Watch your speed

Ever since I got a speeding ticket last year (first ever), driving down one of our rural roads too fast, I have been forced to watch my driving speed, for fear of edging over and getting another one.  I’ve also started to pay more attention to the change in speed limits, instead of racing along oblivious. 

How fast do you drive?  Are you someone who ignores the speed signs and just goes, or do you stay cautiously within the limit, always aware of the limits set?  

Or are you someone who speeds up when you need to, but generally sticks to the rules.

You could say that my driving was a bit like the way I was running my business last year, in that I would forge full speed ahead with a new idea, without always checking my surroundings for warning signs that I needed to slow down.

I would embark on a new idea, set it in motion and then find out what I needed to give more thought to as we went along.  No caution. No recognition that I might need to know more before going off full tilt.  After all, I was a woman of action.   If I liked the concept, I was in.

Now in some ways, this is a good thing.  I wouldn’t be trying to perfect stuff before setting off, nor would I be second-guessing myself.  I would just go for it, and do my best.

But like the speeding ticket, sometimes I’d get caught out.  Sometimes it might have been better if I had slowed down before making big decisions or offers.  The outcome could have been different if I had noticed the signs along the way that this venture was perhaps not going to turn out the way I thought.  Timing is everything.

So just as with my driving, I am becoming more aware.  I am paying attention to the signs and listening to my intuition before I take that leap of faith.  I haven’t lost my entrepreneurial spirit, but I want to be more astute,  more savvy and more cautious on the road ahead. 

What about you?  How do you drive your business?  Slow and steady or fast and furious?  You too may want to observe how far your strategies take you.  Maybe it is time to change it up.

What's your vision?

When you started your business, did you have a vision statement?  At a recent Company of Women breakfast, speaker Adriana Girdler, challenged us to revisit our vision statements.  The one-liners, she observed, no longer cut it.  They’ve become too ambiguous and therefore subject to mixed interpretation.

As someone who works with Fortune 500 corporations, Adriana often finds that it is the lack of a clear vision and vision statement that creates issues within the organization. If it is not clear what you are meant to be doing, how can you know if you’ve got there or if a shiny new project fits with what you are supposed to be doing?

Good point.   When I worked in the non-profit sector, our mission statement was crucial as it spelt out the mandate, and without a mandate, it can be all too easy to go off in too many different directions.  In fact many charities can hurt themselves by “ambulance chasing” – in that they’d go after funding without giving too much consideration as to whether the proposed project actually fitted with their mandate.

I suspect the same could happen in business.  Clearly if something is profitable and makes more money than your “pet” project, it might be time to revisit and determine what business are you in.  Perhaps your “pet project” becomes a sideline and you focus your energies on what is working for you and what is paying the bills.

Adriana also encouraged people to look at their vision statement visually.  By that she meant to add visuals that illustrated the way you want to run your business and what you want to achieve. To help companies do just that, she has developed The Visual Vision Statement Doodle Book  which walks you through the process.

Prompted by Adriana’s talk, I pulled up my original business plan from fourteen years ago.  What did I say back then?  “Our purpose is to create a supportive environment through which women can realize their potential and actively pursue their dreams.”

Hmm.  Certainly we haven’t changed much over the years, but it is a bit vague and we have narrowed in our target audience to women in business, especially women entrepreneurs and broadened what we do beyond support, to providing the tools and training to help women get ahead.

So I have started to craft a new vision statement.  How does this sound?  “To build a caring community of women in business, that supports, empowers and educates women so they can achieve success on their own terms.”

To me this is a work in progress and in the months ahead my team will be revisiting this, as this is a team task, one that we need to work on together so we are literally all on the same page and clear on what we want to achieve.

What do you think?  Maybe it is time for you to revisit your vision statement and gain clarity on what success looks like for you.

Out of the mouth of babes

Last week I attended Matilda.  For those of you unfamiliar with the Roald Dahl’s story, it is about a little girl who has the misfortune to live in a home where the parents couldn’t care less about her and who attends a school where the principal feels children are just maggots.

Not much of a life for a child.  You will be pleased to learn that there is one character, Miss Honey, who does take a caring interest in the child.  But in one of the Matilda’s songs, she has a strong message for all of us. 

Here’s just some of the lyrics:

Just because you find that life's not fair, it
Doesn't mean that you just have to grin and bear it.
If you always take it on the chin and wear it, nothing will change.
Just because I find myself in this story,
It doesn't mean that everything is written for me.
If I think the ending is fixed already,
I might as well be saying I think that it's OK,
And that's not right!

Interesting.  An important message for any of us who may be feeling stuck, who see no “light at the end of the tunnel.”  As Matilda says, if we do nothing it won’t change.

As we start a new year, what changes could you make?  As Matilda says, just because life seems predictable, doesn’t mean you have to subscribe to the ending you think is written for you.

Following extensive research, Amy Vodarek and I are finishing off our book Good Enough? which is coming out this Spring. After connecting with over 350 women, we’ve learnt more about how and why women suffer from self-doubt or feel an imposter, all of which holds them back from realizing their potential. 

But it doesn’t have to be that way.  Many of the women described digging in and making new and often difficult choices. But one’s for the better. It means we have to reflect on what is happening, both past and present, ask ourselves tough questions and look at small steps we can take to change the situation and take charge of our lives.

Because as Matilda says, to stay stuck, is not right.

Go big or go home... maybe not

I recently received a long email from Leonie Dawson explaining why she was clawing back her business.

Since 2009, this creative Australian entrepreneur has built a successful global business but instead of owning her business, she’s found that it owned her.  

She’d grown the business organically with one strategy/product/project leading to another and it all worked.     

But not for her.

Leonie talks about being totally taken over by OPO (other people’s opinions), which led her down a path of exhaustion, burn out and frustration as she was no longer doing what she loved.

I applaud her for having the courage to step back and reflect on what she wants out of life.  Not only that, she’s shared what she is going to do and why she is taking such drastic steps to refocus, to simplify her business and get back to her original mission.

So often we can find ourselves on a path we never planned to take. I remember in the One Red Lipstick project interviewing a successful young entrepreneur who when faced with a large, business-changing contract, chose to turn it down. 

It wasn’t the right time for her or her young family and as she reflected on her skill set, she was an entrepreneur, not a manager.  She didn’t want to be managing a large team which she would have needed if she’d moved forward.  Instead of a creative enterprise, she would have built herself an empire and that was not what she wanted.

Yet in North American culture, the mantra is “go big or go home.”  But maybe not.

In his book Small Giants, Bo Burlingham, shares stories of successful business owners, who have chosen to be great instead of big.   He interviewed business owners who had rejected the pressure of endless growth to focus on more satisfying business goals.  Goals like being great at what they do, creating a great place to work, and making great contributions to their communities.

Burlingham calls this route “the road less travelled” and it could be that those on that road, catch more of the scenery and are less exhausted when they reach their destination.

As you enter 2017, I encourage you to look closely at your goals.  Bigger isn’t necessarily better.  Take into consideration why you started your business in the first place.  Revisit your mission.  Give yourself permission to tailor your business to suit your lifestyle and your family, and ignore the pressures around you to make more, do more.

Remember this is YOUR business.  Own it.