I frequently encounter this odd, paradoxical statement in my work. My clients specifically hired me to teach them how to run their businesses in a way that will give them more time and freedom, yet when I try to schedule sessions with them, they often tell me they’re “too busy.” They’re so busy trying to do that they “don’t have time” to learn how to do those things better, faster, and with less effort.
When I was a kid we’d started counting the moment we saw lightning strike. One one-thousand, two one-thousand, three one- BOOM, the thunder would roll through our neighborhood, shaking everything to its foundation.
When I read Gino Wickman and Mark Winter’s most recent book, Rocket Fuel, I thought, “What an apt metaphor for the roles of Visionary and Integrator.”
Many small business owners are so confident in their vision and so passionate about what they are doing in the business that they are shocked to learn that not everyone in the company shares their vision. This should be a wake up call for business owners who assume that everyone is working towards the same goals. Business coaches, or EOS Implementers™, teach leadership teams that it’s their responsibility to share their V/TO™ and inspire their people with a compelling vision. You may find that when you are sharing your vision, not everyone on the team feels the same way, and that’s ok! Those who understand your vision and who are fully committed to it will be working towards the shared goals of the business every day and their actions will speak for themselves.
It’s common for eager leadership teams to take on too much in the early years of the business. By trying to get everything done at once and making everything important, they run the risk of getting nothing done. When you make everything a big issue, then there’s never enough time to give each goal the attention that it needs. The EOS® approach teaches leadership teams that by focusing on a few goals instead of too many, you will actually accomplish more. It’s called the Power of Focus, and it’s something that you need to be successful.
A key to gaining traction in your business is to put together a leadership team consisting of people who share the company’s vision with you. Creating a team of people who each have clear accountabilities and who are prepared to take initiative when it comes to leading their people is a critical part of developing a successful business. Your leadership team must also be willing to be open and honest about all issues. When you have the right people in the right seats for your leadership team, everything else you build within the company will be based upon that structure.
Many leadership teams spend thousands of dollars each year on unfocused sales and marketing efforts that end up not being effective because they never really established a clear strategy and goals when they first began the process. One of the most important parts of defining a marketing strategy for a small business is to determine what your “Three Uniques” are. Known in the marketing world as the differentiators of a business or its value proposition, the Three Uniques for a business are what makes your business different. They also determine what makes your business stand out from the rest and who your competition is. If you were to line yourself up against your competition, you may share some of the same characteristics in terms of services and focus, but no one else should have the same Three Unique that your business does. When you’ve defined your Three Uniques, it means that you’ve defined what makes you unique and special to your ideal customer.
