Archive for the ‘Coaching’ Category
Does Your Business Have Values?
I first realized the importance of a value-based company when I visited Zappos recently and was inspired by a business that operates daily off of a specific set of values to serve the company and the customers. It really got me thinking about my own values for Team Suzanne and how living those values daily serves my clients, my subscribers, and my life.
We often get so busy marketing, strategizing, and serving that we don’t take the time to identify our core values for the business. I think this is one of the most important visions I have created for myself lately and when you can stay on track with your business values, you naturally help more people and make more money. It is really key to have them in writing so that you can be reminded of your purpose. We all get busy, overwhelmed, and frustrated. When your mission gets marginalized by life, you can revisit these and get back on track.
Here are the values of Team Suzanne! I am proud to say that I strive to work and live by these daily as does my office and support team:
Who’s Recruiting You?
We are all being recruited all the time. Walk through the airport and you’ll be recruited for credit cards. Visit church with a friend you’ll be recruited to come back. Walk through the mall and Auntie Ann’s will recruit you to have a pretzel sample.
As human beings it is in our nature to recruit. We are not solitary human beings…which is why everyone is born with a natural ability to sale. So stop for a moment and think about who is recruiting you.
I constantly see individuals who don’t show up, want to quit, and don’t ask for help find it easier to recruit other people into believing that a program isn’t working or they will not succeed or “it’s not your fault … it’s the coach, the program, the people, the style”. Misery loves company.
I’ve Never Fit In
I’ve Never Fit In. And I refuse to try.
The first 30 years of my life I did try. I didn’t really know any different.
I skipped slumber parties at 7 if it was the same night as 60 Minutes and at 6 I gave a political speech for Geraldine Ferraro — none of my friends knew who she was. As I grew older I could have cared less about High School drama and instead I spent the summers training as a professional water skier and I started a professional acting career when I was 4.
Don’t get me wrong. I wanted to hang with the cool kids and I did — I could hang out with anybody… I like people and so I got along with the nerds, hung out with the preps, and weekended with the dreadlocked hippy group at school.
But I never really fit anywhere. I would try. I was extremely malleable and so I would shift and change and try to be whoever I needed to in that moment — it never really worked.
- I have been overweight since I was 5.
- I have been bossy since 3.
- I have been the girl who does a little of everything forever.
I wasn’t fitting in. And I floundered between it bothering me deeply and total apathy.
Until I turned 32.
Are You In a Practice Or a Business?
As a coach, when you talk about “your practice”, it has a definition and an insinuation of one-on-one coaching. It is important to build coaching businesses that aren’t solely based on one-on-one coaching. Certainly one-on-one coaching is a component – and for some people a very large component – of their coaching business, but you cannot build a successful business when only offering one-on-one coaching.
Here’s the challenge with businesses that are only one-on-one coaching: when you only build a coaching practice, it means that the only money you can earn is when you are present. It means that for every dollar you make, you must spend a certain amount of your own time.
That’s a recipe for serious trouble for a few reasons.
Launch a Coaching Business: 4 Secrets for Authenticity and Success
Something that generates a great amount of curiosity is the fact that I built my coaching business to a relatively large level of success while working a day job.
People wonder how I did it so quickly and if there is a step-by-step roadmap that they can use. I’ll share my four secrets to my success when launching or growing a business. They aren’t complicated marketing formulas. In fact, their sheer simplicity may shock you.
1.) Be willing to make a fool of yourself every day.
I remember riding the train from New Jersey to New York to my day job. I was journaling in a notebook and I thought, “Gosh, how am I going to do this?” I had bought into the mantra, “Build it and they will come,” but when I first started my business, I was struggling to get clients.
And as I was writing in my notebook, this came to me:
“If I am willing to make a fool of myself every day, this is all going to work out.”
If you are willing to be the change that you want to see in the world, you are going to look a little out of the ordinary. You’re going to seem a little off-center. You may even be called crazy.
Think of all the people in the history of the world who have been seen as, “Oh my gosh, that person’s a nut job,” from Jesus Christ to Gandhi to Rosa Parks to historians to political figures.
The realization I had today was that I have a message and I am determined to share that message. So, I can’t worry about what friends or family members think. I can’t worry about failing in front of my colleagues. I needed to be willing to be the fool.
Learn The Rest of Suzanne’s Secrets for Authenticity and Success
