Fourth Article in the Series:
Making Work Play
Doing the things you do best for 75% of the day is a sure-fire way to light you up, as well as your business. In the past couple of weeks, I have asked you to imagine your ideal day and identify the resources you need. If you have been following along, you may now be at a bit of an impasse. A realization that the business you have now doesn’t allow you to have that ideal day.
This is an “ah-ha” moment for many clients that I work with. What they intended to build, or created without a plan, has taken them somewhere they did not want to be. They’ve sailed into the wrong harbor, although they are in the general vicinity of where they want to be. They will just have to invest additional time and energy to trek over the terrain to get to the destination they desire.
Most of the work I do supports service professionals; that is, most of my clients provide a service to other businesses or directly to consumers. The snag to getting their ideal day is not the business they are in, but the efficiency and productivity of that business.
When a service business is started, many business owners are establishing it from the ground up. They get the business going by landing as many clients as possible. There are bills to pay, overhead to meet and a living to be made. As the years go by and the business becomes successful, the proprietor finds they are unable to grow further without cloning themselves or doubling staff, neither of which make growth an appealing option. So they settle for trying to do more, faster, better and find they are on a hamster wheel to nowhere and burn-out.
What’s a business owner to do? Focus. Focus on those clients you serve best, who value your services and are willing to pay for those services. Sounds ideal, doesn’t it? Tune in next week as we begin the process of identifying your Ideal Client.