To be completely transparent, I haven’t been super-positive lately. Yesterday I finally uncovered the internal thought patterns and the external habits that were creating a self-fulfilling prophecy of scarcity.
Delegation
3 Mistakes I Made Speaking In-person
I presented in-person recently, and quickly realized that I’d forgotten some of my best practices.
Don’t get me wrong, the talk was well-received, but I was aware the entire time that I wasn’t feeling as grounded and present as I have in the past.
This video gives three best practices for speaking in-person… ones I’d forgotten about after so many years of speaking virtually.
Time Management: 1 tip + 1 slight change
If you don’t already know I am a nut about time blocking and time management!
Here is a quick video of my one “no-matter-what” habit, and one change I made recently that is making a difference in my clarity and focus on a daily basis.
Let Go in Order to Grow – Delegate by Using the Power of a Virtual Assistant
Contributed by Laura Schappert.
“If you really want to grow as an entrepreneur, you’ve got to learn to delegate.” Richard Branson.
When you’re good at what you do, people want much more from you. This can lead to a real sense of pressure and work overload because you can’t do everything that everyone wants quite possibly leaving you feeling stressed, unhappy and like you’re letting people down. No matter how hard or how long you work, there’s a limited amount you can accomplish. What’s worse, you may be totally stalling your success if you expect to do everything yourself.
There’s no shame in asking for help, especially when you’re overwhelmed and overworked and time seems to do a disappearing act before your very eyes. One definition of ‘delegate’ is to ‘entrust a task or responsibility to another person.’ A good assistant helps you organize your processes, completes your administrative tasks faster than you can, helps keep you accountable and on track thereby creating a flow which allows you to achieve more and increase your value.
Here are some signs you’re overdue for an assistant:
- You feel like your efforts are getting you nowhere or are not creating income
- You’re constantly worried that things are falling through the cracks
- You don’t think anyone can help, and there’s no one who can do all the things you can do
- You struggle to make time for the most profitable parts of your business and those that create the biggest opportunities (these are generally the things you love to do most!)
- Your business isn’t growing, and hasn’t for six months or more
If you’re already relating to this and nodding yes, it might be time to get in touch with me for a complimentary conversation.
People don’t often consider delegation because they think they can’t afford a virtual assistant. This is backwards. Resources always follow vision and until you get clear on what you need, the resources don’t show up. By learning how to delegate work and by doing it well, you can quickly build a strong and successful support system. Part of the delegation process involves knowing what you want to accomplish and determining a deadline to get it done. Having the goal of delegation creates freedom to plan for the future, find new ways to develop your business and time to invest in higher impact projects to achieve success.
To determine when delegation is most appropriate, ask yourself some key questions:
- Is this a task that’s taking me away from planning and strategizing my business?
- Are there tasks that are draining me and keeping me from doing my best work?
- Is this a task someone else can do, or is it critical that I do it myself?
- Is this a task that will recur, in a similar form, in the future?
- Can someone else do this task better or more efficiently?
- Are there tasks I don’t enjoy or am not good at?
- Is this a task that I should delegate?
If you can answer “yes” to at least some of these questions, then it is worth delegating.
By delegating work, especially recurring tasks, you’re making a positive choice by acknowledging your time is valuable and you’re worthy of having the freedom to focus on your specialty. Employ your virtual assistant as you would your business coach, hairstylist, barista, auto mechanic, massage therapist, anyone who specializes in providing a service you often use, appreciate and trust they know what they’re doing. Remember that old V8 commercial, “I could’ve had a V8!”? Well, you can have a VA!
One last tip: The time to hire an assistant is slightly sooner than you’re 100% ready and comfortable. By the time you’re totally ready – both mentally and financially – you’ll be too busy to properly delegate and train them, if necessary.
Are you feeling inspired? Are you already feeling some relief from overwhelm? Are you ready to let go? Are you nodding and relating to any of this? If so, the next step is to contact me for a complimentary consultation. In the meantime, if you’d like to know more, please visit my website. As a virtual assistant, I share my client’s visions, I believe in the services they provide and want every success for them, including time to thrive and enjoy life.
“Success means we go to sleep at night knowing that our talents and abilities were used in a way that served others.” Marianne Williamson
Consistency: The most misunderstood key to success
Consistency is a key to success. Intellectually we know this, but putting it into practice seems to be a constant battle. And why is that?
Because consistency has a plodding, dreadfully dull quality to it, doesn’t it? And we freedom-loving entrepreneurs tend resist anything that resembles the regular schedule of employment. But it doesn’t have to be that way!
Consistency – done right – frees up your time, energizes you, and gives you results. Here are three tips to give you a new perspective on consistency:
- Structure your consistency on a larger scale. Entrepreneurs start businesses for the freedom from a regular schedule – is it any surprise that you’re bored and resistant to a day-in, day-out rote version of consistency? Instead of having daily tasks, consider tackling them on a weekly or monthly basis. I consistently do the majority of my marketing each month in just one or two days – often in just a few hours on the last few days of the month. If I had to do my tasks a few at a time each day, I’d go crazy.
- Build variety into your consistency. Most entrepreneurs I know crave new experiences, so variety is a key value to honor in business. Some example of variety paired with consistency: be consistent about networking, with the variety of attending various events; be consistent about touching base with past customers, with the variety of how you contact them (email, mail, social media, phone); be consistent about email marketing, with the variety of sending out tips, videos and photos. Variety keeps you engaged, and helps you avoid falling victim to distraction.
- Evaluate your consistency… consistently. Even if you’ve scheduled your consistency to give you freedom and structured it to give you variety, if you aren’t seeing results, you’ll just be consistently busy with nothing to show for your efforts. To counteract this, simply track your actions and evaluate your results, then be quick to adjust them when needed.
Bonus tip: Get an outside perspective. Whether from a coach, mentor, or peer, do not struggle to figure this all out on your own! If you want to be consistent and get results faster, learn from others. It’s one of the top three mistakes freedom-seeking entrepreneurs make: avoiding asking for help.
Change your perspective on consistency, then implement your new perspective and instead of being bored, distracted, and unmotivated, you will be engaged, focused, energized – and seeing results!
I NEVER Want to Exercise
I was frantic. I wanted to go to the gym in the afternoon. You must understand – I NEVER want to exercise, so I seriously needed to take advantage of this sudden burst of motivation.
The problem was, I was mired in important but tedious tasks that I did not want to do. Simple things, things that I could give to a 6th grader to complete. All day I avoided doing them, but kept up a steady stream of mental chatter, “What’s wrong with you? Just do it. It’s no big deal. Get off your duff and just do it. What’s wrong with you?”…ad nauseum.
Not only was I avoiding those piddly tasks, but I also didn’t feel comfortable moving on to the more important tasks pertaining to business development and marketing.
So here’s the rundown:
- I was spinning in circles
- I was talking to myself in a not very nice way
- I wasn’t getting the tedious done
- I wasn’t getting the important things done
- I wasn’t going to get to the gym
Then…MAGIC happened. I picked up the phone and asked my Virtual Assistant for help.
I realized that I had to delegate the really tiny tasks. The ones that I tell myself will only take 5 minutes, so what’s the big deal?
The big deal is that those tiny tasks drain us if we do them, make us feel guilt-ridden if we don’t, and either way prevent us from working on the critical tasks of business building and development.
I strongly recommend that everyone who thinks they can’t afford administrative support, think again. If you want to grow, you have to get assistance. And it doesn’t need to be a huge investment!
Many business owners find they get all of the administrative support they need for around $300 per month. In a fraction of the time, Virtual Assistants complete the tedious tasks that drag the life out of you. Trust me, it’s worth it!