The Growth Coach Franchise System had its Annual National Conference in Las Vegas in mid-October.  The weather was spectacular and our franchise owners were enthusiastic to learn best practices from each other, to bond, and to gain additional strategies to serve more clients, touch more lives, and make more money.  Based on the outstanding evaluations, our mission was accomplished!

This Conference was our largest and best conference to date.  As the founder and president of The Growth Coach, it’s very humbling and a bit overwhelming to look out to a large audience of go-givers in a massive conference hall and see how far our business coaching franchise system has come in a little over seven years since May 2003 … when our first franchise owner joined our system and our mission.

Since Las Vegas, the gambling capital of the world, was the backdrop of our Conference, we wanted to emphasize that while it’s OK and fun to gamble for entertainment purposes and within your means, it’s not OK to gamble with your business.  If fact, our theme was “Don’t Gamble with Your Business”.  Many business owners unfortunately do. They take a reactive approach to running their businesses and lives.  Their strategies very often are HOPE and THIS TOO SHALL PASS.  Strategies that simply don’t work.

While the vast majority of our Conference is franchise-owner-led educational sessions (we discovered peer-to-peer education is the most effective way to learn), I did open up the Conference this year with a challenge to the entire group that also tied together all the speakers and topics around our common theme.  This year, I gave a 15-minute motivational talk on Don’t Gamble with Your Business and used the simple acronym G.A.M.B.L.E. to drive home six strategies for greater success and fulfillment. I thought our Growth Coach Blog readers would like to at least read a few of the key points I made on each of the six areas during my talk.

Growth. How are you personally growing as an owner and leader?  If you aren’t, you are gambling with your business. Your business and your income will not grow until YOU grow. To face reality about how you spend your time and your money, check your calendar system and checkbook.  Did you make personal growth and development a real priority the past 12 months?   Did you get some coaching help?  Did you buy helpful books and CDs?  As an owner, you must continue to learn and grow. As John Wooden, the great UCLA basketball coach said, “It’s what you learn after you know it all that really counts.”  As an owner and leader, you must learn to get comfortable being uncomfortable.  Great wealth and fulfillment await you but you must leave your comfort zone.  What’s your personal growth and development plan for the next 90 days?

Accountability. Are you spending time making money or making excuses? Are you wasting precious time blaming the government, competitors, customers or the economy?  If so, you are gambling with your business. Stop!  Your business will not soar to higher levels until you take 100% responsibility and ownership for your results. If you aren’t taking full responsibility, you are playing the role of a victim. Stop giving your power away to other people or other circumstances.  As long as you blame others, rationalize poor performance, or make excuses and don’t take full responsibility for your results … you are gambling with your business.  Instead, ask yourself every day, “What can I do TODAY to improve MY business?”.  Give yourself and your business one of the greatest gifts … the gift of accountability. Hire a business coach or create an accountability partner (CPA, banker, attorney, business partner, etc.) to help hold your feet to the fire and to take your business and personal satisfaction to a whole new level.  How will you improve your level of accountability in the next 90 days?

Marketing. Never forget you are in the business of marketing.  Without marketing, you aren’t in business or won’t be for long. In fact, if marketing is not one of your top 3 priorities, you are gambling with your business and future.  Again, look at your checkbook and your calendar system to find out if you are truly making marketing a real priority.  Stop thinking and acting like a technician and expert.  Technical expertise is never sufficient to manage and grow a business.  That is ego-driven.  Only marketing will grow your business and profits. Spend time thinking about how to generate and close more qualified leads.  Also, have a greater passion for what you give than what you get … a real go-giver marketing mindset. Decide to become a marketing expert, not a technical expert in your business.  Your business and all your additional customers will thank you.  Don’t gamble with marketing or your business.

Beliefs. What is holding you and your business back from greater results?  It’s your fears, uncertainties and doubts. It’s your limiting beliefs that put a ceiling on greater success and satisfaction. As Mark Twain said, “It’s not what you don’t know that holds you back, it’s what you know for sure that just ain’t so.”  What faulty assumptions, sacred cows, and limiting beliefs (“We’ve always done it this way”) could be restricting you and your growth?  If you don’t like your results, look beyond your actions. Go back and look at the real cause … what are your feelings and thoughts?  What are you uncomfortable doing but you know you should be doing?  For example, are you not asking enough times for the business simply because you fear rejection?  Or are you uncomfortable making public presentations?  If you can’t get out of your restrictive comfort zone, get some coaching help. Don’t gamble with your business. Some limiting beliefs and negative stories/movies in your head are definitely getting in your way of greater success. Every business owner has such growth inhibitors. And like them, your biggest breakthroughs will occur in your mind.  You must learn to replace limiting beliefs with empowering ones.

Leverage. Every business owner needs to find more leverage in their business.  Leverage is simply getting the greatest result/return with the least amount of time, effort, money or risk. It’s all about intelligent laziness.  Learn to leverage employees, marketing, best practices, technology, business systems, referral sources, strategic alliances, etc.  Stop doing everything yourself. Your role is not to be the Chief Everything Officer.  Again, hire a business coach or ask one of your current advisers to help you develop ways to serve more clients, more often, and provide more value.  It’s through leverage where you will achieve real wealth … stop doing everything on a one-to-one basis or small scale.  Think and act big. After all, your income is determined by how many customers you serve and how well you serve them.  Get beyond yourself.  You should be owning a business, NOT working a job.  If you aren’t finding ways every month to bring greater leverage into your company, you are gambling with your business.

Enjoyment. Are you enjoying the journey of being a business owner? Or, do you feel overworked, overwhelmed and like a prisoner to your business?  Running a business should NOT be painful or exhausting.  If so, you are doing it wrong.  Your business should simply be a vehicle for a better life … not steal your life. As a business owner, you need to have balance in your life … for your sake and the sake of your family and employees. When at work, be at work.  When at home, be at home … turn off all electronic devices. Disconnect from work, and focus 100% on your loved ones.  Also, get some coaching help so you learn to work smarter, not harder. It’s possible for you to fall in love with your business again. But you will need to focus on making a real difference in the lives of your customers.  Again, have a greater passion for what you give than what you get.  That will help you focus on providing real value and having more fun. Focus on your vision and your company’s mission … why you started the business in the first place.  Reconnect with your passion.

For example, our Growth Coach mission is simple but powerful … it draws all of us together and makes business fun and exciting. Our mission is to help improve North America one community at a time by helping the small business owners in those communities achieve greater success, balance and fulfillment.  We help our clients to make more, work less, and enjoy richer lives by transforming their mindsets and behaviors … and they, in turn, transform the structure, operations, and results of their business.  In short, we empower our clients to proactively shape their businesses and lives according to their dreams, wishes and goals.  As a result, The Growth Coach mission literally helps to make a difference in the lives of several thousand small business owners each and every year and a countless number of their employees, customers, suppliers/vendors, and all the families and community members that depend on such healthy and successful businesses. That makes business fun, and very meaningful and significant for all of us at The Growth Coach. If you want to be part of our mission … learn more about our business coaching franchise opportunities.

Hope you enjoyed reading this Growth Coach Blog … and remember, Don’t GAMBLE with YOUR BUSINESS!