“More from 24” Part 6 – Sharpen your Saw

Part 6: "Do you Sharpen your Saw?"

"If we are business owners with staff, we are teachers, trainers, mentors, and coaches. Therefore, we must become students of learning ourselves." This highlights an essential perspective on being a leader: "Leaders Are Learners."

So, what are you learning at the moment to make your business better next year than it was this year? Are you sharpening the saw or are you just applying a lot of effort and activity with essentially just a really blunt saw? Activity with accomplishment is just Busyness not Business. 

I want to suggest to you, based on my experience working with hundreds of businesses, that around 3% to 5% of all businesses are truly intentional, following a business plan, sharpening your saw, and expecting the upcoming financial year to be significantly different from the one they have just lived through.

Teachers, trainers, mentors, and coaches are typically seen as sources of knowledge and guidance, imparting information and skills to their students or mentees. However, effective educators understand the value of continuous learning and personal growth themselves.

As teachers, trainers, mentors, or coaches, we must stay updated with new information, research, and methodologies in our respective fields. We need to adapt teaching styles, refine our approaches, and deepen our understanding to effectively support and facilitate the learning process of our staff, from trainees to management.

By embracing a mindset of being students of learning, leaders and educators recognise that there is always more to discover, explore, and improve upon. They seek to expand their own knowledge, gain new insights, and refine their teaching practices, thereby enhancing their ability to guide and inspire others.

Business coaching is a key asset in this journey. A Coach can help you in the following ways:

Change: The change process is critical to growth and development. However, if you approach change with the wrong motive and through the wrong dynamic, you could experience limited growth or never truly implement changes that stick and bring true benefits. If you simply rearrange the furniture, your house may look different, but have you truly been affected by the beneficial change you desire?

Openness: A key ingredient of entering into a coaching relationship is being open to and exploring new ideas. A problem is rarely solved with the thinking that created it. Therefore, remember that "Something changes when something changes." What is the first something that needs to change? Are you ready to make that change? Are you invested and inspired by the desired result you want to see from change?

Accountability: There are things we have a desire to do, and those things require very little motivation. Then there are things we may not want to do, but we know they need to be done. However, they never get done because there is no accountability. Coaching provides the accountability you need until you develop self-discipline. Self-discipline is a secondary action and benefit of accountability.

Courage: Having courage is not the absence of fear; it is the reality that your fear could derail you if you let it, and you have made a decision to "do it afraid." Courage is a muscle in the mind that develops over time from exercise. You need to face your future with courage because most people dramatically underestimate what could be achieved in their future if they could just overcome their fears. In coaching, we talk about unhealthy and healthy fear, rational and irrational fear, how to manage and overcome fear, and how confidence is built on the application of courage, not the absence of difficulty.

Honesty: In every relationship in life, honesty works best. Honest people always look forward, while dishonest people always look backward. "Every lie you create keeps you from your preferred outcome." Additional lies follow primary lies, and eventually, your half-truths become your whole truth with the wrong half leading the way. If you truly want to embrace your future, you must walk in honesty and deal with what needs to be dealt with.

The future we embrace is directly connected to the vision we carry and our perceived ability to make that vision become reality. The five principles of coaching are critical to achieving preferred outcomes and planning a life you really want to live through a business on purpose.

At our BOP Workshop "More from 24," our aim is to equip you to discover and develop a strategic plan for your business that may place your business on a deliberate path to success. You will discover new ideas, strategies, and frameworks you can structure your business on over the upcoming fiscal year that will have dynamic repercussions for your future.

In our upcoming BOP Workshop, "More from 24," one of the topics will be Strategically aligning each aspect of your business to make sure your growth is profitable and your want to grow small! We want to help you Growth your business sustainably and Profitably.

The workshop is a virtual event and will take place from 6-8 pm each Wednesday night in July, specifically on the 5th, 12th, 19th, and 26th.

Remember to book your place at "More from 24" by visiting the following link: https://bopaustralia.com/event/more-from-24/

Find a Business Coach to have a conversation with and start your new financial year with a "Business on Purpose." I hope that coach is me!

Wishing you a wonderful week ahead! Cheers, Ian