Welcome, all 2020 overcomers to the hope-filled clean slate that is 2021!
If you are anything like my clients, you are eager to sink your professional teeth into something meaty and substantial to feed your hungry business for the New Year!
You need more than a guarantee for the year ahead.
You need a warranty.
Because, while guarantees are great, they are ultimately dependent on the integrity of Who is responsible?
And, if it’s anyone but you, well, you and your business are vulnerable.
That’s why I like the idea of the warranty.
Warranties are advance directives of the spelled-out specifics of what to do in case of emergency or worse, failure.
Warranties solve unexpected, inconvenient business breakdowns.
A warranty unlike a guarantee (do those exist anymore?) doesn’t mean that things aren’t going to go wrong. A warranty is the promise to protect your business with a well-thought-out plan of action, execution, roles, and responsibilities for when things go wrong.
The legacy of 2020 is that all of us need to warranty our business. These 8 habit principles are a necessary part of any business’ warranty.
8 Crucial Habit Principals
- Avoid reacting emotionally at the moment. Step back and allow the margin between, reaction and response to be weighed and measured with a pause. The distance between disaster and blessing is the cultivated habit of not getting emotionally hijacked. The evidence that this is working in your business is your clear-headedness.
- Respond wisely. A response is a decision. The best decisions are made within a framework of priorities, values, and purpose. When this process is broken, decision fatigue occurs. Lack of commitment to values, confused priorities, and purpose not anchored to goals results in erratic decision making which is ineffective and broken. The evidence of good decision-making is alignment with values, priorities, and purpose that can be mapped to a clear, defined goal that honors why you chose to be in this business in the first place.
- Focus. Your business future is dependent on your ability to focus on the right activity, right now with consistency. Right focus results in becoming unstoppable. The unstoppable professional cannot be beaten. Make it a habit.
- Change. This is required when the distance between where you are today and where your goals are is getting farther and farther apart. Flexibility and resourcefulness change mindsets. The evidence that you must change is you are not growing.
- Stop looking for answers. What you need are better questions. Start with these:
- What do you know you should do?
- What will happen if you do that?
- What is standing in the way of you doing what you know you must do?
- What can you do right now to overcome what is standing in your way of doing what you must?
Knowing the next right step results from asking the right questions. The evidence of a valuable warranty process for your business is you taking action.
- Measure the evidence. Don’t just take the evidence for granted. Count it. Make sure it adds up. If it does, that’s proof things are working. If it doesn’t, you’re in denial. And a problem you refuse to acknowledge cannot be solved and therefore does not benefit from a warranty.
- Aim for the evidence. If the goal seems too far off right now shoot for the evidence that you are moving closer to the target. The goal becomes achievable when you get into the line of fire; close enough to shoot for that dream of a business you’re sure to have if you keep focusing on the activity that produces evidence of forwarding momentum.
- Test the target. Don’t fool yourself by hitting the wrong target! Hitting targets named comfortable and easy comes at the cost of dreams and desires and only feels good for a season. The prize for that is regret.
And, regret is not covered under any warranty.
A suggested method to use these 8 principles is to pick the one or two that you know you are struggling with. Reflect on them. Brainstorm the many ways to put these principles into practice. And, then, DO IT!
Cathleen Mancino is a Peak Performance Sales and Leadership Coach specializing in helping clients make impactful presentations that get clients motivated to make decisions! For more information or to schedule a private session with Cathleen, visit www.theslingshotmethod.com or schedule an introduction by clicking here https://calendly.com/mybestslingshot/15min