For some people it is a sound (think finger nails on a chalkboard) while for others it’s visual (picture of a politician from the other side).  Regardless, we all have something that makes us cringe instinctually.

I’ve got a few myself, and I recently noticed that I developed a new one. It turns out that I wince every time I hear someone make an excuse for not getting something accomplished.

It’s gotten so bad that I have a tendency to completely disengage from conversations whenever I hear it happen.  Don’t I sound like fun?

The reason I find excuses so frustrating is that after coaching hundreds of executives, I am 100% certain that they are the main reason people struggle to achieve their goals.

Intellectually speaking, most of the business challenges I address are easy to fix.  Sales are slow? Increase your prospecting. Employees aren’t doing their jobs? Reset expectations and hold them accountable. Customers don’t come back often enough? Ask them to return.

It’s not rocket science.

Unfortunately, most people know what to do, they just don’t enjoy the behavior required to change and thus make an excuse to remain the same.

This message was inspired by a book I recently finished titled, “The War of Art” by Steven Pressfield. He argues that within everyone there is a force called “resistance” that is determined to keep you from any meaningful achievement.  He points out that this resistance “presents us with a series of plausible, rational justifications for why we shouldn’t do our work.”

I believe this resistance is real and see it most often when someone tells me that they didn’t accomplish a task because they “ran out of time”.

That’s nonsense.  Time is the great equalizer.  We all have 24 hours in a day and 365 days in a year. It’s impossible to run out of time.

When you allow yourself to use that excuse, what you’re really saying is that you allowed something else to take the place of the activity you didn’t accomplish.  You don’t have a time problem, you have a prioritization problem.

There’s only one way to fix this issue.  Get crystal clear about what’s really important in your life and keep in mind that not everything can be important. You can’t put in the most hours at the office and spend quality time with your family. Something’s got to give.

In other words, you’re going to have to learn to say “no” and get comfortable with the consequences.  I will promise you one thing for certain; clarity around your priorities will cut your stress level in half.  In addition, it will bring more joy and contentment to the people and experiences that are really important.

As with most things in life, the solution is simple.  All you need to do is execute.

I have a tendency to over analyze from time to time. I tell myself that I will wait until I capture a little more information before I pull the trigger on a decision. Eventually, I realize that it’s often just fear that keeps me from moving forward. What’s holding you back? CJ PS – Pull the trigger today and sign up for  ThriveMap.

]]> http://www.goreachmore.com/2012/05/14/pull-the-trigger/feed/ 0 http://www.goreachmore.com/2012/05/08/move-the-needle-understand-your-target-market/ http://www.goreachmore.com/2012/05/08/move-the-needle-understand-your-target-market/#comments Tue, 08 May 2012 17:47:49 +0000 CJ McClanahan http://www.goreachmore.com/?p=1425 Last year, I was having breakfast with a colleague at a restaurant that is near my office.  I bumped into a handful of current/past clients and a few great prospects.  Afterwards, I realized that I had really enjoyed spending time with people who valued my time and expertise.

Then, I went back to my office and looked at my calendar for the week.  Unfortunately, I had too many appointments with individuals who were going to complain about their business, my fees and life in general. I asked myself the following types of questions – “Who would I rather spend time with? Who values my services the most? Who can I help get the best results? What type of client is the most profitable?”

The answers to these questions helped me to see that over the past several years I had spent a portion of my efforts targeting the wrong market.  I had lost sight of the type of customer that was the best fit for my services.  The result was that my business hadn’t grown as quickly as I desired and my margins were being squeezed.

If you’re like most small business owners you have on more than one occasion lost your way and spent too many resources trying to get the wrong person to buy from you.  The reason you allowed this to happen is that you desperately want to be everything to everyone because you don’t want to miss out on any opportunities.

The problem with this approach (selling to everyone) is that you lose your focus on those customers that generate the most profit. Remember, you are in business not make a profit, not just to generate revenue. St Elmo’s could probably generate more revenue by reducing their prices and opening 10 stores throughout central Indiana, but what would that do to their profit?

You need to ask yourself the same questions I did last year and a few others to determine the best target market for your products and services.  Here you go – Who likes buying from you? Who do you enjoy doing business with? Who doesn’t question your prices every other order? Which customers generate the most profit? Which customers provide you with the best referrals?

As soon as you have a crystal clear set of answers to these questions you then need to review your current marketing plan to see if you are targeting the right group of prospects.  In addition, this exercise will probably reveal that you need to get rid of a handful of your current clients.  (You can blame it on me if it will make the conversation easier.)

There you go – a simple exercise for helping you refocus your marketing efforts.   As with most things in life, the solution is simple.  All you need to do is choose to execute.  Choose wisely.

And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”

- Steve Jobs

This has become a very famous quote for good reason.  Too many people get trapped in living to impress others. How about you? PS – Interested in finding out what’s important to you?   Click here.

]]> http://www.goreachmore.com/2012/05/07/are-you-listening/feed/ 0 http://www.goreachmore.com/2012/05/01/learning-changing/ http://www.goreachmore.com/2012/05/01/learning-changing/#comments Tue, 01 May 2012 13:14:46 +0000 CJ McClanahan http://www.goreachmore.com/?p=1420 “Learn everything you can, anytime you can, from anyone you can – there will always come a time when you will be grateful you did.” – Sarah Caldwell

I was blessed to spend the last 4 days with arguably the most influential success coach in the world – Jack Canfield. In addition, to meeting a group of talented entrepreneurs, I learned some fascinating new techniques for changing behavior. What impressed me the most about Jack, is his commitment to continuous improvement. Despite the fact that he is considered the expert in his field, he is always attending a new workshop, reading a book or listening to a course on CD. How committed are you to learning? CJ PS – Looking for a great opportunity to learn something new? Click here to get the details.

]]> http://www.goreachmore.com/2012/05/01/learning-changing/feed/ 0 http://www.goreachmore.com/2012/04/25/move-the-needle-measure-everything/ http://www.goreachmore.com/2012/04/25/move-the-needle-measure-everything/#comments Wed, 25 Apr 2012 16:26:38 +0000 CJ McClanahan http://www.goreachmore.com/?p=1416 Each time I meet with a business owner, they quickly inform me that they want more revenue, higher margins, more leads, a better conversation rate or higher productivity from their staff.

My answer is usually, “I can help you with all of these!” However, before I can provide a business owner with any guidance, I need to know a little bit about their company. So, I always, ask them to provide me with at least a 1 year historical analysis of their business including a look at their revenue, margins, number of leads generated, conversion rate and productivity of staff.

Unfortunately, 97.4% of the time, the owner looks at me like I just asked him/her the square root of 5,676,345. In other words, other than revenue (which they don’t really know until after the tax return is complete) most owners don’t really understand their business.

The big problem is that if an owner doesn’t understand these fundamental KPI’s (key performance indicators) in their business, they will not be successful because you can’t improve what you don’t measure!  If their sales went up in the previous month, and they can’t tell me where the leads came from it’s unlikely that they can repeat this result on a consistent basis.  In other words – they got lucky.

The good news is that, like just about everything in small business the solution to this dilemma is intellectually simple.  All you need to do is to set up a handful of simple procedures to test and measure the important KPI’s in the business.  And in case you’re not sure what these are, I’m going to get you started.

Because nothing happens with a prospect, I recommend you start with your marketing KPI’s which include the amount of leads you generate each month and the source of each lead.  The best way to track this information is through the use of a customer relationship management (CRM) system.  These systems are typically fairly inexpensive and easy to use.

Next, it’s important that you understand how many of these leads became clients and the activity necessary to get to a yes/no.  In other words, you’ll have to track your sales process and conversion rate.  Both of these can be done in your CRM system.  (Don’t panic – my next column will be all about which CRM is right for you.)

As soon as you get a client, if you’re at all interested in a referral or repeat business, you had better measure their satisfaction.  The best way to get this information is through a simple survey that ensures you met and (hopefully exceeded) their expectations.  There are many inexpensive tools on the web (e.g. – www.surveymonkey.com) to make this happen.

Finally, nothing matters in your business unless you are carefully measuring the financial results of your efforts.  As I discussed a few weeks back, you should understand your break even, gross margins and compare your monthly results to a simple budget.

There you go – four fundamental KPI’s that every business owner should understand.  As with most things in life, the solution is simple.  All you need to do is choose to execute.  Choose wisely.

Now, in addition to knowing how to play chess, my daughter has gained something far more important. She now knows that if she applies herself she can learn something new.

This is one of many, many lessons my mother in law has taught my kids.  Her passion for leaning and improving is helping my kids become the best they can be.

Now, if she can just learn how to pronounce “Washington”.

What are you learning today?

Why would any person in their right mind pay nearly $4 for a small coffee? Can it really be that good?

One of the reasons we continue to visit Starbucks® by millions each and every day is that they provide something that we all crave – predictability and consistency.  It has very little to do with the taste of the coffee.

How does Starbucks® deliver such a reliable experience every single time? It’s for the same reason that a Big Mac® served in Houston, TX tastes the same as one served in Vancouver, British Columbia.  Both McDonald’s® and Starbucks® have developed and implemented a simple set of systems in each of their stores around the globe.

If you’re interested in building a successful small business you had better be prepared to follow in their shoes.

Michael Gerber, the author of the bestselling book, The E-Myth, points out that “the true value of the business is the business itself”.  What he means is that it doesn’t matter if you sell coffee, groceries, accounting services or printing.  All that matters is that you have developed systems that can deliver predictable results (profit being the most important) each and every time.

Like just about everything in small business, intellectually speaking, building systems is easy. Unfortunately, disciplining yourself to do it is difficult.  Here are a few simple tips to get you started.

First, you will need to put together an outline or table of contents for your systems. While every business is different, they all share the same fundamental components. I would star with the following – marketing, sales, product/service delivery, customer service, operations and accounting.

Next, pick the area where you believe developing a system will add the most value.  The area you choose depends on what’s going on in your business. For example, if you are generating a ton of leads but unable to convert them into clients you should focus on a sales system.  If these clients aren’t returning to buy more products/services or referring you any new business, you may need to consider building a product/service delivery system.

Once you have selected the first system, schedule a meeting with everyone in your company who is involved with the process.  Get them all around a table and start from the beginning documenting every single step in the system.  A big white board is often helpful because it allows you to visually map out the process.

Lastly, after all steps have been documented, you ask the room to help identify places in the process where key performance indicators can be captured.  These will help you measure the effectiveness of the new system.  For example, if you are starting with sales, you will want to identify a conversion rate at each step in the process to identify that are in need of the most improvement.

There you go – three steps for building a simple system.  As with most things in life, the solution is simple.  All you need to do is choose to execute.  Choose wisely.

Don Miller, asks this question in his recent book A Million Miles in a Thousand Years.

As I reflected on my own life, I found myself agreeing with his insight that you always seem to remember occasions that had the most emotional impact on you – whether positive or negative.

You may not remember getting an “A” on the midterm, but you will remember the all-nighter you had to pull to get there.

I have no memory of crossing the finish line of my first half marathon, but I do remember the joy I felt after I hit the 10 mile mark and knew I was going to make it.

Miller believes that our life is comprised of stories that are filled with these types of memories. He argues that our goal in life should be to embrace the memories and enjoy the journey.

Who cares about the diploma on your wall or the trophy?  What really matters is the person you are becoming or as Miller puts it:

“The reward you get from a story is always less than you thought it would be, and the work is harder than you imagined.  The point of the story is never about the ending.  It’s about your character getting molded in the hard work of the middle.”

What’s your story?