I know we have about 30 days left in Q1 and all but when you learn valuable lessons you want to carry them with you so you don’t make the same mistakes twice. In this episode, I wanted to share my top lessons (lucky number 13!) that are guiding how I execute the rest of this year.A wise man once said…“It’s better to know why you failed and pinpoint exactly why you didn’t succeed than being successful and not knowing why you won”Here are 13 lessons of mine in hopes that you can eliminate and avoid some crucial mistakes.
Transcript / MP3
I am going to be breaking down the top 13. Yes, the lucky number 13 insights and revelations from my business in life in 2019 and this is going to be a, you know, depending upon when and where you’re listening to this, uh, I’m streaming this live into our free Facebook group, the scalable service provider. I felt that this was kind of a timely content with this being the first week full full week of January, 2020, uh, as I’m recording this and so I thought I wanted to get it out to you as I’m sharing it, but you know, a few weeks from now you’ll see it in the podcast feed and the YouTubes. And so with that being said, before I jump in, I wanted to quickly ask, uh, whether you, and, or if you watch on YouTube, I would greatly appreciate a subscribe over there and some comments on any of the posts, participate, the people that have been participating in super great questions.…I’m glad you’re finding value in those videos. So you can go over there at Greg Hickman, uh, TV. So youtube.com/greg Hickman TV, you can check that out. And if you’re one of those audio files, uh, and you only listen to audio when you’re in the car, that’s totally cool too. Uh, I would love and appreciate a rating and review in iTunes. Um, most of the people are consuming stuff on, on YouTube cause I do a lot of drawing on the iPad. But this episode, my friends is pretty much going to be me just having a candid conversation with you. So, uh, I hope you enjoy and let’s dive in. I have 13 lessons and I’m going to kind of riff on each one of them and uh, this could be a longer episode. So without further ado, let’s jump right in. So the first lesson, lesson number one, and I have them up on my screen over here. So if I’m looking over here, don’t, don’t worry. Lesson number one and revelation. Now, actually, before I jump into number one, uh, one thing that I’ve been trying to do more of and I guess be better at and I would encourage you to do the same, is that the, a lot of the insights and the lessons that you learn are going to come from asking better questions. And, um, you know, I’m a firm believer in the, um, the notion that questions invite revelations. So as you start to ask better questions, you’re going to get bigger and better, more impactful and powerful revelations, uh, that can help you guide and navigate, you know, your business and life moving forward. So, you know, that being said, ask questions and always work on asking better and bigger questions. And so I spent the better part of the whole year, you know, as we have been growing and tweaking things and all of that on our side to just ask better questions.And so a lot of these insights and revelations that I’m sharing with you today have come from a lot of deep work journaling, asking questions, having really deep and oftentimes uncomfortable conversations with peers and mentors, family members, et cetera. So that being said, lesson number one, revelation number one, your business will never exceed your own capacity as an entrepreneur. Now, uh, this one’s been really, really powerful for me because there are things that you need to be able to do as the owner in your business and constantly expanding your own capabilities and capacity that if you’re expecting your business to achieve things and go bigger than bigger than you can even think or, um, you know, really visualize, you’re going to be in trouble because you can hire the greatest talents and you can install the greatest systems. But if you’re always getting in your own way as the leader, it’s going to be difficult to lead people.You know, you visualize and create these systems that are going to help you become more streamlined. You’re going to have to steward the other people in your organization to solve problems and think bigger. And not just be tacticians in the business. And while they can be great many times if your ceiling on what you believe is possible and how you approach your business is capped, which is often an invisible ceiling, your business is going to have a tough time exceeding that and nearly impossible time exceeding that. So what does that, what does that mean? That means you need to spend time on yourself as the owner thinking time, planning time. I can’t tell you how many people I talk to that literally don’t spend time thinking about their business because they’re too busy in the weeds, in the minutiae and worse in many of the people in this group and like myself back in the day in the weeds of clients’ businesses.So, so much so that you actually never work on your own business. You actually never think bigger than, you know, just having a couple more clients or a specific revenue number. And when you start to, you know, when I look at this for myself, you know, when you’re always chasing, say a specific number and realistically that number is not even that big in the grand scheme of opportunities. Um, you’re only ever going to hit that number, if that makes sense. And so like, uh, one of my, one of my peers mentioned, he’s like, you know what, like, I’ve been thinking like a million dollar CEO and I have, and I’ve had, I’ve been stuck at $1 million business for like the last three years. And so it’s time for me to start thinking and acting like a $10 million CEO for us to break through that barrier. So if you’re thinking and acting like, you know, someone who’s doing half a million and you are stuck and you’re not happy and you’re probably doing somewhere around half a million or below because you haven’t expanded your own capacity to envision what things can be and how you can get bigger and better and more efficient and have more impact and all of that great stuff.And think really just bigger beyond yourself. So when I think of your business will never exceed your own capacity to grow as an entrepreneur. Really what that means is the work is never done when it comes down to your own personal development. Uh, and this is both in business and in life. And also I’ve found that this is kind of like a sub piece to this. Um, if you feel friction and resistance in your business growth and you’re not hitting those goals, one of the first places to look is your relationships and specifically your relationship with your spouse. If you have one or your partner, your family, because it is almost like a, a pipe and you can look at your uh, your body, your being, your balance and your business. And I learned this going through the wake up warrior program with Russ Perry. Uh, and um, it’s like those are stacked on top of each other body being balanced in business.And if the business is feeling friction, you want to look one step up and it’s likely that there’s issues and challenges happening in your relationships. And a perfect example is that like, and I see this all the time and I’m very guilty of this, you know, in the past is that you’re like, Oh man, my business isn’t where I want to be. So I’m going to double down on the business. I’m going to, I’m going to work a little bit more tonight or I’m going to work the weekend or when we were supposed to go on vacation soon, but I’m going to, I’m going to do a little work on vacation. And that’s robbing your family from their time with you and it’s actually creating more problems in your business and more problems in your relationships. So if you actually go one step up the ladder and actually focus on being more present, a better husband or wife or brother or sister, you know, partner, I guarantee you, you will see the benefit in your business also because it creates constraints.So you, lesson number one, I could talk about this one a lot clearly is your business will never exceed your own capacity as an entrepreneur. Lesson number two, if you’re in something for the long haul, there is no need to rush. Okay. I’ve watched people burn out like way too early. And the reality is, and as I’m finding everything that we’re trying to do typically takes two to three times longer than you think. And so, you know, when you buy the six week course or when you, you know, do the 90 day program, you’re seeing a lot more people roll out 12 month programs now. And it’s like, because these things take longer, right? Um, and yes, you can set up some certain things and you can see some wins, but when you’re expecting your entire reality to change in an instant and you’re unhappy when something doesn’t go well after the first week or the first attempt, I want to challenge you because like, you know, I’ll have conversations with folks and I’ve had people have conversations with me.It’s like, Hey, like, um, so you didn’t hit your goals this year. Guess what? Like were you planning on shutting down your business after this year anyway? No. Like you have a vision to keep growing your business and building your business over the next 10, 20 plus years. So like get over it and keep going because it’s going to take longer than you probably think. And so if you’re in a position where like you’re wanting everything right now and you know, obviously we live in an on demand world, I think the abundance of information is very much a problem and a huge obstacle for us as entrepreneurs with the shiny object syndrome. But it’s the ability to understand like, look, you, yes, you want to take your business from 20 K a month to a hundred K a month. I get it. Um, and you’d love to do it in the next six or 12 months.Is it possible in six months? Maybe not for most in 12 months. A lot more likely for a lot of people. Uh, there’s a lot of variables in that, in that equation. But let’s say it took you two years to get to a hundred K a month or three years to get to a hundred a month. And in three years from now, you could sit there and say, I have a seven figure plus business, wouldn’t you still be pumped? Right? So the constant grinding, the working the nights and the weekends, like the work is still gonna be here tomorrow. Uh, and you’re, if you’re thinking big enough about where you wanna take your business and your life and all of these things like stop chasing the result that was supposed to, that you wanted to have happen yesterday and really start being focused on, you know, where is my business over the next year, two years, three years.And you know, I know people now that now that are talking about, you know, we’re planning out our next decade from a vision perspective, like in the next 10 years. Like we can look back at what we’ve accomplished in 10 years now if many of us and start to visualize well now knowing what we know, the skills and the experiences that we’ve had to date. Imagine now going over the next 10 years with all of that, like you are weaponized. So stop trying to rush when and if you’re actually trying to build a business that is going to be sustainable and have longevity and build a legacy, because guess what? A legacy isn’t built in six weeks, eight, 12 months, two years, three years. That legacy is built over a lifetime. And so stop rushing. Lesson number three, growth is always uncomfortable always. Um, so if you’re in a position right now where you, you feel very comfortable, I’d argue that you’re in trouble.Um, and I wrote a post not too long ago that was inspired by Alex hormone assay, um, where I talked about like mountain biking or climbing up a mountain. When you increase altitude, it gets harder to breathe, right? Climbing the mountain. I don’t know if any of you ever gone hiking at higher altitude than you’re normally living at. It gets harder to breathe and it’s very much like growing a business. As your business gets bigger and you grow and you expand the capacity of yourself as an entrepreneur, like I talked about in lesson one, guess what? It’s going to be harder. You’re going to have bigger problems, more challenging problems, probably more riskier problems. The consequences of making wrong decisions at a certain level like are going to cost you a lot more money. Like right now you might make a mistake and it costs $10,000 and talk to you right now.That might seem a lot, but imagine when your business is doing 3 million and you make a decision and it costs you half a million, right? Like the stakes will get higher. Growing is going to be uncomfortable. And you know, if you’re in this group and if you’re listening to the podcast and watching us on YouTube and you’re trying to grow a business and you are in it for the, for the short term, and all you’re thinking about is like your business running on autopilot without you, like I know people that are doing 10 million and they’re still very actively involved in a business because guess what? You’re an entrepreneur. You love what you do, right? You’re going to want to be involved in your business to some degree, obviously. Um, and so like, if you’re super comfortable right now, I’d argue that you’re not, you’re definitely not growing and you might not be around for a lot longer.So if you’re seeking comfort, uh, I think from an entrepreneurship perspective, you’ve chosen the wrong profession. Um, and I know for me, like, you know, I’ve had conversations with my wife where it’s like, it always feels like there’s like more to be done and uh, like when can you take a break? And you know, I’ve done a really good job I think over the last year of like being, um, more integrated and, you know, when I’m working, I’m working, when I’m not working, I’m not working. I don’t really believe in the whole life work balance. It’s an integration and you’re either all in on one or all in on the other. And the, the reality is, is like, I’ve been thinking about this a lot andHmm.Yeah, there’s still a lot of pieces of where we’re at right now. Like I, I’m not satisfied with where we’re, and thus in many ways there are certain things that make me uncomfortable and that means I’m just growing. And if you’re feeling the same way you’re growing, like seek more of that, that’s going to help you get to the next level. A number four, lesson number four, the biggest bottleneck and obstacle holding you back can be found by looking for the skills that you currently lack and the areas where you have the largest deficit. I also learned this from a kind of this clarity from Alex Hormoze. He as well, someone had been following his podcast for a little while now and the biggest bottleneck and obstacle that’s holding you back is tied to a skill that you lack or an area where you have a deficit.And so, um, you need to look at, you know, what are you having trouble doing or what is maybe hard for you that you know, you need to be doing, but maybe you lack the skill and go focus on that. And I kind of help our clients and work with our clients and we do this ourselves is really look at kind of the, the five core functions of a business, which are lead generation, lead nurture, sales fulfillment and kind of retention, resell and upsell. And we look every quarter. Like where is the biggest bottleneck? And you know, maybe you say, okay, well, you know, if I’m every, if I talk to 10 leads and I’m closing, you know, five to seven of them, like likely it’s not a sales problem. So if we’re not hitting our revenue goals, you know, the next possible place might be, okay, well what does our products suck?Because like, we’re not getting referrals or people aren’t getting results. No, we’re getting referrals and regain results. So, okay, well if I’m closing, you know, five of five to seven out of every 10 people you could probably get away with raising your price and also, uh, maybe start focusing on lead generation. Oh, but you don’t know how to generate leads. Well, maybe you need to go invest in a course that teaches you Facebook ads and become really good at Facebook ads and then hire that out to someone so that you understand what you’re expecting someone else to do. I truly believe in the who, not the how. Um, but I also think that’s dangerous when you don’t know anything about the thing that you want the who to be doing. And so I see people like [inaudible], we need help with ads, so I’m going to go hire a Facebook ads agency and they don’t have any understanding of anything about Facebook ads to even correctly monitor and measure if the agency is doing what they should be doing.And I see a lot of people, and I have in the past, myself included, been a victim of this, a victim of this, a guilty of this is expecting someone else to save it, you know, save the business, you know, do the, you figure it out like you’re the expert, but I don’t know enough to lead them or measure them or make sure that you know, it’s a good investment. And so if you feel like a a, if you want to solve the problem, look for your biggest bottleneck, it’s if you’re not growing, it’s likely in one of those five functions and then identify like is it a skill? Uh, what is the skill within that bucket that you lack? And then your next 90 days should literally be focused on how do I either acquire that skill or unclear that bottleneck. Um, which goes into the fifth lesson, which is every problem you have in business.Um, and I would argue life as well can be fixed with either a person, a process or a project. And oftentimes that will require a combination of the two. And so again, so say you realize that in your, your bottleneck is in sales and you realize that you don’t even have a sales process. So okay, well now we need to create a sales process or document our sales process, which is going to position you to maybe hire someone else to do the sales. But then if you’ve been doing the sales, using your process and it’s working now, you actually need to get good at managing a salesperson, right? If you’ve hired them and leading a sales person, it’s a different skill, but it’s compounding on the sales process that you put in place and the sales skills that you’ve acquired a while going through that process to then be able to effectively lead and manage someone else doing it.Because just because you can do it doesn’t mean somebody else is going to be able to do it. So once you identify where the bottleneck is, is it a person, a process or a project or a combination of those things that are going to which, which, ah, which of those things is going to be the solution. So hopefully that’s helpful. Also, if you’re watching in the Facebook group and or on YouTube and you can comment, I’d love, you know, a comment, um, you know, what has been most valuable to you thus far and uh, I’ll do a quick recap at the end. So we are on number six. The more time you spend planning and thinking, the more freedom you will have. One of the first things that we do with our clients is have them create what we call the optimized week. And it’s literally just how are you going to structure and show up each and every week to handle the things in your business in life that need to be handled that need your attention.Because if somebody, if you don’t feel your calendar, somebody else will. And so when on your week are you handling fulfillment, when are you handling sales activities? When are you spending time with your family or taking care of yourself, doing you know, self care or your fitness or whatever. Like if you look at my calendar and most of our clients calendars, things are blocked out. They’re intentional with where their time is being spent. And we’ve had clients that work with us in the first week or so that say, just doing that alone has changed their business because now they’re not reactionary. So many service providers and agency owners, like many of you listening and watching, all you’re doing is reacting to what happens in your client’s business, which never gives you the time to focus on your own and the second you put a stake in the ground and say, this is when I’m going to solve my clients problems.This is what I’m going to solve my own problems. This is what I’m going to spend time with my family. This is what I’m going to spend time working on myself and then honoring that you will see a transformation in your business and you’re going to feel more free. So the structure and the the, Oh, I’m going to spend the next 90 minutes. I’m going to spend 90 minutes on Wednesday, I’m going to take off early Friday and I’m just going to think about my business. I’m going to think about where I want it to go, how I want it to feel. I’m going to journal for a little while and for those of you that are thinking that that is impossible, the second you do it, you will realize that that is work. That is work on your business. You taking a walk by yourself, throw on some music and just thinking, but maybe with a notepad or go to a coffee shop, no computer, just a pad and just think about your business and how can it be better and what, what do you, what are the things you want to do?I promise you, you will start to see a, your thinking expand and your business will start to grow because you’re actually focusing on the most important things and giving yourself room to create. And to many of you guys and oftentimes myself, we get hung up on not just, you know, doing, doing, doing and specifically doing for our clients that we never do for ourselves. So the more time you actually spend on planning and thinking, you will feel more free. Um, number seven, and this is a shout out to, uh, my, my buddy Yuri Elkaim. Um, he actually shared a similar video like this that kind of inspired me. And, um, he says something that we’ve been saying in a different way, but I think he actually just said it better. And he said, boring is good for business, but a boring life kills happiness. And so one of our new core values in our business is do the unsexy work.And when it comes to a lot of the things that you need to be doing to grow your business, they’re not sexy. They’re not chatbots, they’re not, um, you know, the latest shiny object. They are literally like, Hey, did you write ad copy today? Did you create content today? Did you check your Facebook ad metrics? Did you get on the sales calls? Did you go out there and lead your market and create attraction assets? Did you fulfill on what you said you were going to fill? Like all of these things like aren’t the sexy things you want to like see about the morning routine of the seven figure person. Then guess what, half the time, those things are all just fundamentals. And so if you feel like your business is boring, that’s probably good. But if your life is boring, then you’re probably not going to be happy.And so this goes back to like if all you’re doing is working and all you’re doing is spending your time and even nights and weekends to, to fix the problems in your business and you’re neglecting your health, your, your mindset, uh, your, you know, your family, your friends or relationships, you will be robbed of some of the best opportunities and best things that you could experience in this life. Like we live in the most amazing time in the world. And if all you’re doing is working, and even if you love working, I mean, I love working. I love working on our stuff. Like I can do it all day every day, but I would be a hermit crab and I would probably not have a wife or a son and there’d be a lot of, I’d be very lonely, lonelier than being an entrepreneur, which we all know is pretty lonely, especially if you have a remote team.So boring is good for a business. Like, I look at a lot of my peers and you know, the people, my mentors that are doing seven and eight figure businesses and none of them use any of the shiny objects. Like most of them aren’t using chatbots or messenger bots or you know, the latest, greatest shiny thing. Like they wake up early, they do the work, they do what they said they were going to do. They take care of their body, they stop working at a certain time. Uh, you know, they, they hire the right people. They schedule a lot of time to think, they focus on the fundamentals and the thing is they never stopped doing the fundamentals. So, um, shout out to URI on that one. Boring is good for business, but a boring life kills happiness. Number eight, we need to be reminded more than we need to be taught. This was something I shared with our clients at our, um, one of our most previous intensives or most more recent intensives. We have clients from, um, our higher level program come into town, uh, three to four times a year for a two day workshop intensive. Andagain, like as some of the things I’ve already told you, like you’re going to need to hear them again. It’s not going to be the new stuff that’s gonna you know, change your life. It’s going to be be reminded that, Oh yeah, I should actually work out today. It’s been a few days or out reminded that, yep, I know I need to work out three times a week. Like you need to be reminded more than you need to be taught. It’s not the next new greatest thing. Um, I guarantee you that most of you that are out there looking for the silver bullet, the shiny object of the funnel, the three-step, the two step, whatever you’re overlooking. So many of the fundamentals that none of those things will even make a difference. You just need to be reminded that yet need to have a, a solution that solves a problem for one person. You need to master one conversion vehicle. You need to focus on getting traffic really through one traffic source up until $1 million a year and do those things over and over and over and over and over again. And never stopped doing them. As you continue to expand.Okay,so that was eight. We need to be reminded more than we need to be taught. Number nine, great opportunities aren’t always the right opportunities. Um, so what I mean by this is, you know, when we work with clients, we’re helping them transition their business model. They are service providers that have too many different types of clients. They, every project starts from scratch. They do everything one-on-one and they’re not happy. It’s the traditional agency model, you know, full service. We do everything and we help them transform into a more hybrid model where it’s like a, a mix of done for you with coaching and consulting and even training. And as they’re making this transition, we see it time and time again and happen for us. A prospect comes to you and it’s a good amount of money, but deep down you might say, man, like it doesn’t align with where I want to go.It’s just money or it’s uh, with a name of a influencer that would be helpful for me. Um, this is the one that has come ring true for me. Like I get the opportunity to work with some pretty cool people, but oftentimes it doesn’t align with my vision. And I have learned to say no to those opportunities because here’s the thing, while it might look good on a webpage that you worked with so-and-so, if the ripple effect from that opportunity doesn’t actually bring you more of what you want and hint it won’t. If your vision has different, then you’re just going to be attracting more of the things you don’t want and in welcoming more opportunities that are gonna make it difficult for you to choose the right one. And so just because you know, Hey, you might need some money right now and you could take a deal for for 20 K but if that deal for 20 K means you essentially have a full time job and you can’t work on the thing that is actually going to free you from having to work a full time job, then what are you really doing it for?Right now? There’s an equation and there’s a balance and a formula for how to do this right with the intent to transition out. But guess what, as you get better at what you do, as you grow, as your business grows, as you become more successful, you are always going to be presented with opportunities. There will never not be opportunities, but you need to ask yourself, is it the right opportunity? Yeah, can sound like a great one, but it could also be a great one that totally derails you from where you wanted to go and actually sets you back in the longterm. So definitely be monitoring that. And I know that’s something that we’ve had to deal with personally as well as, you know, a lot of our clients face and it’s just sometimes it’s, uh, we’ve had clients that have turned out very big deals because they knew it was not in alignment with where they want to go. And while it was hard to make that decision because it was the first time they had to do it, the weight off their shoulders and how much power they feel like they have after doing it is just incredible. It’s like they’re ready to take on the world. So, uh, number 10, it’s easy to chase things that you want to want.Let me say that again. It’s easy to chase things that you want to want. So don’t blindly adopt other people’s definition or version of success. Once you can do well, you need to be able to define it yourself is really the point. So the lesson is don’t blindly adopt other people’s definition of success. Just because someone else has done X, Y, Z doesn’t mean you have to or because you see other people doing it doesn’t mean you need to do it that way. And if you don’t stop. And going back to that thinking time and planning time, if you’re not sitting down and actually writing out and articulating what you want your business to look like and feel like what your team should look like, how you want to sell. I have a friend who, she sells a high ticket program over $10,000 and she sells it on autopilot without doing high tech sales calls.If she had just gone into a program where all they teach is how to sell over the phone and she just adopted that she might have put herself out of alignment with how she likes to work and, and not found the system that she created herself to sell without having to be on, on a sales call. And there’s some people that love selling from the phone and it’s a great way to close people at a high ticket, high premium, you know, type of service and or coaching program. And so the thing is like if she just said, Oh, well, everyone’s doing it that way, that’s how I have to do it. She would have never come up with her own way that has working for her. And I was guilty of this where, you know, I’ve been in different coaching programs, masterminds where, you know, very quickly it’s just, it happens subconsciously.It’s not even, uh, has anything to do with the program that you’re in. It’s, it’s you, it’s you internal where you say, Oh, like, well, that’s what I should be doing because that’s what everybody else is doing. And all of a sudden that becomes your definition of what is successful and how it needs to be done. And it’s the only way it needs to be done. If that’s how you’re operating right now, I guarantee you you are going to go through a dark period at some point. It’s coming when you realize that that’s you were chasing something that wasn’t even yours. And again, like do you do the example is, it’s a dumb example but I think it will hit home. Like you might really say that like you’re dedicated to having a six pack, right? And, and when it comes down to it, you’re not willing to do the actual things that are required of you to get a six pack.Like count your calories and track all your food and do the apartment mat exercise. Like if that’s not you and you’re not committed to doing that, guess what? The result that you want is likely not going to happen. And so what ends up happening is we want to want things and then we beat ourselves up for not having the thing that we want. But like we have to realize that we just wanted to want it. I want a six pack abs but I am never going to count calories. Like I’ve tried it, I’ve done it, I’m not successful with it. I don’t like it. And I realized that the reason that I wanted it was more for someone else than it was for actually me. As long as unhealthy, I’m flexible, I can, you know, have longevity and play with my son as he gets older.Like, and I’m not out of shape. Like I stay fit. Like that’s the important thing to me. And I always come back to that. So we have to make sure we’re not chasing things that we want to want because society or the mentor or the latest post we see on Instagram seems like that’s what we should want. Right. It seems like very easy to get manipulated these days and not even like not manipulate it, but just subconsciously start chasing things that we feel like we have to have in order to have certain things. And as there’s no boy now. So, um, number, that was number 10 11. We’re almost done here. Uh, number 11, um, this is a shout out to one of my mentors, Brad Martin. Now Martin [inaudible] from sixth division. And um, he said decide, Oh no, sorry. He said anxiety. These are back to back from Brad. Anxiety lives in the space between alternatives, anxiety lives in the space between alternatives.If you are super anxious right now, um, about something in your business or your life, I would put money on the fact that it’s because your in between a decision, um, your, you just have to make the decision. Maybe it’s, you’re looking at two different coaches and you’re like, my business has been struggling, has been struggling for the last year and it’s like I could buy this course or I could, you know, get a coach. It’s like shut the F up and just do one already because all of that anxiety and that what you feel, all that feeling that is not comfortable and not serving you in any way is because you just won’t make a freaking decision. And so you’re in between these two alternatives. Okay. And I can tell you from personal experience, it is one of the most uncomfortable places ever because all you do is get into this spiral of second guessing yourself.And then maybe you add a third alternative and a fourth alternative. And then you go into this, I’m going to review every single out alternative that exists and you just constant and you, you fake yourself. You trick yourself into thinking that you are moving forward because you’re assessing all of these things. But all you’re doing is going in a circle. Uh, my buddy James clear in his book, atomic habits talks about don’t confuse motion with action. And so a lot of times we’re in motion, but we’re in motion like this, reviewing alternatives, like, Ooh, let me talk to every single option. But like not willing to make a decision on anything. Action looks like decisions and moving forward and in a specific direction. It’s not just going like this. So anxiety lives Liz, in the space between alternatives. If you feel that way, you’re likely between alternatives, which goes into the next lesson, which is also from Brad.Number 12 is decide ruthlessly and execute humanly. Um, and my example for this, uh, comes down to, uh, a common one for many entrepreneurs is hiring and firing you at some point. If you haven’t yet, we’ll be in a position where you have someone on your team and you realize that it’s not a good fit and maybe it’s not, maybe it’s not because of a, maybe it’s because of a skill. Maybe it’s because of where the business is going and they don’t fit in the vision, whatever it is, and you don’t fire them, you don’t let them go. You just let them hang around. You let them hang around because the reality is that you, it, the act of, of firing someone is uncomfortable and hard and nobody wants to do it. That conversation sucks. And so you don’t have it. You try to plug the holes or put bandaids on it andokay,in that specific example, you just need to decide ruthlessly that that is not the right person and then execute humanly. And how that plays out for me is we had multiple times in the last three, four years, we’ve had someone on our team where at some point they weren’t in alignment with where we needed to go. They weren’t bad people and some, sometimes they were actually good at what they were doing. It just, they weren’t good at what we needed, what we needed the next person to do and we needed that role more. That role would grow the business. Um, and we didn’t need more of what they were doing and, or we actually needed less of what they were doing. So at that point it’s like, Oh well they’re not going to be happy. I don’t want to force them into a role that they’re not good at, which we’ve tried, doesn’t work.So I said, Hey, we got to make this decision. I’ll do whatever I can to help you find the next thing. And I reached out to my network and you know, within a few weeks he’s got a part time job and she’s got tons of sales op sale opportunities to get, you know, an opera like get a job. The first one, we found her, uh, her next client. And so like to me that was the execution in the humanly way, but I still had to make the decision and decide ruthlessly, it’s like the person’s got to go. That’s it. Decisions made. Now when I go to execute on that decision, you can do it in a human leeway. And so, uh, those kind of combined together. And so I don’t know, like again, with what you’re feeling anxious about personally, you might again have that anxiety and it’s really because you’re probably between two alternatives of some sort.You just need to decide ruthlessly which direction you’re going and then execute humanly. And number 13, close it out strong is just simplify, simplify. I can’t tell you how many times my life and my business has gotten better, happier, more fulfilling. We’ve grown when I’ve stopped doing stuff and I’ve simplified and this has become like a mantra for our business. One of our core values is start simple, get Ninja later. Uh, and you almost never need to get Ninja later cause simple actually works. When I look at my peers and mentors that are doing, you know, you know, seven and eight figure high seven figures, eight figures and I’m like aspiring to be be where they’re at. Almost all of them have a way simpler business than I do and I’m not where they’re at. And when I look at agency owners and service providers, and this is obviously who we love to serve, this is where we came from and this is why we do what we do.We need to just simplify and it ends up like we ended up making things way more complex than they have to be and less is more and fewer products is more, you will grow faster with fewer products. It’s, I know it’s counter to what many of you want to think. You need to be able to do the social media, you need to be able to do the Facebook ads. You need to be able to build their website. No you don’t. You could do one thing or you can combine a couple of those services to solve a problem that actually hurts businesses and people have pain around instead of just being labor. Many service providers and agency owners right now are structured in a way where they’re really just getting paid as labor, which makes you kind of like a glorified freelancer. And I guess I would bet, and I’ve talked to some people in the last week where you’d actually would just make more money if you just went full time with that business, that one client of yours, of those two clients, like if you just spent more time with them and chose one, you’d be making more money than you were making as entrepreneur.And I’m not saying to go work for somebody else. Um, but like the point is is the more services you have, the more types of clients you try to serve, the harder it is going to be to hit your goals. Especially if you’re under, well first of all, if you’re under any goal that you want, if if you’re at, you know, a quarter of $1 million a year in revenue and you want to get to half a million stop doing more and focus on certain things, you want to get to a seven figures, cut out some stuff. I changed my business when I heard clay Collins say the fastest way to get to a seven figure business is to focus on the five ones and it’s one avatar, one solution, one conversion mechanism, one traffic source. And you do that for one year. We did that and we had our first six figure month transitioning out of an agency where we were doing everything for everybody and in less than 12 months we went from, you know, maxed out, no capacity, not really enjoying life or business to hitting our first six figure month working less.Life was wake life and business was like less chaotic and more in control. And so you have to simplify if you serve five different types of clients, focus on one. If you, if you sell all of the services, try to focus on one or like a combination of the three that are complimentary that actually solve a valuable problem to your clients. And you go all in on solving that. This is essentially what we help our clients do is make that transition. If you’re unaware, if you’re new here, transform your traditional done for you. Custom work service, business agency business into something that is more scalable, more predictable, and doesn’t have you working nights and weekends and gives you your time back and allows you to serve more people with less headache and less energy. And so those are the 13 lessons. It’s like simplify and guess what?The people that are doing seven figures are asking themselves the same thing. How can I make my business simpler? Okay, complexity kills. So a quick recap on these 13 if you’re just joining, obviously you can go back and watch the replay of this or the, you know, the video if you’re there, if you’re not attending live. Thank you. If you are attending live, a real quick recap one, your business will never exceed your own capacity as an entrepreneur. Number two, if you’re in something for the long haul, there is no need to rush, right? You’re going to burn out. The reality is it’s going to take two to three times longer than you think it is anyway. So just be in it for the long haul. Number three, growth is always uncomfortable. If you’re super comfortable where you’re at right now, you’re likely not growing and you might not be around next year with how fast things are advancing.Okay? Number four, the biggest bottleneck and the obstacle that’s holding you back can be found by looking for the skills that you lack and or the area across the five core functions of a business where you have a deficit, lead, lead generation, lead, nurture, sales, fulfillment and retention. Um, every pro number five, every problem you have in business can be fixed with either a person, a process, a or a project. Usually it’s going to be, or often it’ll be a combination of those things like a person and a project. Very PR, a PR, hiring a person to execute on a process that you need to create that would become a project. Number six, the more time you spend planning and thinking, the more freedom you will have. Number seven, boring is good for business but boring, but a boring life kills happiness. That, shout out to URI on that one.Number eight, we need to be reminded more than we need to be taught. We need to be reminded more than we need to be taught. Number nine, great opportunities aren’t always the right opportunities. Number 10, it’s easy to chase things that you want to want. Be sure that you are the one defining what success looks like, not blindly adopting someone else’s definition. Um, number 11, anxiety lives between lives in the space between alternatives. 12 decide ruthlessly and execute humanly. Those go together. And lastly, number 13, simplify. Uh, you’re likely making things way, way more complex than they would have to be. Less is more, fewer products is more, fewer services is more, fewer avatars is more. The more that you can simplify, the more that you will grow and feel in control. And get your life back, uh, and on track. So I hope you guys enjoyed this comment below.If one of these, which one of these meant the most to you or maybe you know, hit you right here the most and if again, you’re new here and you haven’t left us a rating and review in iTunes, we would greatly appreciate that this’ll show up there. If you’re watching this, obviously it’s there now or if you’re watching live in the group, it’ll be there soon. And if you haven’t been following our videos on YouTube, you can definitely check us out there. And lastly, if you are an agency owner or service provider and you’re not satisfied with where you’re at right now and you don’t envision growing the traditional agency model where it’s done for you, everything, uh, you know, uh, customization, everything we do, all of the things full service and you actually want to launch something that is more leveraged like a group coaching program or a high ticket consulting program that allows you to have some done for you.But also with some coaching and training, we literally have a step by step process that can take you through how to do that and have your first program with those clients, three to five clients for that new offering in about 90 days. So that’s our focus. That’s pretty much what we do. And once you have that, we’re going to show you how to replace and surpass any done for you revenue you have with revenue. That is from that new leverage thing that we just launched in the first 90 days. So guess what, in 90 days we can get you some clients and get the fundamental systems in place. Great. That’s a win. But if you really want to surpass your current revenue and grow something that has, you know, a legacy and impact plan to be in it for awhile and we have a program for that as well.So if that any of this sounds interesting to you, you can either comment below and say, let’s go and I’ll privately reach out to you and we’ll get a call schedule. We’ll just chat about how we can help and or you can proactively get a call on our calendar by going to system dot L Y forward slash apply answer some questions, pick a time that works for you and you and I literally you and I will talk and make sure it’s a good fit and go from there. So hope you guys found this valuable. Thanks for the hearts that I’m seeing. Come in, you guys. Enjoy the rest of your day and we’ll talk soon. If I gave you five to 10 new clients, would you or your agency break if so, your current agency model is broken. I struggle with this too, until I found a better way. By adding online programs, training, and coaching to our agency, we doubled profits without adding more hours. If you want to work directly with me and my team to transform your agency, does it my scalable business.com to learn more.
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