Not your idea
The fastest (and more efficient) way to get someone to do something is when THEY come up with the idea. In THEIR words. It’s not your job to convince. Or to police them around. It’s to guide them make the best-informed decision. And that only comes from their mouths. Not yours. It’s their idea. It’s you guiding.
Thinking backwards
Usually, how we understand ‘thinking’ is as a scaffolding process, where one thing builds upon the previous one, taking you to a scenario. I don’t usually function like that (been told I think backwards). Thinking backwards is jumping onto as many scenarios could happen, to then take the most likely ones to happen and start working backwards on how to get there, what could the obstacles be for each one, and ways to approach each one. This drives people crazy. If you give it a shot it can…
Needing more better.
On the subject of “We need more better leads and more better marketing”, here are some other phrases that happen in conversations with small business owners. We need results.Sure. What’s your implementation and progress tracking?How do you know what’s working and not? We have to wait.Sure. Till when?What’s making this decision for waiting?So that we don’t lose what we have now. So you’d rather wait and hope for them to agree with you then, than having the hard conversation now and getting an…
Seen that movie before
Pre-S: Been swamped with a project and this past week it was all about findings —which led to more writing. I’ve seen that movie before. Lots of the businesses I work with face similar problems. And they usually come with the same self diagnosis: We need more better leads. We need more better marketing. While this might be true, it’s never the main issue. One. It’s not a numbers game. The more quotes you send, the more sales you’ll make. Sure. Under whose rules? We are losing on price. Our…
Deep diving
In business, a deep dive an exercise to “conduct an extensive and thorough investigation into a specific problem. The deep diver will be certain to explore how the problem originated, what effects the problem is having on its environment, possible solutions for the problem, and how the possible solutions will further affect the problem’s environment. A deep dive is conducted after a short analysis has proved that there is need for further investigation.[…]To investigate the issue and to…
Never hold your breath
Rule #2 in diving. Don’t hold your breath. Holding your breath underwater is an intuitive response to anxiety. The thing with it is that it escalates your stress underwater. And you want to know what to do. Same is in business. Holding your breath looks like this: avoiding making decisions or having hard conversations (with your team or your customers), so that you will “not get” stressed. It only escalates the situation. The way to go about it in diving? Breathing slowly and calmly. What…
#1 Have fun
Having fun. I’d argue the first principle in diving (recreational diving, not necessarily tech-diving). Same applies to your business. If you’re running your business and you’re miserable, it’s kinda non-sense, right? You could be doing something else, or working for somebody. If you’re running a business, it’s about something you see in the market that doesn’t work. And while you find better ways to help, you can still have fun. So remember that. 🙂
Diving principles
You can see business as diving. Here are the principles: Have fun. Never hold your breath. Equalize early and often. Always make a safety stop. Never dive alone. Inspect and maintain your equipment. Be buoyant at the surface, neutral underwater. Have fun. They have more to do with business than what you’d see on the surface.
AI will replace you
“AI will replace you.Well, I’d love to see AI wrestle into a wetsuit, smash out 3 deep dives, blow a perfect bubble ring at the safety stop & still make it to happy hour.” Reel IG: @mantadivegilit Could you have an AI (or a robot) to do all of those things efficiently? (except the HH, maybe?) Sure. Would that be fun for you? Not quite sure. It’s the same with your business. AI won’t replace you because it won’t do what you do for the fun of it. At the end, if you’re not having fun, you can…
On the house
You’re stuck with something in your business. You know it. It takes lots of energy from you and don’t really know how to overcome it. Tell me. Whatever it is —pricing, marketing, strategy, branding, segmentation, distribution… business. I’ll point you in the right direction this week. All these years working with and advising small businesses on how to grow have come with tons of resources —books, articles, videos, podcasts, tools— that are better when shared. I’ll direct you on what you…
