
A lot of people today don’t see much beyond the feed on their phones. I know that ain’t totally fair. But you’d be surprised, when you meet a lot of different business owners. But that’s a problem, because it takes your eyes off of your own vision.
If you want to learn to do a handstand, one of the big things is to ‘see and believe’ that you can do the handstand.
If you just keep kicking up, you can spend years trying and get nowhere.
When you ‘see’ it, you start to connect with the movement lots faster.
And so it is with your business.
Practice ‘seeing’ the world you want to create.
For us, it’s small businesses that are creative leaders in their niche. They don’t follow the status quo, but rather create a new ‘game’ for their customers to help their customers win in the fast changing world.
They are great communicators, and they take risks.
So I practice ‘seeing’ how that all connects, and what that actually looks like visually.
You can practice this with little tasks, and then it becomes a skill you can carry forward into your overall business.
Step five - Think of exactly what you want to create. Then create that
If you want to create a social media post, create that.
If you want to create a book. Create that.
This sounds almost too simple.
But it’s easy to over-complicate your offers and marketing (and business!).
When you think of exactly what it is that you want to build, whether it’s a project, or your overall business, then you are way ahead.
A lot of people don’t really know what they want to create.
And therein lies the root of the problem.
A successful business needs something to drive it forward.
Necessity can be a driver.
Competition can be a driver.
But one of the most powerful drivers, is creating a strong vision that you can see and believe in.
This doesn’t mean that a vision at any point in time is fixed. Or can’t evolve. But it does mean that there’s an image of a new world that you are creating. One that you believe in, that also helps the people you serve.
Some people tick this box with a ‘vision statement’ up on a website. They tell people what they’re about, or what the mission is.
But it’s another thing to practice seeing and believing in our own vision. And creating the world that we want to build in our mind, before we go out there and start doing it, and ‘show’ people what that vision looks like, and how it helps the people we serve.
Some people are naturally good at this.
Others are more stuck in language, and rules, and may benefit from partnering with a more visual person.
Either way, all of it is a skill we can work on, and apply it into your business daily.
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Spectator to doer: Finding your inciting incident
One of my favourite old TV shows is Seinfeld. It turns out, that there’s a few parts of the show that were totally improvised, or accidental. For example, the way that Kramer comes through the door in a sliding rush was done the first time because Kramer missed his cue. It was such a hit, that it became it’s own sub-thread in the story. He continued to develop it until he could slide from the doorway all the way to the kitchen.
When Kramer missed the cue, it became an ‘inciting incident’ in the story.
It was a catalyst that knocked him off kilter. And shifted the direction of the show in a small, but key way.
In business, we’re often looking for ways to motivate ourselves.
Or ways to stay accountable.
We think that this should be coming from within. From some internal drive that some people have, and others don’t.
But usually, the spark for motivation comes from outside of us. We see something. We hear about something. Or we meet someone, and that creates a vision that stirs enough emotion to create movement.
We have an inciting incident in our lives, that knocks us out of balance, and leads to action.
Successful business owners and creators don’t just sit there with infinite piles of motivation. They are just very good at finding these catalysts.
The root of the word motivate is “to stimulate toward action, act as the inciting cause of”
And later, “inner or social stimulus for action”.
Motivation then, is the starter of action. It ain’t the continuation of action. It’s the catalyst.
How do we get this stimulus to move from spectator to ‘doer?’
Do we need more energy? Most likely. The further we go, the more we learn that more energy at a cultural, or physiological level is at the heart of progress and creativity, with the reverse also being true.
Do we need more information? For most of us, that’s now debunked. While some people still trawl through video courses, they already know that it’s a distraction, and it creates more contempt for the whole thing as the information pours in, and there ain’t any more action on the other side of it.
We need to break routine
In story structure, an inciting incident is the beginning of a story.
Robert McKee outlines this well:
“The inciting incident launches a story by upsetting the equilibrium of the protagonist’s life and throwing the story’s core value either positively or negatively, but decisively, out of kilter. This turning point initiates the events that follow and propels the protagonist into action.”
Prior to the inciting incident, the protagonist, or lead character, is sitting in balance.
They may have problems, desires, or things that they want to do. But those positive forces are ‘in balance’ with the negative forces that stop movement: Perceived risk, fear, comfort, inertia to stay where we are, uncertainty, et cetera.
This is where a lot of people sit. On one side there are dreams and desires. But on the other, narratives from different angles that create a sense of fear and risk. So there is a long term equilibrium, that slowly morphs into groundhog day.
They become spectators.
It’s like Batman sitting in his lair, brooding. Sure he can go save people. But why? There will just be more crime in Gotham. Why bother?
The inciting incident ‘shocks’ the character out of balance: The Joker arrives on the scene. Bane arrives on the scene. Batman is suddenly, and necessarily moved into action.
But these events don’t come from a life of routine
In everyday life, with a lot going on, and a fair bit of stress, there’s often no energetic reason to change our path, unless we have a strong inciting incident. Basically, we need to put ourselves in the position to get knocked out of balance in life.
I get to interview a lot of business owners about their backstory
Quite often - not all the time - those who are the most successful have had a strong inciting incident in their past.
They grew up very poor.
Their first business went bankrupt.
They had an injury or illness.
A lot of times they had a strong, negative inciting incident, that knocks the character deeply out of balance, propelling them into a positive action over time. Which, in the case of business, can be a good thing.
Then, as each chapter of their story is complete, or after they reach each goal, successful business owners, and generally the people we look up to, seek out more catalysts to spark the next step of the journey.
It doesn’t just happen. They get out and meet people.
They go travelling.
They have trained themselves to constantly be looking for inciting incidents, or catalysts.
They are trying to knock themselves off kilter, knowing that the next stage of growth won’t just ‘happen’, but will often start from outside of themselves, and then they can create a vision around that, and continue to drive forward.
Do all inciting incidents need to be negative?
We started watching a series called Yellowstone a while back. We haven’t finished it. But basically what happened was, the family on the Dutton Ranch was in balance. Sure there was a mild feud going on. But it wasn’t at a tipping point.
But, in one scene in the first episode, one of the sons was killed off.
This was the obvious inciting incident, which kicked off the main story line of saving the ranch and the family.
Negative inciting incidents like that can be powerful.
But positive can work as well. Getting married. Moving overseas. A holiday, et cetera. Seeing something beyond what you thought was possible.
Either way, an inciting incident always leads to action. Because if it doesn’t it’s not an inciting incident. It’s just an event that leaves everything in equilibrium.
People as ‘catalysts’ or inciting incidents
Personally, my biggest shifts in life have come from people who have been inciting incidents for my life. My mentors and teachers.
People who are very prolific.
Or very energised. So just being around them knocks me out of balance, and gets me thinking about the next idea.
For example. When I left corporate, I had no job but I needed a way to support myself, so I walked around retail stores, and found a part time job moving shoe boxes. The job paid $20 cash per hour. Which was all that I needed then.
But the real inciting incident, was the owner of the store. His name was Luke. He was great at sales, because he was so good at nurturing vision with customers. And he made me ‘see’ that people love to buy, and selling is a good thing.
When we meet someone that inspires us like that, we are shocked into action by seeing what’s possible, and actually attainable. It creates vision, and we can’t help but shift our course.
Finding inciting incidents
One of the hardest periods for me mentally, was actually when we were doing pretty well in business.
We had the gym, revenue was great. We had a pretty good lifestyle.
But I was grinding. I would go from home to the gym, and maybe to the cafe. And just stay inside of those four walls.
I would look on social media for inspiration. But it was just flashy images and people talking.
If you think about this in a typical story arc, the character expanded to reach a certain level of success. But then they started to contract. Instead of seeking more inciting incidents, they start to protect what they have, and remain ‘closed off’.
And what they need, is a catalyst for a second ‘expansion.’
It sounds small, but the way that I broke out of that was, I started inviting other gym owners over to train. We would do a session. Talk about ideas. And it would spark new directions. I started to run some different workshops and then retreats. This led to a coaching program. And eventually, it led to us deciding to sell the gym and move north to where it was warmer.
The reason the first period was so difficult, was because there was no inciting incident. Without a catalyst, or something to spark action, the character just flounders.
Before a story, physically, socially, or otherwise the character rests in a state of balance.
Life is in balance.
Sure the protagonist has her daily ups and downs. But she’s in control of her existence. Something must happen in her world, for a new story to begin. In a way, this forces her into action.
Well, our job then, as visionaries and business owners, isn’t to create ideas out of thin air.
Or to suddenly wake up, and change everything.
Our job is to ‘run into’ catalysts and create vision. Things that spark our thinking, and force us out of equilibrium.
The shift from spectator to doer ain’t about summoning motivation from within. Or getting more hype. It’s rare to wake up and suddenly be motivated in any meaningful way that lasts.
Because as long as life is in balance, and we have control over everything, then there is no story. Rather than beating ourselves up for not having the motivation to become a ‘doer’, what we need to do is put ourselves in a position for a catalyst to happen.
‘Doers’ are constantly looking at this.
They’re talking to people from all walks of life. They are calling people back. They are showing up at events. They lean in. Not because they have to. But because they know that a little moment, conversation or event can be exactly what they need.
And ‘tip’ them into the next leg of their story.
Of course it’s easy for me to say this as a business coach. But an easy option is to enrol in a course. Go meet new people. Travel. Disrupt routine enough to open a doorway for something to knock you out of balance.
This forces you to take action, and a new story begins.
Why Thinking ‘Small’ May Be Best, Even if You Want to Grow Big
The first business I opened, was a small retail store.
The floor space was around sixty square meters, and ten minutes away, was Rebel Sports, a big chain sports store. The sales reps for the shoe companies used to come in, and talk about the order sizes that Rebel would make.
Ten times bigger than my orders, for any particular shoes.
Man.
I did the numbers in my head. How many shoes they must be selling. Multiplied by the price of the shoes… Plus, they sell a whole bunch of other stuff as well besides shoes.
And here in my little store, I was picking my orders, balancing my budget with what I expected to sell each quarter.
Often, I’d catch myself thinking about ‘more’. How do I catch up with these other guys?
But the fact is, our business was successful because we were the opposite of Rebel.
We grew, because instead of thinking ‘big’, we thought ‘small’.
While they focused on scale, we focused on service. Our staff were good runners. We would custom order shoes for customers. We supported local races. And, we built a horde of raving fans, that continued to buy, to the point where even after they would leave the country they would call up the shop, and place an order for shoes to be sent to them.
It’s easy to fall into the trap of chasing ‘big’, when often, thinking ‘small’ is best.
Even if the goal is to grow over time…
Let’s say you open a bakery.
Well, there’s a lot of bakeries in my town. There are cheap ones. Gluten free ones. Bakeries with a café tied to them. There’s a pet café with a bakery tied to it!
And in your bakery, you have a few customers, but you want to grow.
What are your options?
Install the point of sales systems that work better?
Get a better website or brand package?
Learn to do home delivery?
All that can work. But, what about thinking small? Zooming in to your unique business, the customer, and the story you’re inviting them to be a part of, and how this affects your products and service, so that it’s memorable enough for people to talk about?
Rather than chasing bigger, think ‘smaller’, focusing on one, two, or ten individual customers, and figuring out how to surprise and delight them, so they talk (online, offline, whatever).
(I have a friend Kat, who did exactly this with a sourdough bakery on a little island in New Zealand. And by delighting a few customers, she quickly was in so much demand she was maxed out).
Focusing on ‘small’ doesn’t mean staying small. (But it can).
It’s a way of thinking, that helps you to build your business the way you want, and service your customers, properly. Which, if you want, allows you to create scalable offers and systems, on top of a story that resonates, to grow.
Or, you can do what Ruby and I do, build a business you love that’s just the right size, so you can live the life that you want.
But how do we stay out of the ‘hype’ culture, and avoid feeling like we’ve got to ‘chase’?
We focus on three principles:
Set upper boundaries on services and offers
Drop the word ‘scale’
Realise you can lead, even if you’re in a team of one
Step 1 - Why set upper boundaries on your service or offers?
A few weeks ago, I found out that my friend had some t-shirts made for his personal training business. They said ‘Uncommon Strength’ on the front, and the graphic was a Jimmy Hendrix style font.
So I asked him for a large, and he said they were sold out. But I could put my order onto the next batch.
I’m still waiting for that shirt…
Since there was limited supply, I want one. And it keeps pulling my attention.
Another friend of mine, just announced she has some shirts for her business as well. I wanted to support her too, so I looked at the shirts. It directed me to a print-on-demand website that does shirts for you. There were ten different designs, in different colours and sizes. And, they’re always in stock, because they are printed to order.
After five minutes on the site, I left the whole thing, knowing I can go back whenever I want.
No urgency.
When you set an upper boundary, you restrict supply creating desire and demand
This often (assuming there’s a quality service), increases demand.
A little while ago, one of the brands Ruby follows, Sézane, did a ten year anniversary product drop. They had told their customers it was coming, via email and social media. When it went live, it all sold out in thirty minutes.
A lot of people missed out. Including Rubes.
In fact, some people were straight up furious, raging in the instagram comments.
But you know what? It just created more demand. And the result was, the next clothing drop sold out just as fast. Now there’s a reputation, and they’re always selling out.
But, how do you sell more?
Do you need to sell more?
If it’s revenue that’s the question, you can adjust pricing, or, you can repeat a similar offer a couple of times per year, creating a constant ‘drip’ of supply, with high demand.
Setting boundaries reduces overwhelm
The other week Ruby ran a small networking dinner for women in business.
It was a chance for a dozen women to come together, and catch up. Anyway, the first thing she did, was limit it to fourteen people. Then, when she sent out the first email with the invites, she was already coming from a place of limited supply. She wasn’t trying to get 100 people in.
Fourteen is easy to deal with. When she organised the emails, the location and the decorations, it was low stress.
Then, at the event, everyone got a chance to talk to each other.
Could she have made it bigger? Sure, but would everyone have been talking about how intimate and special it was afterwards? Probably not.
Now, she can run a second one, at a time that she chooses, and it’s highly likely a lot of the women will already want to come back.
Everywhere you look, people will tell you to chase ‘more’
And certain businesses and offers are suited for that. Many of the businesses we work with have evergreen, highly scalable offers. But what happens when we slow down and look small first?
Rather than trying to get the customers excited and market and sell with hype, we can explain the situation, see if it’s for them, and invite them in rationally.
It destroys neediness from your sales, and makes you more magnetic straight away.
Which, paradoxically for you as the business owner, means you can ship the work more easily, produce more over time, and invite more people to work with you.
Step 2 - Staying ‘Focused’ When Everyone Yells Scale
Every time I check on instagram, I’m hit with some advertisement about how so and so agency just scaled to 100k months. Or how to go from zero to ten million dollars in three years. Fact is, the entire space has been ‘scale-washed.’ Brainwashed into thinking that the only way to go is up.
The first thing to realise is - and this is from someone who’s seen behind the scenes for a lot of businesses... It ain’t always what it seems on social media.
And I won’t go into names, but more than a few of these guys might be showing the flash online, but behind the scenes the profit (and often revenue) ain’t there. I heard one guy was a big name coach, but turned out the dude is struggling to pay the bills.
Marketers know the ‘scale’ angle is attractive
It looks like you can suddenly get ‘high ticket leads’, without doing the work over time. ‘Scale’ has become go to word, to get the lifestyle of holidays by the pool at the lake Como mansion.
Now, this isn’t to say businesses shouldn’t grow
A lot of businesses we work with, grow. That’s the point. We’ve had clients from from 30k months, to 150+ k months. Growth is a great idea for the right business.
But they didn’t grow because they focused on getting bigger straight away.
Instead, on each step of the journey, the business owners check back in, to see how they can create a better service and a more compelling business story with more humanity.
When the business story is kept as the North Star, and customer service is a priority, the business owner can choose to look at systems or ways to leverage growth.
But trying to cram people in is rarely the path that gets there.
Realise you don’t have to scale
You may want to, and that’s fine.
But you might get your business to the perfect place where you can travel, take time off, work good hours doing what you love, and serve your customers or clients in the way that you enjoy.
For a lot of people, this will be the sweet spot of business, rather than trying to triple it in size.
There’s a gym based in Sydney that has ruffled a few feathers. It’s built specifically for executives, there’s a laundry service, one to one coaching. And the membership pricing is around $400 per week. More than most gyms. Anyway, what they did was limit the membership to 100 spots. In a city of millions, that ain’t a lot. From there they built a story that resonates with a particular group of people.
Within a year or so, they were full.
Now, they’re onto their second location, with the first membership capped.
They are growing, but it came from focusing on each individual member, one at a time, without racing to be huge.
And, they’re doing work they enjoy.
We found a similar thing in Creator Club, our business coaching membership
In a world where most business coaching programs are trying to get thousands of people in, we help a few of the right business owners do work that matters, that gets them to where they want to go, and have a biz-ness they love.
Some of that model doesn’t scale easily.
And that’s OK.
So, we’ve limited the spaces for the coaching. As I write this, we’re full.
And from there, we create small, specialised offers on the side for specific skills or tactics that businesses want to learn.
Step 3 - You Can ‘Lead’ Even When You’re Small
But can you become a small business ‘leader’ if you don’t grow a huge team?
I think when most of us in business think about leadership, what we’re really referring to, is the ability to take creative risks on new directions, and invite others to come along.
It ain’t about team size.
When you write your article, and ship it to the world, in a sense, that’s leadership.
When you run an event and invite twenty people to come, your leading.
A lot of our clients have VA’s, assistants, part time staff, or remote workers, and all of this can come under the banner of a team that you lead. But if you’re flying solo, you can also lead yourself, and the clients that you serve.
To lead means, not to follow
You’re creating a new business story, and opening the door for others to walk through.
All business owners should aspire to be leaders, but it has more to do with marketing positioning, than it does having to have staff or a team.
A lot of times, when a new business owner comes in, they say how they’ve been listening to the latest podcasts on how to get success in business. They’re fired up, and ready to ‘scale’.
I say well, OK, what’s your offer? What’s your marketing?
A lot of times we find that this is where we need to work. The basics.
This is a kind of guru syndrome. Focusing on scale, rather than starting with an attractive offer for the people you want to serve, then finding more ways to serve them that are in line with that story.
And until we can circle back to the work that matters for a few people, it’s hard to grow at all.
When we take the focus off of rapid growth, we can focus on helping customers win
When we do a good job, people talk about it. They hang around. They want to come back. Instead of chasing for more, we find ourselves with opportunities to serve more.
Whether that’s more people, or the same people, for longer.
Scale, growth, and stacking revenue have a particular place and time. But if the process to ‘scale’ gets away from humanity, or the reason why you’re in business in the first place, then the end result rarely works out.
All that’s to say that if thinking ‘big’ ain’t working, try thinking small first.
Build a business you’re proud of for your particular audience.
Then, grow bigger if you want to.
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Listening vs. Leading (and why polls so often fail)
About eight years ago when I owned a gym in Melbourne we were making some changes to the class timetable. There was a new class we wanted to introduce, to make use of an empty time slot in the middle of the day. Plus, people had been asking us about a midday slot.
So what I did was, I put a poll into our Facebook group, I think we had 85 or 90 members then. And I provided some different time options, to ask which one would best suit people. As expected, the Monday 12pm time slot was the most popular, with at least twenty votes, and plenty of comments that people would want to come to that time.
So, we put the class on. One person showed up. Most of our classes had eight to fifteen. Then the next week, two people. But then instead of climbing, it went down. Back to one. After six weeks, and relentless internal marketing of this new class, it was still barren. I’d been duped. Of course it wasn’t intentional, but I realised that what customers ‘say’ and what they do, are two totally different things. And from this point forward, I realised that ‘listening’ to the market is of course important, but ‘leading’ the market is even more powerful.
The other day I was talking to a good friend of mine who founded a big CrossFit gym down in Melbourne. It’s an institution, and has held over 200 members for as long as I’ve known the guy.
More:
While still a co-owner, he’s since moved north and started another training business.
Now the size and longevity of these businesses doesn’t come by accident. I mentioned on the phone that I always thought he was great at World Building - which in a sense, is using creativity to build your unique business so it is like no other, that has elements of your personality, values and interests. He said something really interesting - and I’m paraphrasing here:
“It started with me building what I wanted. I built the gym that I wanted, with the music that I wanted. And the programming that I was interested in. Everyone else was doing this common CrossFit font, and it all looked the same. So I did something totally different. I built my own thing.”
He went on:
“Once people started to come, then it changes a bit. You have to find that balance, where you’re building something that you’re proud of, but it’s also for them. But you have to lead.”
Very astute.
And his ability to make decisions and lead is largely why he is still going strong.
And while he knew his market like the back of his hand, he never took their lead, and rarely ‘listened’ to them directly.
It turns out that listening to the market ain’t always guaranteed.
And, that as a creator and service provider, you have to watch, notice, take hints, and often lead your customers.
We aren’t always sold this idea though. It seems like everywhere you go marketers are telling you to listen to your audience. And survey your people to get responses. There’s polling services, survey monkey, and every social media platform is equipped with voting tools, and poll plugins.
It seems like every other day where you might open an email, or be on social media, and see someone asking the audience:
“Would you like it if I did this?”
“Which out of these would you like?”
“Which would be better out of these…?”
“What should I do about this..?”
And these get engagement. Just not always results, as we’ve seen.
I believe one aspect of this is that what we say as customers, and what we do aren’t always the same thing, as was the case at our gym. A lot of times, we might give a response to a poll or question, so that we can be seen as a person that gave that response. Even when the results are anonymous, it still gives us a chance to say a certain message, even if it conflicts with our behaviour. I remember working with clients as a personal trainer years ago. They would often say that they had given up sugar or dairy, or some other vice over the past month, but then later talk about a certain kind of cookies they loved and had the last weekend, or something else that they had supposedly stopped having. I didn’t even care about the food, they just brought it up in conversation - but it’s always interesting to see the difference between what we consciously say, and perhaps unconsciously do.
Another factor I believe is that we love to be led, surprised, and in some cases, directed.
A few months back I was at a nice restaurant in town. I took a few guys out for a meal, and straight away the waitress came up and ran us through the menu. She outlined how the degustation worked, and as each meal came out one of the head guys would come out and explain the dish, and what they had created.
Every season or so, they change the menu.
No customer feedback.
No survey forms.
No polls on social media to ask what to do.
They take the creative and emotional risk to make the changes themselves, and lead the patrons to something new and exciting.
This is the risk we take when we start a business.
If you could just poll the public to ask them what they want and what they would pay for it, then go ahead and make that for less money than they would pay, then you would instantly have a risk free business. But that aint the case. Business must have risk in order to have reward. And thus leading and creativity is part of the job.
So what does listening to the audience really mean?
Surely there is value to listening to the audience or your customers?
Of course. But it might not look the way that we think. And ‘asking’ your audience ain’t the same as ‘listening’ to them. A few years back I ran a business retreat, and brought in some guest teachers. One guy was a free diving instructor, and we took about twenty business owners through their first free diving session. He taught them all kinds of breath holds, and relaxation techniques. It was a big hit. Did the group ask for this? No, it was a total surprise. But at the same time, I was ‘listening’ to this audience before I booked the guy. Basically what I mean by that is they all were adventurous kinds of people and when I would watch what they’re doing and what they were interested in it was always cool stuff. Then I would post things about free diving or spearfishing, and they would get into it. So they could never have thought of doing freediving at a business retreat, but if you did ask them before, they would say (or show) that they like adventurous things.
‘Listening’ to your audience is really watching your audience’s behaviour, and then using creativity and innovation to come up with new ways to help them.
There was a famous clip which was a caller that called up the Howard Stern show because he wanted to give him some ‘feedback’ on the show.
And Howard basically told the guy that he didn’t want his feedback. That it was his show, and he was running it the way he wanted. The guy said that it was a community, and Howard Stern just told him to go find another community who cared.
It was a little extreme - and I’m not recommending you do that exactly. But the point of it is still there.
If he changed the radio show because this guy told him to, then he would have to start listening to all of his callers. What’s going to happen when the 100th caller chimes in with changes to make to the show? By the end it would look like total trash.
I’m not for or against Stern - I’ve never listened to his show. But this clip makes it clear that he gets that it’s his role to lead the audience. Sure to ‘listen’ to what he sees that they are looking for and find entertaining, but then to ‘lead’ them in his work.
I don’t know if this is helpful for you.
Except to say that if you’re looking for your audience or market to give you ideas directly, or tell you the best way to run a program or service, then you may want to go deeper. See how you can ‘listen’ to them by watching what they do, how they act, how they buy, and what they struggle with, before looking for direct verbal advice.
Look for ways to take what you are seeing, or things that you think they might want, and creatively wrap solutions around that.
How can you lead your audience or clients more powerfully?
Something to think about.
Taking Your Biz to the Next Level: Focus and Stamina
Your mind hits a prolonged mental block.
Annnnd your business is flat, just like it was last week, and last month.
But, you know it doesn’t need to be this way, because your offer or service is solid, and people have bought your stuff before. But, you just can’t seem to get a grip on doing the work that matters.
And it’s diabolically frustrating. And it’s painful - and what better way to avoid pain than to distract ourselves. Which, when we finally catch that distraction, is even more frustrating.
How do we break this cycle?
How do we switch from being entertained by social media and distractions, to feeling interested or driven by our work, so that we can go to the next level?
This must be at the root of thousands of self help books. Some say to do more through time blocking or brain optimisation. Others say to do less and you’ll be more effective at getting key tasks done on your business. It can all get confusing, quickly.
Here I’ll share three steps that have been helpful for me.
These have saved me in business at least twice (once I’ll share below), and are behind how I got the first book done in a few months, publish articles, and podcasts. In fact, every stage of growth in any business that I’ve been involved with, has come from this.
The steps are: Create “death ground” urgency, Know what matters, and Find Focus.
1 - Create urgency
There’s a great book by Robert Greene, called 33 Strategies of War.
A lot of people know Greene’s other books, especially 48 Laws of Power. But 33 Strategies of war is great. It’s not about war tactics. It’s about strategy and philosophy, and can be applied directly to business. Anyway in one of the chapters he talks about a concept called “Death Ground”. Basically what this is, is when you’re in war, you position your own army so that their back is against the wall. This eliminates all ability to procrastinate or remain lazy. Then your army becomes more effective and stronger.
The idea underneath this is that our procrastination or inability to focus becomes our worst enemy.
“You don’t have time for this display, you fool,” he said in a severe tone.
“This, whatever you’re doing now, may be your last act on earth. It may very well be your last battle. There is no power which could guarantee that you are going to live one more minute…”
“… Acts have power,” he said, “Especially when the person acting knows that those acts are his last battle. There is a strange consuming happiness in acting with the full knowledge that whatever one is doing may very well be one’s last act on earth. I recommend that you reconsider your life and bring your acts into that light… Focus your attention on the link between you and your death, without remorse or sadness or worrying. Focus your attention on the fact you don’t have time and let your acts flow accordingly. Let each of your acts be your last battle on earth. Only under those conditions will your acts have their rightful power. Otherwise they will be, for as long as you live, the acts of a timid man.”
“Is it so terrible to be a timid man?”
“No. It isn’t if you are going to be immortal, but if you are going to die there is not time for timidity, simple because that timidity makes you cling to something that exists only in your thoughts. It soothes you while everything is at a lull, but then the awesome, mysterious world will open its mouth for you, as it will open for every one of us, and then you will realise that your sure ways were not sure at all. Being timid prevents us from examining and exploiting our lot as men.”
- Journey to Ixtlan: The Lessons of Don Juan ,Carlos Castaneda, 1972
Our first business was a running retail store.
I’d sunk all my cash into getting as much stock as I could, but still couldn’t fill up the wall of shoes.
So I had sporadic models, with half size runs.
Anyway, rent was over $5k that first month, and I was already running low.
My back was against the wall. I needed sales.
So what happened was a Nike representative came to me. His name was Mike. Mike from Nike.
And Mike helped me out with a contact list of emails, of all the podiatrists and trainers in the area.
Basically what I did was emailed all of them for an introduction, and then went out and met them.
I think I emailed 271 people.
I met up with twenty or thirty.
It was enough to get a few referrals, and then the word of mouth started to spread.
If I wasn’t ‘back against the wall,’ would I have emailed them?
Probably, but it may have taken a lot longer.
As long as we have the ability to act, creating a positive pressure to act is a great way to see change. The only problem, is you need to find a way to manufacture this urgency. For most people, they’re living in a pretty comfortable life. So there really isn’t much urgency. And we have a lot of things to distract ourselves with - social media, Netflix et cetera.
We need to figure out some way to create the urgency despite all of this comfort.
One way is to actually create it. Make the metaphorical ‘death ground’ more real.
Sink a bunch of money into something. Invest in a marketing project. Invest in a mentor. Invest in a book you want to publish.
Figure out what a meaningful amount of money is to you, and then put that on the line. It needs to be enough to create urgency, so that you wake up and you move.
Now, having said all that, I don’t know if it’ll work for everyone. I’m reminded of one guy I worked with when I was a personal trainer. And he had a heart attack. And then he made it through, but the doctor told him that if he doesn’t change up his health quick - he was a highly stressed out accountant - then he probably wouldn’t make it much longer. And the dude wasn’t that old. Maybe mid sixties. He was literally on death ground.
But then this guy came in, and he wasn’t even that committed to his training. It was sad. If there’s one thing that will help with health - it’s some movement, and fixing up your diet. He just couldn’t be bothered though. He was an awful client. Always late. He had too much money, but not enough sense.
So it might not work for everyone, but it’ll work for most people.
2 - Know what work actually matters
Say you’re really focused on your business - you’re on death ground - but then you’ve got to figure out what the heck to work on. Do you work on your offer. Do you work on your sales process? Or what about your marketing?
To be honest, this is where a mentor can come in. Someone who has overcome the force of resistance, and overcome distraction, and is keeping you on track with the right tasks.
We need to either immerse ourselves in the problem very deeply to know where the work lies, or, we can consult or talk with someone else who is familiar with the problem and benefit from their insights.
Both can work, but either way it’s important, and can lead to growth.
Example:
I’ve seen business owners at $30k months want to stop, and start a new business on the side to make more money… My job - why they would pay me, is to slow them down here. We would talk through this, and realise that there was still a lot of potential and work to be done with the main offer. And in fact, even from a financial perspective, it would be a lot easier to grow through the first offer, than it would be to create an entirely new offer for a new customer segment.
When he kept going, the guy went to 50, 60, 80, then $100k + months, all from this one principle.
Figure out what matters relative to your mission, and stick to it.
3 - Find your focus
How do we stay the course?
It seems like such a simple task.
And yet, it’s fraught with difficulty for business owners all over the world.
A while back I met a guy from New Zealand who had built an online education platform. Basically it was a SAAS product. Anyway, the business was seeing some success, and soon the guy was making good money with this startup. The problem was, he was also spending it. He was starting to go out, drink more, gamble… Because there was so much money flow, it was a case of why not have some fun? Anyway, soon they started to think about growing this company and exiting it. Or selling it off. And so he talked to his own mentor, because there was no way that he could grow it doing what he was doing. What happened was the guy basically forced him to lock himself in his office, and do sales calls. So he was constantly calling, setting up meetings with educational facilities, making sales.
Eventually this created the uptick they needed in the user base.
And soon he sold it off for somewhere between $30-$50 million dollars.
Once we know what to work on, we need to figure out a way to find, and hold, our focus. And the way this dude did it was through brute force.
Personally I go on a slightly different angle. I prefer interest-driven focus.
I’ll explain with an example.
Right now I’m writing the second book, which is on World Building. It’s no easy task to write a book. It takes some work. And a lot of time.
And to be honest, there’s a lot of other stuff I’d rather be doing than sitting there and pounding out words on a keyboard.
BUT…
When I can reframe that situation, and reconnect with the fact that I am actually deeply interested in the topic, and that it is interesting to me to write and teach these concepts, then I can really write.
And so this is the concept of writing from a place of interest.
And so it is with all of my work. To an extent, there’s really no difficulty in staying focused, because as long as I have enough energy, this is the main thing that is attracting my attention at the time. Or in other words, it’s easy to focus on things that hold our curiosity.
This leads us to the final point there…
I don’t know about you, but to me, when I’m in a low energy state, it’s easy to get distracted.
So this sounds super cliched, but figuring out what gives you enough energy, and what takes energy away, and maximising, or limiting, accordingly, is super important.
For me, to stay focused I need enough food and enough sleep. Maybe some walking and some training here or there.
It ain't super complicated, but it is important.
When we want to grow a business, it takes what can feel like an incredible amount of work.
One way to reframe this, is see it as a large amount of energy, that you are directing into the work, and not into a bunch of other random things. Simple right? Not always easy though. But that’s OK, because our three steps are:
See that if your hand isn’t being forced into urgency and action, then you need to force it yourself.
Put yourself on Death Ground somehow.
The second thing is you want to be focusing on the right thing.
If you get this wrong, you can spend all kinds of time doing random stuff, that feels like working, but doesn’t get you anywhere at all.
Ask some questions, get some help, and make sure you know exactly what it is that you need to focus on.
Our last step, is to get focused.
Some people seem to thrive by brute forcing this. Others, like myself, tend to do better when it’s interest led. i.e. orienting the work itself towards problems you like to help solve anyway.
If you follow these steps, and create ways to be interested in the work as you go, you’ll be surprised by your output, productivity, and in many cases the growth and maturity of your business.
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The hidden power of 'vision' in your personal goals
One of the thing I’ve been thinking about coming into the new year is the whole dynamic of how people set goals.
It probably got triggered by all the stuff you see on social media right now:
“Twelve months is enough to transform your life if you buckle down”
“2022 I was only going at half speed. Wait until you see me in 2023”
“It’s a holiday not a holimonth, make sure you get back on the grind for your goals”
et cetera.
What’s funny was it’s the first year there’s been that sort of vibe since 2019, when it was about to turn into the birds nest of 2020 and for most people they threw away their goals. So I think a lot of people were psychologically scarred from that. And still, people are positive but you never know what’s around the corner. I actually think there’s going to be some challenging stuff ahead.
One thing I’ve realised is with any goal or project, you’re always in negotiation with yourself.
This kind of comes from the great Jim Camp, who was a pillar in our vision based sales stuff in Creator Club.
So if you have a goal of some kind, as you work towards the goal, you’re always negotiating with yourself.
We either keep going with it, or we slow down and quit.
Like I’m writing the second book right now, and if I wanted to, I could get stuck in that negotiation every day.
“Ah, I feel good, I’m gonna write some more on this book”
or
“Ah it’s never going to get done anyway… I’m going to quit”
So there’s this heavy negotiation that can be going on, without us even knowing.
Probably between your conscious mind (assuming the mission was something we consciously chose) and the unconscious mind. And certainly there’s an energy component under all of that as well.
But here’s the thing I wanted to talk about.
Camp also teaches us that “Vision Drives Decision.”
Meaning if we’re in a negotiation or sale, it’s our ability to ‘see’ the future that involves the product or service, that drives the decision to take action.
So if your car needs a service, you can see a vision of what will happen if you let it go. Not good right,? Imagine you break down on the side of the road somewhere, you sit there on the highway, you run out of food, you try and fix it, but you struggle, you have to get picked up, and you get all embarrassed. Plus, you miss the appointment you were going to. It sucks. Maybe you end up losing your job because of it. I know a guy who ended up homeless after he lost his job… It wasn’t good.
So, you make the decision to book it in.
So coming back to the goals stuff - the big driver I believe for the success in the goals, is to set a strong enough vision. To be really clear on what it is that you’re working on for the next 90 days, or 365 days.
Or even one day, right?
Do you know what your vision is for the next one day?
Something to think about for a lot of people.
Because if you aren’t clear, then what’s going to happen?
You’re just going to lose out to that voice in the head that talks about quitting.
You must have a current, or future problem to be solved.
With my book, I’ve got a current problem to solve, or transition to make:
To help people get a basic understanding of world building principles and apply them to their life.
With my marriage, same thing, how can I recreate or create a better marriage, with more excitement or adventure going forward?
If you get the vision clear, you can successfully ‘sell’ yourself on why you follow your system every day.
If you’re vision ain’t clear, you’re just going to drift around.
How can it go any other way?
And you can do this today. You don’t need to take a week out and do a big ‘vision’ board exercise. You can just start by going today, what’s the vision I have for the day? What am I working on? What’s the problem that I’m solving? When you’ve got that down, you can get to work. You’re going to be happier too, because happiness is a feedback emotion of working towards a vision that you create.
So there we go.
Write it down on a piece of paper.
I write it down on a little card that sits propped up on my desk.
Two or three things that I’m working on.
This is why you came into this world as a human. Not to drift. Not to push buttons, but to set a vision, and realise it.
That’s the definition of the Creator.
'Never settle'
When I was about twelve years old, I used to mow the little lawn we had at our house.
I’d push the mower along this hill, and weave it around the trees.
When I was finished, my dad would come out to inspect it.
He’d look around each little tree, and then say:
“You missed a bit here”
I’d look down at the little blades of grass.
Then go get the mower back out, start it up, and go around again.
Then he’d come back out.
“Hold on… You missed some over here” and point to a few more bits of grass.
This infuriated me. In my mind, he was doing this to trigger me. So to counter, I would go get a pair of scissors to chop each bit of grass that he pointed to, to try and make a statement. He didn’t care. He would just shrug and say the job was still not done.
At the time I thought this was some kind of vendetta against me.
But later I learned that he was focusing on the follow through.
He wouldn’t ‘settle’ for the result that wasn’t what he wanted to see.
And he was teaching me this lesson.
When we try to make a change in our reality, when it gets hard, it’s really easy to ‘settle’ for how things currently are.
The default, or the status quo that we’ve created in our life is comfortable.
But when we settle, we accept ‘less than’ what we want.
Let’s look at business marketing
Say you’re a trainer, or a yoga teacher.
Like most service providers, you’ve probably got some pretty deep experience in one area, which is why you are building a business around it.
And now you want to write or create content for some marketing.
So you focus on articles, and email marketing, plus some social media.
But this new area is totally foreign. You haven’t done it for long, and it’s awkward, and takes time. You had a goal of writing an email weekly. But now it’s been a few weeks, and it hasn’t gone out.
The next step, is to ‘settle’.
Shrug your shoulders, and relax back into what it was like before, and just put up with it.
The old reality continues.
The thing is, this happens everywhere, not just business. In fact, I’ve been thinking about this a lot more in my personal relationships than anything else. In particular, my marriage with Ruby. It’s really easy to settle into an ‘average’, boring marriage as you go along. It’s habit. But I was reading the other day about marriages. Over 50% of them end up in divorce. And 75% of those divorces are instigated by women. So that ‘average’ is no good. So to me, if you want an exceptional marriage, then you can never settle. You can never really relax. You’re always on duty, because otherwise you slip, and the relationship slips.
If you decide to not settle, you’ll find another gear.
You might piss some people off as you raise your own standards. People might not be used to that…
But they’ll learn.
Don’t settle for less that the outcome that you want to see. If you’re looking for a new relationship, don’t settle. If you want a result in a running race, don’t settle. Keep extending yourself, staying curious, and growing.
When you do this, you’ll find a new level of motivation and energy to create the change that you want to see.
Why 'thriller' businesses don't work
I recently read a fascinating book called “Hitchcock: Mastering Suspense”
It was written by a screen writer.
But has a lot of lessons for small business owners. Whether on the marketing side, or, like in this case, the mindset.
Early in the book William C. Martell defines the difference between an action movie and a thriller.
“In an action move, the protagonist confronts the conflict. In a thriller, the protagonist runs away from the conflict.”
Action movies have action scenes.
Thriller movies have suspense scenes, and little action.
Suspense lasts longer than action, and of course, creates long, heightened periods of stress.
“Suspense is the anticipation of an action… once we get to the action part the suspense is over!”
And it’s very similar in business.
When people take action, they’re typically less stressed than those who avoid action for longer periods of time (sometimes, even in the name of ‘relaxing’).
And more:
There are twenty ‘suspense’ scenes that are common among thrillers, that are known to cause that heightened ‘edge of the seat’ stress feeling.
Here are ten of ‘em
1) TRAPPED - Extra points for vulnerable factors (i.e. Not knowing what to do next - all tactics, no strategy)
2) WATCHING - UNABLE TO HELP SOMEONE ELSE IN DANGER (Can't help the client, not sharing the offer)
3) HIDING (MUST BE QUIET) - while bad guys search. (Fear of judgement)
4) OUT IN THE OPEN (the flip side of hiding) - how not to be seen. (Put out marketing, now afraid of judgement)
5) BEING QUIET / STILL / UNSEEN - when bad guys search. (Avoiding difficult conversations)
6) PRETEND TO BE SOMEONE ELSE - will false ID be discovered? (Copying someone else’s personality)
7) MISUNDERSTANDINGS - communication breakdown leads to trouble. (Not really sure what I’m talking about, not constant communication with clients)
8) CREEPING AROUND - REMAINING UNSEEN (lurking, consuming but not creating)
9) RACE AGAINST TIME (i.e. impatience in the business)
10) THE MAZE - lost, confused, trying to find way out while they search for you. (Gettin’ caught up in consuming youtube, the social media scroll)
For the creator, too many of these ‘suspense’ scenes will turn an every day business into the deepest, darkest, and most ‘knife edge’ thriller you can imagine.
Which creates a ton of stress, from a lot of non-action.
Not ideal.
The quickest way to turn the thriller into an action is to end the suspense and take an action. And the more this happens, the lest suspense there is, and the more the business can grow.
Create ‘action’ businesses, not ‘thrillers’.
Something to think about
"Game of shadows" - Two common mistakes for new online coaches and creatives
When we were younger, I was put through homeschool for a bit.
My father was my teacher, headmaster and tutor. He put me through a blend of his own ‘syllabus’ and the stuff we got sent from New Zealand correspondence school.
It was fairly brutal at the time. He was a strict teacher.
But there were two really cool things that came out of it.
First, we were finished ‘class’ by 12pm each day.
We started at 8am, and in four hours, we’re done with everything. In the afternoon we could go do other stuff.
Second, when we got back to normal school (we were living on a boat at the time), I was way ahead of the curriculum.
Not because I was particularly bright.
But because the schedule we had created had ‘removed’ so much dead time - going to and from classes, ‘morning tea time’, travel to school, et cetera.
I ended up being able to ‘coast’ for a year or two, and still get great marks.
I realised that the school system (even back then), had a bunch of inefficiencies in it.
To be frank, it was downright slow, because of these ‘shadows’, or faults people don’t see.
And so it is with online businesses.
A lot of people want an online business today.
They want to be able to stay in their lair, and work on their terms, with the people they like.
And so there’s a lot of people doin’ it. Teachin’ it. Spruikin’ it. And so on.
But it isn’t always easy.
Over the years, there are two big traps I’ve seen people fall into (and fallen into myself) which can add years to the journey, and generally slow things down.
But first we can see there are generally two categories of people who want to launch their business ‘online’
(I’ve used the term ‘coaches’ here, but it could be anyone)
The two categories of coaches:
While we risk getting a little too simplistic here, there are two big categories when it comes to starting out as an online service business.
And it all comes down to audience and reputation.
The first category is “known and new.” These people are already known online. They have personal brand, an engaged audience, but are new to the business side. The second category is “unknown and new.” They aren’t known (or at least aren’t known in their new area), and have no existing trust. Then they are trying to launch a new business from this context.
Let’s break each one down, and see the major mistakes (and, how you might be able to fix them)
Category one: “Known and new”
You have an existing, engaged audience, that knows you in a similar industry that you want to work in.
Example:
One of the clients we work with was a well known CrossFit athlete and coach.
She had a thriving audience on instagram (i.e. rabid ‘fans’ that hang off her every word).
So when she launches her own nutrition program, she has no problems getting leads.
In her words, “getting leads is never a problem”
Another way to think of this, is that she has great personal brand.
If you have a thriving personal brand, then you have an entirely different situation when you start an online business.
Common mistake or problem:
If this is you, the main problem you might face (depending on the size of your horde of fans), is systems, financial acumen and attention, and coming up with a clear offer that people want.
Example:
A friend of mine is an athlete.
He has over a million followers on instagram. It should be easy to monetise this right? Well, he put out a line of t-shirts, and the things barely sold. I think he sold thirty of them. He’s also tried to run workshops, and had to run ads in order to get a dozen or so people. I was blown away when I heard this.
But basically what happened (and often happens) is that he put out something that people couldn’t get behind. They followed him for his sporting entertainment, but didn’t have a huge emotional investment in his world. So his shirts were kind of meaningless.
Getting the attention and even the leads is not the problem here.
The problem is the story and the offer need to be compelling, (and sometimes, the back-end systems need to be boosted.)
Solution:
If you’ve got a huge bank of raging fans, or at least a big audience base, the first step is to make sure they’re engaged, and that you know what they’re interested in. Test ideas with content. Listen when you’re in conversations. Look at your comments on social media or emails, and see what’s firing people up.
What do people want, and what are they struggling with as they try to get there?
This is at the root of a compelling offer.
Once you see what’s resonating, then share the story of your offer, as you put it together and release it to the world.
Example:
Let’s say you’re an online yoga teacher, with a big following, because you’ve shown up over the years, and connected with people. You are experimenting with different content, thinking about your offer. You see something that lights people up. This is a thread. You talk about it more. You do a podcast on it. You write some more emails about it. Then you think about it, and you realise there’s a way you can teach this to people at a deeper level. Now you have a direction for your offer. You’re solving a problem that’s front of mind for people, and connecting with something they have shown that they want. This is called “reading between the lines” and is only something you can do when you’re connected with your market. This makes it pretty easy to share the offer, and direct people to a landing page or your site.
If you have an existing brand, and engaged audience, you’re off to a great start.
You may be able to go straight to a group program or scalable offering, as the demand may be there already.
You just need something that resonates.
Create a simple offer, then make sure your systems are in place to handle it.
Category Two: “New and unknown”
You have a new business, with a non-existent, small, or unengaged audience.
Often we think with access to so many people, online should be easy to launch and scale.
However, this isn’t always the case.
If you’re new to the online space, and you don’t have a lot of connections, you’re in a unique situation.
It’s worth looking at the ‘scope’ of the task ahead:
Common mistake or problem:
The big mistake I see over and over again, is expecting to see results just from posting to social media, when you have much less trust in the online space than you think.
i.e. Just because you ‘go online’ doesn’t mean people will ‘buy from you online.’
This mistake tends to come about because people focus a lot of their own attention on instagram, and they see other people ‘supposedly’ making money there.
It’s easy to think “hmm.. I could do this. I just need a good bio, some posts, and I can sell my wares.”
Not quite.
Many of the truly successful people you see online have been creating content, and shipping out helpful resources and value for five, ten, or twenty years. Without an existing audience, it takes much, much more effort than many think to create a trusted online profile, and viable online business.
But it can be done. Read on.
Example:
You might be a personal trainer that wants to go online, or a mindset coach, or a life coach that is starting up.
You have a way to help people, a lot of passion, but really no audience that knows you, likes you and trusts you.
I know, this is a bit of a hard truth.
But it’s super common. In fact, this is most of the people who want to start an online business.
And the most challenging of this subgroup - if you are entering a new market where you don’t have trust.
i.e.
Let’s say you’ve left corporate to become a health coach.
But you only have a handful of people who follow you on social media, or no email list. And you rarely publish content or engage.
There’s no real brand.
And no real online personality…
And now you want to kick off this buisness.
Problem:
As you can imagine, the big problem here is no matter what you ‘launch’ online, hardly anyone is going to see it. And the few that do may not want it right now, or may not trust you yet.
The single, biggest, hottest problem, is that there is no awareness, even for your great program.
So, you now have to do the work to build this awareness.
Solution:
There’s two sides to this, depending on how quickly you need the revenue…
If you need the cash pronto, then without a big audience, you’re forced into direct sales (conversation based selling) at the start (or ads - but good luck with no audience and low trust online).
This can help you build revenue and a track record (social proof).
But then on the other side, you want to be building brand, audience and online awareness.
Because this will help you long term.
You need both.
Example
One coach we work with teaches women how to build strength through online programming.
When she started out a few years back, she had only a few hundred followers on social media. She rarely used the platforms. What happened was, she launched the offer, but only a few people bought in.
So, she started to build awareness - she collaborated with people on podcasts, ran a ton of workshops and events. (Sometimes with only a few people showing up), got people onto her podcast, was a guest speaker at events… She worked hard to create a much bigger online “position” for herself through radical content production, outreach and connection.
[I need to reiterate… This takes consistent work, and often a ‘behaviour change’ - as in, it’s not something everyone is going to comfortable with straight away. There’s a learning curve.]
Anyway, now when she shares her offer, she gets much more engagement because there are more people engaged in her audience.
She had more trust, and more personal brand, so now had more buyers.
Now, there is a little nuance that can be a part of this solution.
And that is using the “offline” side to build your online.
People don’t often talk about this…
But typically, most people who have a bigger online ‘personal brand’ are also aggressively connecting with people, or are active with people offline too.
(As I sometimes say, there are very few “purely online” businesses. There’s typically an offline story somewhere, somehow)
All of that is just to say - if you don’t have any online brand or trust, you may well benefit from creating offline events, connecting with people offline, and then tiring that back into your online world.
Something to think about.
Example:
When I first started to sell an online coaching program, I had no instagram.
No emails.
No podcast.
I just knew people in the community, and committed to meeting other new people.
So I went head first into direct sales. I would have conversation after conversation. Meeting new people wherever I could. The result was that in a very short space of time, I sold around $40k worth of coaching. It was a great start, that helped propel me forward.
Then alongside this, I started to write the emails, articles and podcasts.
And slowly use a bit more social media. Then I kept connecting it all together as the story became clearer.
If you have no real audience, you can’t stay isolated, or only do the odd ‘post’ and hope that it works. You need to do both direct sales (for early revenue) and work on building the audience, by connecting with others, running events, or producing content.
Conclusion
There are two big mistakes we see over and over again with new online businesses.
One for existing personal brands, and one for brand-spanky noobies.
For thriving personal brands, the mistake is tone-deaf offers, not sharing a compelling story, or not having the systems in place to support the thing that you sell.
This happens, but it’s not the main issue we see today.
The second mistake, for the new coaches and creative business owners, is over-reliance on posting on social media, even though their trust is fairly low (because they are new).
Or rather, a general overestimation of the ‘market value’ that they have as a professional.
And so, the solutions are different…
For the former - it’s about listening, and creating a compelling story, then paying attention to your finances and systems on the back end, so you can create a business you’re proud of.
For the latter - embrace direct sales early on to build revenue, and aggressively work to build your online awareness at the same time. Go without the former and you’ll have very little revenue to start. Go without the latter and you’ll always be chasing sales, with no brand building over time.
There can be a lot of obstacles when you’re starting out in business, especially online. But once you ‘shine a light’ on these shadows, you can work on overcoming most of them, and build a business you’re proud of.
Speed is everything (stop withholding to go fast)
Before this small business stuff, I was an engineer. It was my first job out of uni. Yes, I did work a bit when I studied, but this was a consistent pay cheque. After living on $30 per week for food, and my car flooding every time it rained, I was stoked to have some cash flow.
This job was a big step in starting to sort myself out.
Anyway, I worked with F-18’s doing crack repair design.
When you go on these jets, they are super ‘raw.’
There’s not even any paint. No leather trim. No fancy digital screens.
And the outside is plain grey.
They look cool, but you wouldn’t call them ‘beautiful’.
They’re built for speed.
For a few years, in one form or another, I’ve been interested in speed. Speed of Steve Jobs. Speed of clients I work with. My own speed, and sometimes, lack of speed. The basic ‘theory’ is that if you do more, produce more, and test more, you’ll figure things out faster.
I’ve seen clients 10X their business in two years.
And others not launch an offer in a year.
The difference is speed.
They get more ‘shipped’ in a given amount of time, they learn more, and they build a greater reputation.
I’ve found that speed may even be the most important ‘characteristic’ overall.
Speed allows you to test offers with your market.
Speed allows you to create a bold reputation.
Speed allows you to execute ideas faster.
Speed allows you to make more sales.
The other day I was talking with a sales manager for a local gym. He does 2-3 x more sales than any of the other managers in other chains. I asked him how? He said he just attacks his work. He’s not any smarter, he just has more speed.
Anyway, that’s enough yammering about the ‘why’.
And know - I haven’t mastered this. I've sat on things for years. I sat in a corporate job, miserable, for years, lying awake at night. I sat on a book I wrote for weeks, before I could send it to the publisher. I've sat on draft emails for too much too long, perhaps hundreds of times.
But each day, I get faster.
I started to hang around people who do things so fast that it blows your mind.
And now, I practice ‘speed’ as part of the work itself.
Where does ‘speed’ come from?
Over the years, I’ve looked back at why some are so stinking slow, and some move super-sonic.
And there seems to be no difference in ‘stress’ or ‘fatigue’.
I realised it’s not just about the effort, or ‘pressure’ we create, but also about the friction.
People who move quickly seem to have less mental friction slowing them down.
In the book - "15 Commitments of Conscious Leadership."
Here’s one thing they said:
97% of people admit to outright lying.
But this isn’t nearly as big of a problem as “withholding.”
Most firms and leaders withhold.
Withholding is refraining from revealing the relevant facts.
We’ve been programmed to withhold and/or lie. We are afraid, so we withhold.
But this makes us slow.
Now, it’s generally accepted that withholding is from fear.
So the question is, what are you afraid of?
Most people are afraid because they are uncomfortable with their truth, or who they actually are.
So they withhold in their training.
They withhold in their relationships.
They withhold in their work.
So, to build speed in your business, and cut over-thinking, we attack this withholding stuff thing right at the jugular.
If this resonates with you, you know it’s going to take time to internalise this.
Nonetheless - here are some prompts that can help you build speed in your business, by cutting with-holding:
Where in my life:
Am I overthinking?
Am I withholding?
Am I doubting
Write out some ideas. When we start to see where you are withholding in one area of life, we also start to see where we’re withholding in another area. The dynamic is the same.
Where can I bring out:
My truth?
My transparency?
My honesty?
Where in your life can you bring out more? Where can you amplify your nuances, or your personal characteristics?
With-holding creates a tone of problems, because it is a bottleneck for speed. It creates back and forth conversations in the mind. It creates lethargy, and doubt.
But when we practice candor, or destroying ‘withholding’ as much as possible, we get faster in our work.
We build speed.
And speed is one of the big keys to business growth.
Want more help with your productivity?
Grab our CEO Hour Framework.
This is a short PDF with three sections to help you plan the week ahead. You can fill it out any time, but we find it’s best when you do it on a Sunday, or Monday, to map out the week ahead.
Become clear, energised and organised for the week ahead, then ruthlessly execute with no holding back
Click below to download.
How to know which idea to work on
A few days back I got a message from a coach in Creator Club.
I’ll withhold his name, because I’m not sure he want’s it to be shared.
No matter:
“I feel like I’m getting in my own way a bit at the moment. I’ve got a ton of ideas I’m working and writing on, but struggling to get them actioned and followed all the way through. I’m working through it but my to-do lists at the moment seem humanly impossible.”
i.e - A lot of ideas, but not a lot of follow-through.
A common little nugget in small business.
I sat back in my chair, looked around my lair, and formulated my somewhat “thick-skulled” take on this.
In essence, our real problem when we have too many ideas is not that we don’t know which one to focus on.
Or, that we focus on the ‘wrong’ one.
But simply that we don’t follow through on any of them.
We get stuck in overwhelm, and that feels horrendous and can create a downward spiral.
So let’s call that our ‘base case’:
Ideas = Infinity
Follow through = zero
Direction = downward spiral
Or something close to that.
This means that relative to the base case, ANY follow through is going to be a win, and, the mere ACT of following through is going to train that ‘follow through’ muscle.
I asked him:
“What are the top three ideas you are working on?”
He gave me three ideas.
“OK cool, which of those is the most fun?”
He told me that the podcast would be the most fun - which was one of his three ideas.
I asked him if he had recorded the podcast?
Turns out, it’s all done, except for the intro and cover art.
The action then, is to momentarily forget all the other ideas, and execute the next step of your most fun idea.
But what if it’s the wrong idea?
What if I should do something else?
Well hold on - nothing was getting done beforehand!
Now, we can work on something we like, AND learn to develop the ‘follow through’ muscle.
Our new situation:
Ideas = Infinity minus one
Follow through = one
Direction = upward spiral
That’s 100% improvement on follow through.
Doing this, we also develop speed (I like to call this learning “same day speed” - get the idea, and execute it / ship it on the same day)
Once that thing is done, then move to the next thing.
Look, there are undoubtably a lot more complex ways to go about this. You could sort your ideas into quadrants of importance, and prioritise them based on urgency et cetera. But here I’m assuming that people know they should be doing all that stuff already - but they aren’t doing it.
Which means it’s as good as useless, and it’s much better to execute the thing you want to do.
Spark the productivity via maximum fun or interest.
Then build momentum you need for everything else.
Something to think about.
Want more help with your productivity?
Grab our CEO Hour Framework.
This is a short PDF with three sections to help you plan the week ahead. You can fill it out any time, but we find it’s best when you do it on a Sunday, or Monday, to map out the week ahead.
Become clear, energised and organised for the week ahead, then ruthlessly execute with no holding back
Click below to download.