The equation for a successful business (& life)
So, I you ask, what is the equation for a successful business?
You may have noticed it’s been a bit quieter on LinkedIn from me recently-a bit less ‘original’ material and a bit more ‘sharing’. And you’d be right. As a consequence of growth in 2 business has now (un)necessarily increased the amount of ‘DO’ing activity in my days, with a corresponding decrease in ‘BE’ing type space and reflector. And guess what? The ideas dry up and the brain gets crowded. I’ve because a busy fool. A frustrated, not so efficient, out-of-flow type of fool. And has all this frantic ‘doing’ actually delivered the goods? Well not exactly…
Isn’t that interesting!
Enter a happy coincidence (strange how that often happens!!). Just as I’m thinking there has to be a better way, it’s time for our half yearly ActionCOACH conference, where all the UK ActionCOACHes get together for a few days packed of learning. It was so, so tempting to skip this as I can ill afford 1 ½ days out of the business… But I’ve paid, places are booked, and the diary is cleared- so off I went!
Half a day in and there’s a strong theme of ‘mindset’ emerging through many of the speaker sessions. Perfect! A forced time to reflect. Similar, re-enforcing messages coming in from different angles.
Within a few hours of arriving back in Buckinghamshire, I felt clear headed, more in control, more in my zone, and yes, the words have started to flow again. All providing further confirmation of the equation for life’s success- BE x DO = HAVE
So simple and yet life changing…
In order to have more (eg more time, more money, a better team) we need to ‘DO’ more (taking actions) and ‘BE’ more learning and self-improvement. What we have in life is a product of who we are being and what we are doing.
When we neglect one or other half, the results diminish, and you have less.
It’s easy to sacrifice your learning at the expense of getting another hour/day at the desk but this is a very short-sighted strategy. The bolder choice is to invest in both being and doing in equal measure, if you’re serious about optimising results.
So, when did you last take your foot off the gas? Take time to step back, take yourself out of your daily environment and do some serious personal learning? It feels like a luxury we can’t afford to do-but in reality, it’s a necessity we can’t afford not to do.
Protect your time and invest in yourself and you’ll be paid back handsomely. And by the way- if it works for you-it’s going to work for your team too!
