As I listened, I could feel this business owner’s voice drop into lower and lower energy cadences. She was telling me about the situation in her business—the tangle of team dynamics, family members involved in the operations, and a history of decisions that had layered on top of one another. It was complicated. It was…
Every December, we sit down with our spreadsheets and fresh notebooks, feeling a mix of exhaustion and hope. “Next year will be different,” we tell ourselves. Next year we’ll be aligned. No more weekends. The team will step up. We map out revenue targets and key initiatives. It feels good. It feels like control. But here…
Sometimes a client will come to a call with an excited, nervous energy, tinged with fear and dread. They’ll say something like, “I have this idea, but it feels a little crazy,” or “Is it too much to think about this right now?” They’re sitting on a big dream—something that seems too good to be…
When I was six years old, and my father was teaching me to ride a bike, we lived on a street with a big tree right in the middle of it. There was plenty of room to drive around it on either side, but the road was paved right up to the tree with no…
If your work is successful, it generates more work; as a result, the concept of “finishing your work” is a contradiction in terms so blatant and so dangerous that it can lead to nervous breakdowns—because it puts the pressure on the wrong places in your mind and habits. Kenneth Atchity, as quoted in Beyond Entrepreneurship…
“Make no little plans; they have no magic to stir mens’ blood and probably themselves will not be realized. Make big plans; aim high in hope and work, remembering that a noble, logical diagram once recorded will never die but, long after we are gone, will be a living thing, asserting itself with ever-growing insistency….
One of my clients is planning to spend time thinking about her plans and creating a forecast for next year, and she asked me if there were any questions she should think through to prepare for that exercise. Here’s what I sent her: But I know you are all a lot of smart business leaders,…
On Tuesday, we talked about how we all have a voice that tries to undermine any changes we make or steps we take toward our goals. And the more important the goal or significant the step, the more resistance we feel! In my battle with The Resistance, one practical step has made the biggest difference…
I set some ambitious goals for 2023, and I’m clear about the small steps I need to take to move me in the direction I want to go. But as I take those steps, I hear a voice inside my head that’s not helping me. In fact, it sounds like it’s working against me! Do…
I was at a holiday party last month, and it was full of agency owners. As I walked through the crowd, I must have heard this snippet of conversation a dozen times. “How are you?” “Oh, I’m so busy, just slammed. It’s really overwhelming…” Each time I heard it, I got more disturbed. Why do…