Who are you without your business?

Without your business, what kind of person are you?  What do you like?  What do you love?  What do you not like?  What makes you feel good?

If your business doesn’t serve who you are, it’s because you didn’t set it up that way, or things changed since the beginning. You still can make it a business YOU are happy with. 

In fact, you must.

Alignment

Ask your people this question today – “Where is our team trying to go (what are we trying to accomplish) in the next 12 months and what is your part in it to make that happen?”

No hinting, no coaching, no making them wrong – you just want to see what their answer really is.

Do YOU have a clarity/communication/leadership problem?

Your team can accomplish great things – when they all know and are in agreement as to what that is.

How to make a profit

The difference between breaking even and making a 10% profit is about, oh, well, let’s see – about 10%.

It’s 1% here, 2% there, and half a percent there. 

You can do it.

You’re not "done" yet

You can’t be the person who attracts what it is you say you want, and the person you are now at the same time.

You must give up the old you and leave that person behind, in favor of the person you need to be.

Deploying Attention

In a day, there are some things a leader can handle quickly, without getting too deep.  There are other things that take careful uninterrupted thought, study and consideration.

Can you deploy attention when needed to make the right calls?

Seeing

Hindsight – Learn from the past; there are predictable patterns.

Top Sight – see the whole situation; get perspective

Insight – Know the details that make it work

Foresight – What will happen if I do this?  What’s next? 

Take time to see.

Do you understand English?

Highly successful people are doing things that can be explained to you using the same 26 letters you use every day.  There’s no magical 27th letter that they have which is kept from you.

All you have to do is learn the right things from the right people – and do it in your business.

Right?

Know Thy Numbers

All human activity in your business comes down to a number.  You live by them, or die by them whether you know them or not.

You’d better know them so you can adjust that human activity to make them come out well and stop wasting time doing things that don’t matter much.

Do you know your numbers?

Where can you win?

Where can you excel at delivering value to your customers that your competitors are unable to?

What customers?  What product?  Can you win with Service, Product, Innovation or Price?

Put yourself in a place where you can win, and winning will be a lot easier.

Why be stubborn?

If you’re not doing so well selling YOUR products and services, maybe you should sell someone else’s.