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December is a great month to do business! It’s also a great time to step back to work ON your business. “ON” your business means planning, organizing, cleaning up, streamlining, creating and other things which do not involve you engaging in business development or client/customer service.
If you stop working in your business, like doing business development, won’t you lose money though? The answer could be yes or no. Consider automotive plants that shut down for 2+ months at a time to retool for a new vehicle model. Do you think they do that to lose money?
In reality, if we don’t stop to take stock of what we’ve been doing, evaluate what has been working and what has not, then make a new plan to do better next year, we may keep doing the same things over and over and get the same results, or make some minor changes and get minor improvements in our results.
If you are ok with that – slightly increasing your KPIs every year, that’s great, keep up your routine. But, if you have been working at your business for a while and you want to make a dramatic leap up to the next echelon of your business potential, you need to do something dramatically different.
What could that look like? It could involve investing significant money into purchasing more equipment and hiring more staff or sub-contractors, or it could involve writing a book, creating an online course, revamping your website with SEO and a new UI, or creating a presentation so you can reach a larger audience in a shorter period of time and maximize your time to money ratio, or it could be as simple as hiring a virtual assistant so you can spend more time doing business development and client/customer service.
Remember this acronym: R.E.C.S., and plan to take a significant time out for it at least twice a year – once this month to prepare for next year and once in the summer to prepare for the fall back to business time, and a brief time out once a month. Taking a significant time out every quarter (3 months), plus the brief monthly time outs is ideal. But, like other goals, be realistic, so you will stick to it.
If you keep putting it off or forgetting, write yourself a reminder on a sticky note and put it up somewhere near your workstation where you will see it regularly. Also, BLOCK THE TIME IN YOUR CALENDAR so no one will book a meeting with you during this designated R.E.C.S. time and you will remember to not book anyone in then either. You can even put a bunch of asterisk next to the words, “RECS” in your calendar so it emphasizes the importance of getting it done.
Be reasonable in the amount of time you block though. While it is essential to take time off from working IN your business for RECS, be mindful of how much time you are taking out, so you don’t end up in a stressful situation of prolonged lack of income.
If your business is just continuing as usual or its only growing slightly every year or you know what you want or need to do, but, you are not sure if it’s the best way or you need someone to hold you accountable so you reach your goals, get professional advice from successful business owners who have made the leap from good entrepreneur to wealthy business owner, and hire a Business Coach or Business Consultant, also called a “Business Advisor,” who can give an objective third party perspective, help you see your blind spots and give you the knowledge, training, guidance, motivation and accountability you need to help you reach your business potential.
As a very experienced business coach and consultant, specializing in business strategy, sales, public speaking, and marketing, including digital marketing, I would be happy to help you whether you are at the start of your business or you’ve been working at it for a few year.
To book a free consultation where you tell me about your current situation and goals and we discuss how my business coaching or consulting services may be able to help you, please go to https://calendly.com
You will be glad you did.
Tammy Defoe
Tammy Defoe is the Founder and President of GTApreneurs Inc. She is a Business Coach, Sales Trainer and Public Speaking Instructor. She is very skilled and experienced at helping entrepreneurs grow their businesses.
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