6 tips for keeping your business goals on track

We’re now into the third week of the new year, a time when many entrepreneurs find they are beginning to drift off course regardless of honest intentions.

Maybe you resolved to post on your blog more frequently or publish a monthly newsletter. Perhaps your plan is to finish your e-book by mid year but you’ve only written one chapter. Or, you vowed to get your work into 6 galleries. You’ve made a list of those you want to contact. When you searched their websites, you began to wonder if your work would sell and got sidetracked creating a line that might better fit those galleries.

If you are already slipping off course, you aren’t alone. Just look at the gym signups and how the crowds thinned out already.

For entrepreneurs, it doesn’t appear to be a problem of motivation. Judging by  the comments I get from people who truly want to commit to launching or growing a business, it’s more the challenge to remain focused. If you are committed to accomplishing your business goals this year, I recommend you:

• Limit the number of short term goals.  If you are like many creative people, you may have trouble accomplishing your business goals because you are easily sidetracked by new ideas. This is a huge challenge for me as well. I find it helpful to narrow my big goals to three at a time. When new ideas rush in and clamor for my attention, I remind myself that if I try to do too much, I won’t get anything done well. I commit to seeing three through to completion before I will address the others. If you do this, make a note of the ideas as they come to you and file them under “brilliant things I will do when I can give them the attention they deserve.”
• Get clarity on the reason your goals matter. What is the feeling you want to experience when you have accomplished each goal? What difference will it make in your life, the community or the world? Write out your “why” in detail and review it often.
• Create a vision board for your goals and post it where you see it daily. There’s something powerful about a physical image that helps reinforce the importance of your goal. It doesn’t have to be a work of art. Just make sure you have a vivid picture of what those goals accomplished will look and feel like.
• Celebrate small accomplishments. Those first baby steps toward your goals can be the hardest. Take note of milestones and celebrate them. Maybe you’ve made a list of a dozen galleries or shops you hope will feature your work. Once you’ve contacted the first four, congratulate yourself and honor the accomplishment. Have lunch with a friend or take a picnic to the park. Make it celebratory in a way that’s meaningful to you.
• At least in the beginning, stick to a schedule. To-do lists are fine but it’s easy to keep putting off items on the list. Instead, schedule certain days or times of day to do specific tasks toward your goal. If you know you want to publish a monthly newsletter, schedule a day each week that you work on it. If you know you want to post on your blog 3 times a week, make writing appointments on your calendar. I’m not advocating rigidity. You don’t have to schedule your tasks for 8-5 Monday through Friday. One of the perks of self-employment is being able to work around your own body rhythm so if you write best in the middle of the night, mark your calendar to write at 2 AM Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday. Then if something comes up that you want to do, adjust your schedule for one night.  It’s OK to stay flexible. Just be accountable.
• Join a mastermind group or find an accountability buddy. In addition to the support, sharing of resources and idea generation, a mastermind group will give you a sense of accountability. When you know you have a phone conference scheduled every Wednesday at noon, you are more likely to stay on course to meet your goals for the week. You will feel a responsibility to your group so you will be sure to have accomplishments to report. Also, when you confront an obstacle that discourages you from moving forward towards your goal, you will have a team to help you overcome whatever the challenge is and get back on track.

Speaking of accountability, there’s still time to join Barbara Winter and me for the Obstacle Buster Mastermind this coming weekend in Las Vegas. Find out more HERE

How to start your business when you know what you want but have no idea where to begin

I’m getting excited about the workshop that Barbara Winter and I will be facilitating next weekend in Las Vegas. The attendees have some phenomenal business ideas and we’ll be working through what’s been holding them back so they can make those dreams happen now.

I’ve heard from a several aspiring entrepreneurs who said they wanted to join us but had scheduling conflicts.  They all said the same thing. “I have this great business idea but don’t know where to get started.”

Here are a few tips to help you begin working on your dream business.

• Research people who have already done what you want to do or something similar.
  Read their blogs, study their websites, listen to podcasts and read books by people who are doing what you want to do. Not so that you can mimmic them but so that you can learn from their journey and do your own version and share your unique gifts.
• Talk to people who have been successful at what you are trying to do or something like it. Ask what mistakes they made in the beginning and what they learned in the process. Most entrepreneurs love to share. We don’t see start-ups as competition but complimentary. When I meet a new self-employment guide, I take note of what qualities they possess that I do not and will frequently refer a client to someone who I think might be a better fit. By connecting with someone who has already done what you want to do, you may not only gain a mentor but a friend who you can do some co-operative projects with as well.
• Don’t let the things you don’t know how to do keep you from beginning. A smart entrepreneur admits what she doesn’t know and recognizes that learning is a life-long pursuit. You can always outsource or barter the skills you lack or don’t enjoy performing.
  Or partner with someone who has complimentary gifts.
• Hire a coach or consultant to guide you. Be careful to find someone who has had their own business, not someone who was trained as a business coach but never started a business. Don’t worry about certification. What matters is that they have learned by doing and can share their experience with you.
• Attend seminars or workshops with other entrepreneurs. You’ll learn from the facilitators and the other attendees will share resources and valuable insight with you. You’ll find your tribe and source of ongoing support. (We still have a couple of spaces left. Find out more HERE.)
• Start with baby steps. Even if your dream is big, start small. I’m not an advocate of the 5-year plan because I believe your business will evolve in ways you can’t even imagine now. It’s great to have a vision of the big goal but it’s easiest to make it happen by taking small steps every day.

What first small step can you take today to move forward toward your dream business?

Do you have so many ideas for starting a new business that you have trouble focusing on any of them?

Do you have so many ideas that you have trouble focusing on any of them? If so, you have a lot of creative company. This past week, I’ve spoken with each of the attendees of the upcoming Inspired Livelihood Obstacle Busting Mastermind.
Every one of them had more than one idea, some had many.

“I have too many ideas” is a common complaint of creative entrepreneurs. Being an idea generator is a gift but it can have you running in place if you aren’t able to effectively launch any of them because you are too scattered. It is absolutely possible to run several businesses successfully but just like juggling oranges, you have to start with what you can handle and add more as your confidence and competence grow.

I helped each of the attendees choose one idea to start with and we focused on fine tuning the vision of what that one business will look like. When they show up at the workshop in Las Vegas, we will focus on making that one idea a viable business. Once that business is running and they are seeing profit, it will be easier to launch the next idea, and the next. It’s kind of like when you have a baby. You give that first your undivided attention. Then, when that first child is a couple of years old and you’ve kind of got the hang of that parenting thing, you’re more able to parent a second. Maybe add a few more? Imagine if you gave birth to all your children at once? You’d be like the old woman in the shoe, right? Well just like kids,  you shouldn’t launch all your ideas at the same time.

If you’ve been sitting on a few projects or business ideas for awhile and haven’t been able to make any of them profitable, you are probably suffering from “refusal to choose” syndrome. But you know what? You did choose. By choosing to try to do them all, you’ve chosen to dilute your energy and get nothing done, right?

I know this first hand because the last several months, I’ve been thinking about several new businesses I want to launch. I’ve done research and some initial steps on all of them but mostly been ineffective moving forward with any of them because my attention was too scattered.

Then a few weeks ago, I realized something. If three months ago, I had chosen to focus on just one new project, I’d now have it successfully launched and be starting on the next. Instead, I haven’t launched any of them.

If you’ve been sitting on several ideas for the past year and feel frustrated because you’ve launched none, I’d like to offer you a challenge. Give yourself permission to put all but one on the back burner. Not forever. Just right now while you get that first one crystal clear and moving forward. Try it for three months. Remember, you aren’t neglecting the other ideas. You are just giving each idea the attention it deserves. Once that’s rolling, spend three months on your next idea. Imagine where you’ll be at the end of the year if you do that. You’ll have launched four new ideas successfully.

Do you need some guidance and support birthing that first idea? If so, check out what Barbara Winter, best selling author of “Making a Living without a Job” and I are doing to help a small group of aspiring entrepreneurs break through the barriers and start their dream businesses NOW.  Find out more HERE

Are you limiting your dream to the size of your desktop?

Is your dream too tidy? When you sit down to plan out your next business moves or other creative project, do you work on your laptop or a legal pad? You could be limiting the scope of your imagination or stifling creativity by trying to fit a big idea into an 8.5 X 11 inch space.

The past few days, I’ve been chatting with attendees of the upcoming  Inspired Livelihood Obstacle Busting Mastermind. The purpose of the pre-workshop call is to help them gain clarity on their idea so that when they arrive in Las Vegas we will focus on how to make it happen.

As I listen to all these exciting ideas, my possibility cogs spin and I realize how we limit our dreams by confining them to the size of our desktops. That may work if you are a  linear thinker but a lot of us, particularly artists, think in more dimensions and need to give our dreams room to grow.

If you have an idea for a project and want to get crystal clear on what shape it will take, try this:

• Get several pieces of poster size paper or a roll of craft or butcher paper and some markers. NO erasable pencils because for this exercise, there’s no such thing as a mistake.
• Spread them out on the floor rather than a desk. (If you can’t get down on the floor, use a large table but let the papers overlap so that you KNOW you are not limited to the size of the table.
• In the center of the paper, write your topic or project name. (This doesn’t have to be the permanent name.)
• Then jot down a word or symbol for everything you think of. At this point, it doesn’t matter where on the paper-When one idea sparks another, record it somewhere near that-just get it down-quickly. Don’t analyze it.
• Don’t worry right now about the order or whether or not you even know how to do whatever idea pops into your mind. This is about “WHAT IT IS” not how to do it. (that comes later.)

Nothing you do in this first exercise is a commitment.  These are just random thoughts and ideas.
I suggest you say to yourself, “If this business (or project) could be anything I wanted and I didn’t have to think about whether or not I have the knowledge or resources to do it, what would it look like?” This is the dream stage. Don’t try to be realistic or worry about if you could sell this idea or the logistics. Just get your ideas down.
If you get near an edge of the first piece of paper, tape another piece to it. Don’t limit yourself to what fits on the paper. Even if you have to go out the room, down the hall and through the front door, make sure you don’t let running out of space on the paper stop you.
You’ll be amazed at how your ideas will expand into the space they are given.

If you have a BIG idea but don’t know where to begin to make it happen, there are still a few spaces left in the upcoming Mastermind in Las Vegas. Join Barbara Winter and me as we guide a small group of creative entrepreneurs through the obstacles to make their dreams into a viable business. HERE’S THE SCOOP

Is “Routine” synonymous with “Monotony” ?

An article in this morning’s Vibrant Nation reminded me of the # 1 reason I will probably always be self employed: I want every day to be new and fresh.  I hear this daily from clients wanting to leave the job world and start their own business. They want to escape the “same, old routine.”

The Vibrant Nation post is titled, “The secret to being your own boss?  Routine!”  However, when I read the article, author Kay Strom’s day is anything but tedious. Her “routine” includes scheduling time for soaking in the tub, a mid-day tea break, coffee dates with friends, daily river walks,  and speaking engagements on cruise ships. Hardly monotonous.

What Kay does that makes her writing life a success is schedule her days so that the things she wants to do have a time slot everyday along with the work she must do, including writing a chapter every single day.

Thinking back to times I’ve been most productive, I realize there was a lot of routine in my day. A couple of years ago, I spent several months in Florida  where I had an investment property. Daily beach walks, the primary constant in my day, had nothing and everything to do with productivity. Each Sunday evening, I checked the tide charts for the following week. Then I scheduled my work day, including appointments and phone calls around low tide. It was a different time each day, of course, but those beach walks were so important to me that I made sure I scheduled everything else I wanted to accomplish that day around them.  Not only were my walks good for my mental and physical well-being but often, my best ideas were born during those walks so I considered them a business necessity.

Like snowflakes, no two beach walks are ever exactly the same and none of my days was just like the one before. Some days I worked at home in my den. Other times, I checked out different coffee shops with internet access. Several times I brought my work to the clinic where I spent hours between medical appointments. Always, I scheduled my “routine” beach walk.

That same year, I spent months living and traveling in my volkswagon camper van. On the road, no two days are the same because the people and environment change, but I did have a kind of routine. Over breakfast, I’d check and answer emails, read a few favorite blogs, check weather and road conditions and decide on my route for the day. I’d usually drive for a few hours, then stop and make client calls, have group mastermind calls or record a telephone interview for my Inspired Livelihood inspired entrepreneur series. I’d have lunch, take a walk and drive a few more hours. At night, I’d write and schedule posts to appear on my blog.

Thinking back on that time, I realize it wasn’t a routine in the sense that I did the same things in the same place at the same time every day but my days did have structure and I believe it is that structure, the scheduled time for the things that matter, that’s the secret to successful self-employment. And structure does not have to be boring.

Are you supporting your own or the theives who rip them off?

Do you check labels when you buy for yourself, your family and friends? I sure want to believe, if you are a crafts person trying to make a living selling handmade, that you support your own industry.
An artist friend just showed me something she bought for her garden that I knew to be a knock-off of a local crafter.  I couldn’t hold my tongue. This is a woman who has been complaining that she can’t get the price she believes her work should command and that she doesn’t know how she’ll make it as an artist if people are “too cheap” to pay what her work is worth. So, I called her on it. I asked where she bought the piece (although I could guess) and if she knew where it was made. She said she hadn’t checked the label. I asked if she knew that it was a copy of a US crafter and she said she did but couldn’t afford his work  because (get this- “I’m just a struggling artist” ) and that even if she could, it was for “outside after all.”  I was livid and laid into her, as only a good friend should do: “If you aren’t willing to pay the extra for made-in- America, how can you expect people to pay for your work rather than buy a similar piece made in China?” For the record, I’m not talking behind anyone’s back here. I told her she was going to be the subject of my public rant. I said I wouldn’t use her name but I have to admit it’s tempting.
If you’re in the industry, you likely know the difference between a knock-off and a licensed piece made with the artist’s permission for which the artist receives a royalty. One is stealing, one isn’t. Who are you going to support?
So, the next time you are exhibiting at a trade show or crafts fair and you’re worried about making enough to cover your booth fees and travel costs, plus net a profit, ask yourself how often you buy the knockoff because you’re “just an artist and can’t afford” the higher priced handmade version. There’s no question that it’s tough to find certain items made domestically and that when you do they are often pricey. But so are those designer brands that you think are made here. Look at the label of your $200. handbag. Or the sweatshirt you picked up in our nations capital or, better yet-anything decorated with our starts and stripes, including an American flag. If you’re having trouble making it as a crafter, ask yourself if you are supporting your fellow artists. Yes, you may pay more than if you buy the same item made oversees but the answer is to buy two pieces made by hand rather than four made in China. I’ll hop off my soapbox now, but…please, please support your own.