Every week, when I take business clinics, eager entrepreneurs ask a wide variety of questions, such as “Should I take Investment?”, “Should I expand into the International market?”, “Should I start employing staff?”, “Do I need to invest in a CRM system?”, “should I hire a Social Media agency?”.
The list goes on. But if you drill down, all such questions come back down to the same fundamental question. Where do you want to take your business?
It seems the most fundamental question, that affects every decision you make as a business owner, never gets given much time and attention.
Would you jump in your car with no road map or sat nav and hope to get somewhere vaguely that you wanted to, without having a clue about the route? Unless you love driving (or you’re a glutton for punishment!) you’d probably want to do a bit of research on the route first. So why don’t we do it in business?
One of the main reasons is because business owners don’t want to dream big enough due to limiting beliefs or imposter syndrome. Others think “let’s just see where it goes”, or entrepreneurs think putting a plan together is too much work, especially if it involves lots of numbers and spreadsheets. So a plan never gets created.
But here’s the problem.
Frustrations start to occur because you then see other entrepreneurs on social media looking to be far more successful than you. How did that happen? How did they get there, whilst you’ve been working your butt off, focusing 7 days a week?
What did they do differently?
Chances are, they had a plan! Nothing super detailed necessarily, but they had a clear vision of where they want to take their company or career and the steps they then need to take to get them there.
Many of the most successful entrepreneurs will suggest to “Begin with the end in mind”. I.e. in x amount of time what will be the end goal of the business. Will you want to sell for retirement, or will you want to build quickly and sell to a bigger organisation, so you can start on the next venture, or do you plan to just run the business as a lifestyle business?
The main thing here is to be really honest with yourself about what you *actually want*. If the idea of a multinational,billion pound empire appeals to you, but you also like to spend your weekends in the pub with your mates, and travel is not really your thing, would you actually take that opportunity if it came knocking at your door? Or would you prefer a work life balance where you run a smaller empire with less pressure and less travel? It also means being really honest about your personality and capabilities, and what you enjoy. This is so much more important than comparing yourself to others on social media and wrongly believing that everyone around you is making a huge success of their career, whilst you appear to be stuck or drifting.
If you don’t know where to start in gaining clarity, then a great starting point is not to focus solely on financial goals, but focus on the *experiences* you would like to have during your lifetime. If travel is really important to you and financial independence, then a business focussing on an international nomad lifestyle would be a great move. A business drifting to taking on premises and more and more staff may not be so conducive if nomadic travel is the experience you want to have. If you want to experience your children growing up and being “present” then a business or career that can accommodate that would allow you to fulfil your dreams. And that’s ok! So many entrepreneurs I speak to actually give a visible sigh of relief when we talk through the fact that it is your life journey and no-one else’s, so if you want to have just a lifestyle business that affords the experiences you want to have, the only person stopping you is you. But if you want a billion pound empire, that’s ok too, so long as you’re doing it for you and not because your mum / dad / partner / hairdressers wife’s second cousin think that’s what you *should* do.
Once you have real clarity on where you want to take your business, the rest slots into place. On any decision, you simply ask “does what I am suggesting, or thinking about fit in with the overall vision I have?” You can then also focus on the skills you need / want to develop, in order to achieve the experiences, you are now focussing on.
I have a vision board in my office, which consists of a collage of pictures that all represent the experiences I want to have. Friends and family are important to me, so any business decisions I make, I keep them in mind. I also want a house abroad, somewhere hot! That is also kept in mind when making business decisions, as is running operations as ethically as possible. Yes, I would like my empire to grow significantly, and I have a 3 year forecast. But it is all within the constraints of staying ethical and true to myself, my friends and family – and of course that villa in 30 degrees!
