We’ve all experienced sticking points in business. While we’re “stuck” these places can seem impossible to get past. Fortunately, there’s a proven process that will help you to identify and overcome the things that hold you back.
Identify Your Sticking Point
First, you have to identify what you’re actually up against. This isn’t as difficult as we make it out to be. Most business sticking points have to do with starting and growth. The first (starting) is fear based. We have the idea, the plan, and the process laid out in our mind and maybe even committed to paper, but we just can’t get started.
The Art of the Start
Starting a business, implementing a new software, streamlining, opening a new department, attending your first training conference, these all have to do with starting. What holds us back? The way we see. Clarity is the key to just about everything. If we see things differently, we will do them differently. So, the first step is to “think about how you’re thinking.” What thoughts run through your mind when you ponder the “start.” Is it fear, dread, apprehension? Once you identify the feelings about starting, you’ll be able to renew your thoughts and push past the resistance.
If you still have trouble, get an accountability partner. Our UP Women community is the perfect place to build mentorship relationships and verbalize your intentions to another person. You’ll find that doing something as simple as speaking out your plan does great things to bring you to your goals.
Grow Baby Grow!
Business growth is a good problem —we’ve all heard that before. Unfortunately, growth can actually cause a business to crumble if it’s not handled properly. If your strength is in sales, but you’re weaker in operations or fulfillment, you’ll constantly be working against yourself because you’ll never have truly satisfied clients.
Here are a few questions to ask yourself about business growth:
Growth is change and change always needs to be monitored and assessed. Of course, some businesses, such as eCommerce websites, have the ability to grow indefinitely, while others, especially those that are service oriented, have a ceiling unless you’re willing to outsource or expand. Bottom line here? Assess the growth of your business on a monthly basis. Make a ruthlessly honest list of the problems and complaints and come up with solid solutions to implement immediately. Sometimes your solution will be a quick but temporary fix, other times you’ll be able to put the full solution in place.
Document everything. Keeping these assessments in a calendar or journal along with the solutions and success rates are vital. There’s something about documenting that allows you to really see where you are and what next move you’ll need too make.
Starting and growth, the two main problems in business. If you’ve been stuck, it’s time to change the way you see the problems. With a renewed vision you’ll be able to identify the problems and push past the things that hold you back.
