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The Number One Business Question I Regularly Ask Myself

The Number One Business Question I Regularly Ask Myself

by | Feb 22, 2023 | Business model

After years of trial and error and navigating periods of burnout, I’m delighted to report that I have a business model that really works for me. Not only does it bring in regular and sustainable income but it does so in a way that allows me to take time off when I need to, not work crazy hours each day and still have an impact on my client’s lives and businesses.

This is not by accident, it’s by design and from keeping my focus firmly on one question and 3 variables.

How can I make the most amount of money, with the greatest amount of ease without sacrificing impact?

What I love about this question is that it’s answer leads me to a business model that is sustainable for me. Let’s look at each of these in turn.

You don’t need me to tell you how important income is. Without income, we don’t have a business (rather an expensive hobby). Without a steady and consistent flow of income that covers our expenses, we struggle. Often living month to month in a state of stress and worry, which then impacts how we show up to our work.

We might even repel would-be clients with a needy, desperate energy because we are so focused on getting the sale that we struggle to stay in a mode of generous service.

Or maybe you are making regular and consistent income and want to grow. You want to go beyond just covering expenses and want to be able to save for the future, travel, buy a home.

Whatever your situation, as a business owner, income is likely to be a priority for you.

If it’s the only priority, that’s when we run into trouble. That’s where we see businesses that prioritise profits before people and we all know how that goes.

As conscious business owners, only focusing on money isn’t enough of a driver for us, so it would be unsustainable over the long term if this was our only priority.

When we seriously consider how easy it is for us to do the work we do, we begin to work smarter instead of harder.

It’s a common mistake to think that if we are going to make a decent living, we must be working hard. I long ago stopped buying into the idea of hard work. Does that mean I slack off all day and do the bare minimum? Hell no!

What it means is that I consider each and every task and service I offer in my business and ask myself, how can I make this easier for me to do? How can I work smarter instead of harder?

Over the years that has looked like simplifying my services so that I still serve my people but without overstretching myself to do so. Why? Because overgiving and overextending ourselves is not sustainable in the long term.

For the conscious business owner, having a positive impact is a key driver in everything you do. It’s why you do the work you do, it’s what motivated you to start your own business in the first place.

When impact is focused on above all else, we start to see overgiving. We tell ourselves that in order to have a meaningful impact we must be doing all of the things for all of the people, all of the time.

When impact is prioritised over income, I hear business owners saying things like “the money isn’t important to me” and this is where I despair.

When we only focus on impact and ignore the importance of both income and ease, we deplete ourselves in the name of giving. We give everything to our clients and don’t get enough in return. We live in a state of unsustainable struggle and over time, this inevitably becomes unsustainable.

When making the most money in the easiest way possible becomes the goal, without any consideration of impact then the end user or client can suffer because the impact of the service is not being prioritised.

Maintaining a healthy balance between all three of these variables (income, ease and impact) is crucial and ultimately leads to the most sustainable way to do business.

What this looks like in practice

Allow me to give you an example of how this has played out in my own business.

When I first launched the Conscious Business Mastermind back in 2020, I had the price low — 100€ a month. I gave a lot for that. Weekly calls all year round, new classes every month and 1:1 sessions for every member, every quarter. The number of participants that first year was also low. The result being a yearlong group program that wasn’t profitable and that took an enormous amount of time to deliver. Low income, high impact, low ease. Not sustainable.

Over the years, asking myself the question, how can I make the most money, with the greatest amount of ease, without sacrificing impact? has led to many changes which have resulted in the Mastermind becoming a hugely important revenue generator in my business. It’s also where I see many of my clients really soar. Those changes have included: Putting the price up from 100€ to 135€ a month, removing the free 1:1 sessions and instead offering these at a discounted rate and focusing on getting the numbers of participants up. Given that I repeat much of the teaching, every year it gets easier to deliver.

I’m regularly told by participants that I could charge more for what’s on offer but I don’t because I think that on this service, I’ve got the balance of Income, Ease and Impact just right. But this didn’t happen by accident. It happened because I thought long and hard about these 3 variables and made sure that all were taken into account as I tweaked and redesigned my offer. High income, high impact and high ease = sustainable over the long-term which is why I’ve offered it for 4 years running.

So how about you? Is your business model working for you? Could you use some support. See below for details of a low-cost workshop I’m running on this very topic.

On Friday 24th February, I’m hosting a Create Your Sustainable Workshop in which I’ll share what it takes to create a business model that can sustain you financially and energetically. To register head here.

Celebrating Five Years Since I Launched This Business + 21 Lessons Learned

Celebrating Five Years Since I Launched This Business + 21 Lessons Learned

by | Jul 13, 2022 | Business model, Uncategorized

“Success is not final; failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.”
~ Winston Churchill

On Thursday 19th May 2022, I celebrated 5 years in business as a business coach, around 8 years in business total (I was a Life Coach before that) and around 10 years of working for myself. As such, I thought it would be a great opportunity to share some of what I’ve learned over the past 5–10 years.

The most exciting thing for me to be able to share after 5 years in business, is that it’s working.

I make a good living, working only 6 hours a day. Often working only 4 days a week, as I regularly take Fridays off. I love what I do and I’m having a positive impact on the lives and businesses of others (so I’m told!). What more could I ask for? In many ways, it feels like a dream come true.

Whilst I share this, I’m painfully aware that it hasn’t always been this way that there has been a lot of struggle and fear over the years as well as courage, blind faith and dogged determination. A lot of highs as well as a lot of lows. There have been months where I’ve made more money than I knew what to do with and months where I’ve not known how I was going to pay the rent (more of the latter than the former so far).

In this blog, I’m going to share just a few things I’ve learned along the way.

1. Your income doesn’t reflect your worth. Period.

2. The number of likes, shares and comments on your content doesn’t determine the value of what you have to say. Most people aren’t even seeing it.

3. There is no shame in getting part-time work to pay the bills while you’re waiting to get your business off the ground. Financial stability is a really good place to operate from.

4. Belief that you’ll succeed is key. I genuinely believe this is one of the most important factors of my own success. I never said “if my business works” I said “when” and I meant it.

5. In many ways your business is just like having a job. You have to show up for it and do the work or you’ll lose it.

6. It takes time for things to work. In my experience, it’s taken at least a year of consistent application of any given strategy before I’ve seen good results. Strategy switching kills your business.

7. Less is more. The more you do, the more exhausted you become and the more confused your audience gets. Pick a few things and do them well.

8. Keep it simple. Don’t try to be too clever in your business, try to be clear. Remember a confused mind says no.

9. Do what you love rather than what the mainstream marketers tell you you should be doing. You’ll be more consistent that way.

10. Support is essential. Over the years, I’ve worked with many coaches, taken a lot of courses and had several amazing mastermind partners. Even now, I wouldn’t hesitate to reach out to a mentor if I’m feeling stuck or unsure about my next steps.

11. There’s no quick fix or magic bullet when it comes to building a successful and sustainable business. Those people on the internet who say that there is, are profiting off your desire to succeed. Be in it for the long haul and know that these things take time.

12. It takes about 4 years of consistently working on the right things to reach a level of sustainability in business. That’s been my experience and it’s the number I’ve heard shared by other experienced business coaches I respect.

14. The two most important strategies to implement to grow your business are: consistent content creation and practising authentic outreach (aka, talking to people!).

14. Strategy trumps tactics. It doesn’t matter if you are on Facebook, Instagram or LinkedIn, writing long-form, making videos or doing reels. What matters is that you are showing up consistently and being of value. That’s strategy. The former is tactics.

15. It’s more important to challenge your clients than it is to please them. In my line of work anyway!

16. Generosity is a wonderful way to do business. But don’t over give as it doesn’t serve you or others.

17. Be mindful of what you consume. Unsubscribe from or unlike anyone whose advice feels toxic or makes you feel less than. Choose your mentors wisely, based on shared values.

18. You don’t need to worry about bothering people, if you are a business owner, then you must accept that people are in your audience and on your list because they expect to be sold to.

19. Ask for feedback as much as possible, but focus on what your ideal clients are telling you more than anyone else.

20. If you really want to master something in business, taking action trumps all the thinking, studying, reading and listening you can do.

21. Give more than you ask. Genuinely put people before the sale and interestingly you’ll make more sales.

There’s so much more I could say but for now, I’ll leave it there. I hope that in some small way, my lessons learned over the last 5–10 years, are useful to you on your journey. Now over to you, what’s your greatest lesson learned in business? I would so love to know.

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Once a week, in the form of an e-letter, I share the best of what I know about building a business with integrity for conscious business owners.

The intention behind these letters is to be a voice for integrity within your (undoubtedly) cluttered inbox. To be the one email you can count on to contain strategic and soulful advice for building a business without selling your soul.

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Why I Don’t Recommend Coaching Packages (+ What I Do Instead)

Why I Don’t Recommend Coaching Packages (+ What I Do Instead)

by | Apr 27, 2022 | Business model

“Don’t be intimidated by what you don’t know. That can be your greatest strength and ensure that you do things differently from everyone else.”
~ Sara Blakely

In this blog, I’m going to talk about coaching packages, why I don’t do them or recommend them and what I do instead. If you’re a coach, healer or teacher the approach I’m going to share might be a useful one to explore for your business.

Let me start by sharing my experience. If we rewind just a couple of years, I was firmly in what I call the feast and famine phase of my business journey. I was primarily offering 1:1 coaching packages and only getting a new client every month or so. Or sometimes, like buses a flurry of clients for ages and then nothing for weeks or months. I followed all of the mainstream advice and offered a variety of ways to work with me 1:1, ranging from single intensive sessions up to a 6-month deep dive package. In the middle was my Soulful Starter 3-Month Package. That package cost 2200 Euros (approx. 2500 USD). Nearly always people paid in installments, month 1–1000€, month 2–700€ and month 3 — €500€. If clients overlapped it was great and felt a bit like I had sustainable recurring income.

Finding an alternative to packages

The problem was that new clients were hard to come by, which meant that some months were okay financially and others were dire. I had never considered that the package format could be part of the problem as I had never seen any other alternative talked about online. That is until I discovered the work of George Kao. At that time (circa 2018), he was offering coaching on a subscription basis, you paid an affordable monthly fee for 2 coaching sessions a month and could cancel anytime. I was blown away by this way of offering coaching.

Everything (well nearly everything) in me wanted to implement it in my business right away, but a small niggling voice of fear stopped me. I thought about moving to the subscription model for a good year before I started to implement a behind the scenes version of it. Basically, when clients on my 3-month package (because nobody enrolled for my 6-month package…ever!), came to the end of our time together, I would offer them the option of going on to do what I called “continue coaching”.

This was a 300€ a month subscription for the same two sessions a month but was a significant drop in price for the client. After introducing continuation coaching, every single package client I offered the option of it to said yes. I couldn’t believe it! It seemed that people really liked the lower price point and monthly subscription model.

It still took me another year to introduce the subscription model as my only way of doing 1:1. I’m not sure what my fear was, but I think the fact that it was such a reduction of my fees and aside from George, I’d never seen anyone else do it that I constantly questioned whether or not I was making a huge mistake. Eventually, I bit the bullet and did away with my premium priced packages and embraced the subscription model wholeheartedly. I can safely say that it’s been hands down one of the best business decisions I’ve ever made.

Suddenly, it became 100 times easier to sign up new clients. Rather than a handful of clients, I now consistently work with 15+ clients at any one time. The subscription model is an easy yes for most people and so I rarely have people say no once they’ve got on a work with me call. There are several reasons I think the subscription model has worked so well for me.

Why the subscription model works

It’s more affordable than a premium priced package, making it far more accessible for people. I think there is something about seeing a 400€ a month price tag that feels easier to swallow than a 2200€ price tag.

Given that there is no set end date, it doesn’t place a burden on myself or the client to achieve results in an arbitrary time frame like 3 months. I do ask that people commit to a minimum of 3 months so that some traction is possible, but after that, they get to cancel whenever they want.

Typically clients stay with me between 6–12 months with several clients going well beyond the 1 year mark. I truly believe that the subscription model empowers the client to decide when they are ready to end the coaching relationship, rather than feeling forced to end too soon because renewing is too costly.

Because of the price, the way it’s structured and the fact that clients tend to work with me for much longer, tangible results are much more likely, meaning that I get more word of mouth referrals and therefore more glowing reviews.

The logistics

Given the success I’ve had with the subscription model, it’s something I now teach to my clients, many of whom have had similar successes. I want to share with you now a few of the logistics so that if you feel called to implement the subscription model in your business,

Eliminate other options.
Don’t add the subscription model in amongst other 1:1 offerings, this can be tricky for some people who feel that they want to give their would-be clients as much choice as possible but in my experience, having one clear way to work with me is one of the reasons, it’s been so successful. Remember a confused mind says no so a simple offering is usually a far easier sell than a suite of options that can cause confusion in the buyer’s mind.

Use a recurring payment system.
I recommend Paypal’s subscription option. It’s quick and easy to set up and means the amount is taken from your client each month, without the need for invoices or payment requests, much like other subscriptions might work.

I set it up as a button, but rather than have it as a button on my site, I get the link, which is a bit long and unsightly, so I pop it into bit.ly to get a nicer looking link and simply send these to people in an email after we’ve agreed to work together.

Some people who have tried to implement this model have mistakenly set it up just for the 3 month minimum commitment period, don’t do this. Simply state up front that the subscription runs until either the coach or client cancels it.

Ask for a notice period.
I ask for 30 days notice so that I have time to refill the spot. However, often clients don’t give this notice and while I do have a contract this is not something I would ever enforce. It doesn’t feel good to me to make people pay for a service they no longer want, need or can afford. However, saying up front that you would like at least 30 days notice before terminating the subscription is helpful.

Set a minimum commitment time frame.
The beauty of the subscription model is that the client can cancel anytime, but without a minimum commitment you run the risk of people quitting before your work together has had a chance to have any impact at all. You don’t have to use the 3 month mark like I do, but take some time to consider what feels like a good minimum commitment to you. Be mindful not to make it too long. I think the 3-month mark is good because it doesn’t feel too overwhelming for the client but it’s long enough for people to see the value in what I do and then stay on far longer.

I hope this gives you enough to consider using the subscription model in your business. If so, let me know in the comments.

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Once a week, in the form of an e-letter, I share the best of what I know about building a business with integrity for conscious business owners.

The intention behind these letters is to be a voice for integrity within your (undoubtedly) cluttered inbox. To be the one email you can count on to contain strategic and soulful advice for building a business without selling your soul.

If you want to receive the Soulful Strategies Weekly, simply share with me your name and email address below and you’ll start recieving emails right away.

Are You Paying Enough Attention to Your Business Model?

Are You Paying Enough Attention to Your Business Model?

by | Feb 23, 2022 | Business model

“Most people overestimate what they can do in one year and underestimate what they can do in ten years.”
~ Bill Gates

I don’t know why, but “business model” is not something I see talked about all that often when it comes to building a sustainable online business, but it’s absolutely key to your business and personal success.

If you’re sitting here wondering what exactly I mean by business model, don’t worry I’ve got you.

The term business model is one of those business concepts that many business owners will have some idea of what it means, but if pressed couldn’t quite articulate or describe all of the key elements. Like many other business terms, the definition will change depending on who you talk to or which google search result you look at.

One technical definition is this:

“A business model is a company’s core strategy for profitably doing business. Models generally include information like products or services the business plans to sell, target markets, and any anticipated expenses. The two levers of a business model are pricing and costs.”

For micro businesses like ours, a more simple and therefore useful definition is:

How you make money in your business.

The second seems simple enough, but when you look at this more closely — what exactly are we talking about when we ask: How do you make money on your business? Are we talking about the offerings you have? The way you market those offerings? Or how people find your offerings? The specific combination of offerings you have and/or their relative price points?

For me, business model is a combination of all of these things and the combination we end up with determines the kind of business we have. And, if we’re not intentional about the business model we create, we’re in danger of building a business at odds with the kind of life we want to live.

Where most people fall down is that they don’t think about the overall business model they are creating and instead dive headfirst into creating products and services. If we are not intentionally creating products and services with our overall business model in mind, then we tend to create for one of the following three reasons:

1. It’s something you feel like creating.
2. It’s something you think you should create based on what other people are creating
3. You feel the need to be launching something new in order to make more money.

Let’s take each of these in turn.

1. When we create what we feel like creating, we fail to take into account what our audience actually wants or needs. Then when it comes to launching, we may have a beautifully crafted product or service, made with love and all the best intentions, but nobody buys because it isn’t what they asked for, want or need. The solution? Don’t create anything that you haven’t already tested or researched with your audience.

2. I’ve talked about it before but many years ago, I made my first big business model mistake when I became seduced by the idea of a low cost membership program. This was a classic case of choosing to create something based on what others were creating. It felt like a no-brainer to me to charge people a low monthly rate for regular content and classes and in no time be making thousands of euros a month.

With just 200 people paying €25 a month, I would be bringing in €5000, or so my thought process went.

It didn’t work out like that. My audience was so tiny that whilst I had a good initial take-up, because of the low monthly rate I was hardly making anything. Whilst 200 people paying 25€ didn’t seem like a crazy goal, when we dive deeper and consider average conversion rates, I would have had to have an email list of nearly 7000 people, 3% of those signing up, to get 200 people into my membership. For the record, (average conversion rates are between 1–5%) and that’s not even taking into account that around 50% of my list don’t even open my emails so that would mean 14,000.

Now I don’t know about you but I’m some way off 14,000 subscribers. And, the marketing tactics I would need to employ to grow my list to those kinds of numbers are not the kind of marketing tactics I’m prepared to spend my time on.

So, what happened in the end was that I found myself on a treadmill of creating new resources and classes every month so that I didn’t lose the few people I had, with little time to do the marketing required to get new people in or to grow my list. It was exhausting and I finally found the courage to close the doors on that offering at the end of 2019.

I’ve been a lot more mindful since then about what products and services I create.

3. Another common reason for creating a new product or service seems to come from a belief that we need to be launching something new in order to generate income.

This can be an issue particularly at this time of year when we’re busy making plans for the year ahead. It’s not uncommon for me to look over a client’s goals for the year and express concern about how much they are trying to achieve, in particular, how many new things they are planning to create, launch and sell.

“Most people overestimate what they can do in one year and underestimate what they can do in ten years.”
~ Bill Gates

Whilst this quote can seem disheartening at first glance, when the truth of it is embraced, we can actually take heart in what’s possible over the course of a decade or even the next 5 years. If we take me for example, I walked away from my career in program management nearly 10 years ago in 2012. People thought I was crazy to walk away from something I had spent over a decade building and the stability of a well-paid job.

If you had asked me each year since how I was doing, you would have had vastly different answers, some years were great, some years were terrible (emotionally and financially) and yet as I stand, with a decade of effort behind me, I’m excited to acknowledge that my business is thriving and I’m now making double what I was making in the well-paid management position people told me I was crazy to leave.

The key to my success?

One of the keys to my success is the simplicity of my business model. I make 99% of my income from just two things. 1:1 Coaching and the Conscious Business Mastermind. The former, I don’t market at all and yet I have a full practice and a waitlist and the latter I market and launch just once a year.

This is by design. Being in sales/launch mode is not something I particularly enjoy. Creating valuable free content on the other hand is my happy place. This is why I have purposely built a business model that does not require me to be constantly hustling for new business and that allows me space to serve my audience with meaningful content.

This is not only easier on me but also on my audience. When we’re constantly in launch mode, we exhaust our audience, haemorrhage subscribers and generally spend a lot of energy for little return. People are also much more inclined to get confused when you have a vast array of services versus just 1–3 signature offerings. In my opinion, less is definitely more when it comes to business model.

So how do we avoid making these business model mistakes? Before creating something new, ask yourself these questions.

1. Is this something my audience have told me they want me to create?
2. If not, have I done adequate research or testing to know that this would be successful if I created and launched it?
3. Have I thought through what it will require from me to create, deliver and market this — when I consider this, does it fit in with the kind of life I want to live.
4. If 3% of my mailing list bought my new product or service would it be economically viable?
5. How willing or able am I to have this thing start small and spend a few years growing the numbers?

Have you started working on your business plan? Has what I’ve shared today been useful? Let me know by commenting and letting me know.

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Once a week, in the form of an e-letter, I share the best of what I know about building a business with integrity for conscious business owners.

The intention behind these letters is to be a voice for integrity within your (undoubtedly) cluttered inbox. To be the one email you can count on to contain strategic and soulful advice for building a business without selling your soul.

If you want to receive the Soulful Strategies Weekly, simply share with me your name and email address below and you’ll start recieving emails right away.

Five Things I Ask All New Clients To Do

Five Things I Ask All New Clients To Do

by | Sep 15, 2021 | Big picture, Business model, Planning

“Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I will spend the first four sharpening the axe.”

~ Abraham Lincoln

After opening up a number of new coaching spots on my calendar, resulting in having several first sessions with new clients. It dawned on me that it might be useful to share with you the five things I always focus on with new clients to make the best use of our time together. These are, in my opinion, five of the most important things we need to work on to ensure the best chance of success. I should warn you this is a long one but definitely worth working through.

1. Activate your network

Nine times out of ten, one of the pieces of homework to fall out of the first session with a new client is to do my outreach challenge in order to activate their network.

We all have a network, whether we think we do or not. Our network includes all sorts of people:

  • Colleagues — people we are working with or have worked with (either in a former job or with our current business),
  • People in our audience — our followers, subscribers and consumers of our content,
  • Our clients — former, current and potential,
  • People we admire — the people in our industry who we follow, our mentors, the people who inspire us.
  • Personal — friends, family and general supporters of our work.

When we are busy working on our business, we tend to let some of these relationships go quiet, we forget to keep in touch and as a result our network becomes dormant. Activating our network means keeping these connections alive. Reminding people that we are here. Being of service to our network and becoming front of mind for people. This way they are more likely to think of you when someone they know is struggling with the very struggle you help people to overcome. It not only makes good business sense but it also feels good to be connected.

The challenge in a nutshell is to reach out to 50 people in 7 days simply just to check in, free from agenda and with the sole purpose of connecting or re-connecting. For the full instructions (which I highly recommend you follow if you want to take on the challenge) click here. Be sure to watch this video before getting started.

2. Set up your ideal schedule

When people first start working with me it’s quite common that their schedule or calendar isn’t as organised or as optimised as it could be. I usually start by inviting my clients to consider what their ideal schedule would be and answer questions like:

  • What timetable do you want to have? What days will you work? What days will you have OFF? What will be your working hours? When will you take breaks?
  • On which days do you want to do client calls? Is your calendar wide open to your clients or do you only want to do live calls on certain days or at certain times of the day?
  • What key activities will you schedule in each week? When will you do outreach? When will you create content? When will you check email?

I usually walk them through my schedule using the ideal schedule I’ve created in my Google Calendar, which you can see below.

Initially some people find my schedule overwhelming because every space is blocked off but it needn’t feel overwhelming. As I always say to my clients, if you set up your schedule to include everything that needs to get done including the breaks you need to take then you’re creating the conditions for success.

If Monday afternoon at 2pm rolls around and your schedule says check email and you really want to work on some content you can always move things around, but having things scheduled in, shows you at a glance what needs to get done over the course of the week.

One area I’d encourage you not to move is your breaks. If you’re in the flow it can be very tempting to stay at your desk and work through your breaks but I do believe you pay the price later on with a lessened ability to focus and inevitably less energy. Breaks are essential to maintain our focus and energy throughout the day.

3. Create a content schedule

Consistent content creation is one of the first things I like to get my clients started on if they are not doing it already. One of the most important steps you can take on your journey to consistent content creation is to create a content schedule. Whilst many people think that scheduling their content is a sure fire way to stifle their creativity, I assure you that if you give this a try you may be very surprised by the results. To create your content schedule you’ll need to follow these 3 steps:

1. Choose your channels. Rather than have 5 or 6 channels you show up inconsistently on choose 1–3 channels to show up on. If you are just starting out with content, I would recommend getting started with one channel and not adding in another until you are consistent with that one.

2. Choose your rhythm. Once you’ve chosen where you’ll share your content, you’ll need to consider when you want to publish content. Take into account that with one new piece of content a week, you can publish far more frequently than that simply by repurposing.

3. Create your plan. Your plan should bring together the where and when, (as determined above) with the what of your content. Your overall plan might then look something like this, which you can then populate with actual topic ideas later on.

 

4. Plan out your year

I invite all my clients and Mastermind participants to create an annual business plan at the start of the year, but no matter when someone starts working with me, if they haven’t already, I invite them to set an overall objective for the rest of the year, up to 3 strategic priorities to help them achieve that objective plus a set of simple goals under each priority.

To give you an example of what that looks like in practice, here are mine for this year.

My overall business aim for 2021: To put in place the systems, services and products to scale the success I’ve achieved in 2020 to double my annual income without working more than 7 hours a day.

My Strategic Priorities:
1. Systems
2. Business Model
3. Products

The goals under each:
Systems: 1. Make Notion my business hub. 2. Get SOPs in place. 3. Streamline software and apps. 4. Improve and streamline client improvement.
Business Model: 1. Deliver workshop plan. 2. Retain 30% of current Mastermind participants and get glowing testimonials. 3. Maintain full roster of 1:1 clients with increased rate.
Products: 1. Research, design and deliver a new product or products that can bring in passive income.

5. Simplify their business model.

Last but not least, I usually invite my new clients to simplify their existing business model. Many business owners fall into the trap of thinking that the more they offer the better their chances are of getting the sale. I’ve actually found the opposite to be true and that the more simple my business model is, the more money I make because it’s easy for people to access and choose how they want to work with me.

What we usually do is close down any service that isn’t bringing in regular income to allow us to focus on the service or services that are or that we want to be.

So there you have it, 5 things I work on with new clients so that we can then continue the journey together with the essentials addressed. Each of these could be a whole article in itself but I hope you have enough information here to have a look at each of these in turn and take some action to better set yourself up for success.

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Seven Ways to Start Leaning into ease

Seven Ways to Start Leaning into ease

by | Jun 2, 2021 | Business model, Mindset, Sustainability

“Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes, including you.”
~ Anne Lamott

 

One of my words of the year for 2021 is E A S E. (The other in case you are wondering is Health). The more we get into this year, the more I’m realising that in order to feel truly healthy (rested and nourished in mind, body and soul), the easier my life needs to feel, so leaning into ease is taking top priority for now. 

Why is ease so important for me (and potentially you)? Well personally I have a habit of making things harder than they need to be. What I’m realising is that somewhere along the line, I picked up the idea that in order for the things I do to be valuable or to have meaning they must require hard work.

It’s no surprise that these are linked in my mind. We live in a world that highly values productivity (output) and hard work so it makes sense that the idea I could do work I love, have a positive impact on others, make a decent living AND for it to be easy can at times feel like a pipe dream. Perhaps you can relate? 

Here’s the thing though. I absolutely know that it’s possible to have money, impact and ease because I’ve seen evidence of it in my own life and work. I can also see quite clearly how I get in the way of said ease. For me, it’s over-working – pure and simple. It’s staying at my desk, looking at the screen when instead I should be taking a break. It’s buying into the idea that working harder (instead of smarter) will help me to achieve more, which leads to nothing more than a treadmill type of existence. 

When I examine where this comes from, I think of my old 9-5 life, where presenteeism was a real thing, where it sometimes felt like the best way to demonstrate one’s value was to be “at your desk” – coming in early, staying late, working through lunch – all of which I did and more! Now as my own boss, I’ve come to see how I’ve continued this unhelpful pattern and the negative impact it has on real and sustainable productivity (and life!).

With all of this in mind, I’ve been looking at a combination of practical and mindset changes I can make to get back to a feeling of ease and calm with my work and as a result I’ve been making some changes around here. 

Commiting to ease

As simple as it sounds committing to having life be easier has been a game changer for me lately. In making the commitment, I’m not only taking practical and strategic steps (more on those below) to make this happen but I’m also signalling to my brain that I believe ease is possible even within my demanding schedule (busy full-time business + two small children + yearlong new home refurbishment project!).  

What that has looked like in practice is asking myself on a moment by moment basis, how can this be easier? This question can bring about the simplest changes to bring in more ease, which add up pretty quickly to a calmer and easier way of being. 

Carving out Focus time

My working days are very full, I have a full 1:1 coaching roster and group mastermind, which means I do lots of video calls on a daily basis. Because of this all of the non client facing work (content creation. marketing, product + service creation, business admin etc) I need to do has to get done between calls. Until recently I simply blocked these times out as “work” slots and they could be anything from 1 hour to 3 hours long.

I’ve long known about the power of time blocking but because of how scheduled my days already are, I had been resisting scheduling even more in my calendar. The negative effect of this is that oftentimes I have long periods of time at my desk without clear boundaries around what I am working on and when I can take breaks. Cue reduced focus and increased fatigue.

Lately, I’ve rejoined Focusmate – a tool that allows you to schedule 50 minute accountability sessions with another person to work on a specific task. These really help me to stay on task for a full 50 minutes after which I allow myself a break. Deeply focusing on one task for 50 minutes is far more effective for me than allowing myself 3 unstructured hours in which I aim to “get stuff done”. 

Making breaks sacred

The flip side to scheduling structured focus time is to also schedule clear opportunities for breaks. But if you’re anything like me, breaks often feel like the hardest thing on the schedule to stick to. As Cal Newport says in Deep Work (one of my all-time favourite books):

“Ironically, jobs are actually easier to enjoy than free time, because like flow activities they have built-in goals, feedback rules, and challenges, all of which encourage one to become involved in one’s work, to concentrate and lose oneself in it. Free time, on the other hand, is unstructured, and requires much greater effort to be shaped into something that can be enjoyed.”

Something that has really helped me with this lately is reading. I’ve always been an avid reader but over the last few years since children came into play, reading has become somewhat of a luxury. 

In honour of ease and to support my commitment to taking breaks, I’ve started reading novels again and use my breaks to read for 15 minutes in between sessions or focused work slots. This is working for me on several levels, I now have an incentive to stop working and step away from my desk, I get to do something I love that I had previously struggled to find the time for and because I am reading books that I really enjoy, I get so engrossed that I am able to completely disconnect from my work during my break.

This is very much a win-win as it allows me to take a meaningful break and return to my work feeling rested and re-energised. 

Taking time off

Similar to taking breaks but different. My default for years has been to take time off from my work on an adhoc basis as and only when it feels absolutely necessary. This year, right at the off-set, I booked off all of the school, national and regional holidays. More importantly, I’m committed to being completely OFF work during those times. Recently was a great example.

Here in Spain, Thursday and Friday were holidays and school was closed, rather than do what I would usually do – i.e. juggle work and childcare with my partner and members of his family – instead I took both days off completely. Aside from liking a few posts on Facebook, I did no work whatsoever and it was blissful. Nearly all four days were spent either reading, relaxing in the sun on our piece of land or playing with my boys. 

Have I come back to an overflowing inbox? Sure! Has it taken me awhile to get back into the swing of things this week? Sure! Do I feel 10 times more rested than I did last week? Absolutely 🙂 

Repeating what works

Or put another way, don’t reinvent the wheel. Something I have been putting into place over the last few years is repurposing things I have already created. The temptation for me (and other business owners I’ve talked to) is to always feel like you need to create something new. I see this a lot and I recognise it from my earlier days in business.

What often happens is that we plough a ton of energy into creating something pretty darn good and we publish it, run it, roll it out once and then, without so much as a backward glance, move on to the next thing. What a way to make things harder for ourselves. 

As a fairly prolific creator, repurposing has become my new business besty. I’ll share a very recent and live example. I love creating and running free challenges and over the years I’ve created many. This year in honour of ease, I’m repurposing all of the challenges I’ve previously created. We recently completed my free 14-day content challenge and whereas last year it was an all-consuming event as I created all of the graphics, prompts and emails from scratch and to a deadline, this year all I’ve needed to do was make a few tweaks, schedule the emails and prompts and I was good to go. It’s amazing how good it feels to repeat something versus creating it from scratch. 

As I lean into ease I aim to do this whenever possible. 

Asking for help

As a recovering perfectionist/control freak, asking for help doesn’t come easily for me. Truth be told, I’m much more inclined to tell myself that I know best than to admit that I might not in fact know it all! This year I’m all about asking for help where needed. I’ve hired an assistant who is helping me execute my content plan (he does all of the repurposing for me!), I’ve joined a business mastermind so that I can get the business support I need (yes even business coaches can benefit from business coaching!) and have in the past responded to offers for complimentary coaching sessions on topics such as conscious parenting, mindset coaching on letting things be easier and practical self care. 

It feels like such a gift to be on the receiving end of coaching rather than the one delivering it. I’ve had several coaches over the years but it’s been the longest while since I’ve had anyone supporting me. The insights and shifts I’ve already seen as a result of some of these sessions has been life-changing. 

Keep coming back 

Like all new habits, coming back to ease is a practice and to stay consistent with it, I need to remind myself regularly to do so. Of course, as is usually the way, the Universe has pointed me towards some resources to help with this. Annoyingly, I don’t recall who I got these questions from – I’m fairly certain I found them as I was scrolling through Instagram and now have them typed up, printed out and pinned to the wall above my computer screen: 

1. How can I let this be easy? 
2. Is there someone else who can help me with this?
3. What’s the simplest way to get this done?

Seeing and asking myself these questions on a daily basis really helps to make leaning into ease a daily practice.

And there you have it, 7 things I’ve been doing in my life and business lately to honour my word of the year. 

SIGN UP FOR MY SOULFUL STRATEGIES WEEKLY

 

Once a week, in the form of an e-letter, I share the best of what I know about building a business with integrity for conscious business owners.

The intention behind these letters is to be a voice for integrity within your (undoubtedly) cluttered inbox. To be the one email you can count on to contain strategic and soulful advice for building a business without selling your soul.

If you want to receive the Soulful Strategies Weekly, simply share with me your name and email address below and you’ll start recieving emails right away.