In a meeting last week with one of my Platinum clients, Brian, reviewing the goals he had achieved since we began work in January, he shared an “Ah Ha!” he’s had.

“Linda, when you kept steering me to simplify my Vision, I didn’t want to hear it. I wasn’t ready to. But, wow! Once I heard you, once I followed your process and created that simple vision – it’s all taken off like a rocket!”

Now, prior to this, Brian had been having difficulty getting his team on board. He couldn’t get all their activities pulling in the same direction towards the same goals. When we took a look at the reasons for the weak results, the confusion behind it became apparent. Everyone on his team had a different understanding of what the objectives were.

For the lack of a clear vision, all their time, intelligence and energy was having minimal results. Instead, the was lots of wasted time every day, by well-intentioned professionals…

A real shame to have all those resources wasted. But that didn’t have to be the way they operated for the long-term.

What do I mean by ‘simplify’ your vision?

The reason this is so helpful is that simplicity and clarity at the beginning, from the top, becomes the starting point for every activity in your business. ‘Simplify’ your vision.. and you can make it easier to identify your ideal target market. Simplify your ideal target market…  and you can focus all your marketing efforts so that you’re easier for them to find. Simplify your marketing… rather than trying to be all things to all people… and you make yourself easier to understand and an easier solution to buy.

Moreover, while it becomes easy to see the impact that your Vision’s simplicity has on your external presence in your chosen market, it’s as important inside your company.

Why?

Because you can simplify your operations. Simplify the solution you’re trying to offer and you can simplify your delivery of that solution. Your time and that of your entire team, gets used doing the right things at the right time, without needing to spend time straightening out confusion, conflicts, and plain old inefficient time wasting by everyone.

That in turn means you can simplify your systems, the processes you use to get work done, which leads to simpler results, that are simpler to measure and track, and simpler train new people to produce. And so on.

That doesn’t mean thinking flies out the door. On the contrary, it means each person can ask “Is this in line with our Vision?” for themselves, to help keep the entire company’s efforts pulling in the same direction towards the same goals.

Each person becomes a Visionary and Brilliant Problem Solver for your business.

Whether you are heading a major organization, or a division, or your own small business, the result is the same.

As you set a clear vision, it becomes apparent what is out-of alignment, wasted time and effort, busy work for busy sake rather than the best path to deliver solutions to your customers.

Of course, setting a new Vision, or a cleaned up Vision, or your first one ever, often makes people fearful. The most common reason I hear from my program participants is that “I’ll have to stop doing a lot of what we’re doing here.”

Indeed, that is the exact choice that Brian faced, that I face, and that you will face.

But I ask you, in this economy, do you want to be putting all that time, energy and intelligence into doing things that are expensive busy work, or put them into focused, high payoff activities that are simpler, targeted, lower cost, more highly profitable?

You have the opportunity, right now, to step back. Step out of the business of habit and ongoing activity and take ten to fifteen minutes and look for the simplest vision you can hold, that humms and excites you.

Or, you can keep yourself very busy, and delay achieving the goals you say you want.

My vote? SIMPLIFY your Vision.

Thanksgiving is always a great time for pausing and taking stock, then acknowledging what HAS been successful this past year. I spent a lot of time in hopsital waiting rooms, ICUs and funeral activities for my step-dad. Each of those hours stirred up thoughts of appreciation AND of priority.

I’ve found, from way too many personal encounters in this life time, that when shocking events strike our lives we snap into a closer focus on what is important and what is the fluff and chaff that’s clouding our view and our focus.

So Thanksgiving seemed an opportune time, as I took a deep slow breath before heading back into the business world, to reset my focus and priorities for business. I put the next article together for all of us – there’s no reason we need to wait for miserable events to refocus!

I look forward to your thoughts about all of this.

One of my clients, Don, kept waffling back and forth over which sized firms he wanted as his clients. For the lack of that focus, his efforts were scattered and outright conflicting with each other.

If you’ve been aware of hearing about the Law of Attraction recently, you’re in step with the latest message about inspiration. For nearly 25 years, I’ve seen it taught in various forms, from ‘mindfulness retreats’ to est to various Human Potential and Self-Actualization programs. Each program teaches their own frameworks, or those borrowed from the ages, to give us tools to use on a daily basis.

As with anything in life, all the techniques and frameworks are only moderately effective if you don’t KNOW where you’re going. Without a clear Vision and destination in mind you’ll either eventually get lost or it’ll take you a long time to get there, much longer than necessary.

If you’re heading out to drive into new territory and choose to do it without a roadmap, you may spend a lot of your time recognizing you’re lost and looking for road-side assistance, over and over again. It may not make sense to even head out in the first place.

Over the years, it’s been proven out that if you don’t consciously declare what you want, you’ll continually attract what your unconscious mind wants to attract rather than what you say you want.

In business, I see this play out over and over again with participants in my Productivity and Time Mastery Kick Start Program. People learn a technique or two that has the potential to double and even triple how much they accomplish in less time. They take on a commitment to using the new practices, and then come back asking for personal tune-ups.

When we take a closer look at what’s going on, they’ve go the technique down pat. They’re often missing the content – what they’re spending their time on has not been prioritized or selected to get them to a specific destination.

It’s a lot like taking a fabulous ride in a Maserati (yes, the techniques are that powerful), on a perfect day with superb road conditions… and then noticing you’ve got no idea where you’re headed, for how long, and why.

All that energy going to waste! So I want to share with you two of the tune-up steps I use with my program participants.

Pick a Focus
Over the years, I’ve seen certain entrepreneurs be completely wishy-washy about what they want. Or they’re wanting it for the reasons that are taking them off course. BIG mistake. Not knowing what you really want creates confusion in both your marketing AND your manifesting.

Here’s what I mean. Say one day you decide that you want to attract a roster of 200 clients, and you set that intention. But the next day, you decide that instead, you’re interested in only 35 private clients and systems to serve another 150 with a second tier of services. That same afternoon, you decide you don’t want ANY private clients, but instead, you want to only deal with groups. (I’ve watched this switching take place over and over with professionals.)

If you’re sitting in a restaurant placing an order and calling the waiter back over and over, to change it again and again, eventually the waiter will tell you “Call me when you know what you want.” And walk away.

The same goes in your business. For the lack of a focused Vision, every new idea pulls you off course. At that moment, all the time management techniques in the world can’t get you to your destination faster or easier.

If you’re aware that what you focus on is what you bring into your reality, whether you refer to it as the Law of Attraction or by any other term, then you’ll recognize that you’re repeatedly sending the wrong message over and over again to the Universe (or your subconscious mind, whichever you prefer).

Bless The Rest
One of the greatest fears I find my clients facing, is “But what about everyone else who could use me?” I know that fear – I struggled with it for 18 months!

When you recognize that people are looking for ‘someone who understands them’ you’ll realize you can accelerate your results by focusing your message and your marketing on them. If other folks show up – serve them if you wish. Open your grip on trying to serve everyone and keep your eye and your message on focus and you’ll find your ideal clients will be clamoring to work with you.

That  single focus will guide your product or services design so that they send a consistent message. You’ll be able to keep all your marketing and your service delivery targeted to their specific needs. This in turn will attract what you want, much faster.

Don picked a specific industry, and a target company size for his ideal clients, and 90-days later he’d doubled his active clients. Now it’s your turn!

There are a lot of techniques we can bring into our business from other areas of life. Each has the capacity to significantly shift the way we’ve been approaching business. For instance, once a year, every year, I have a personal day “off” – off from business, off from play, and off from my normal activities. It’s Yom Kippur, the Jewish day of self-examination.

I make it my commitment to stop my automatic way of living and being with others. I try my best to look honestly as what my challenges have been, how I’ve dealt with them and what I’d prefer to do differently going forward.

This particular ‘break’ is actually very structured, and the structure is easily adaptable to using it for a business ‘fasting’ day and review your business. Here’s how:

Do Your Prep Work

To have a really effective self-examination we have to start before the actual day itself. About a month ahead of time, I spend a few days thinking through how my year has gone. I make notes about what has had me stuck or where I’ve been less effective than I wish I’d been. Usually it’s focused on my personal life.

I’m sure you can see how the same preparation is the set-up that’s needed for reviewing how things have been going in your professional life. That means pull out the notes you made about your goals for the year, what you wanted to achieve. Take a fresh read through and see how close you’ve come to the mark and where you’ve missed your targets. Sort out what information or reports you’ll want to use and get them ready before the day itself.

Schedule The Day

We’re all living busy, rich and complicated lives. Whether for personal reflection or business review, you need to set aside the time and commit to it.

If you don’t put it on the calendar… well, you know how that goes. It just won’t happen. No matter which day of a week you select, weekday or weekend, you need to put it in your calendar and commit to sticking to it.

One of the wonderful aspects to Yom Kippur is that it starts at sundown. As a result I go to sleep already complete with my regular world, with my attention on how I’ll use the next day.

Deflect All Your Distractions

For those of you may not be familiar with Yom Kippur, one of the central activities is fasting, from sundown through sundown, one full day. No water, no food. In a sense it’s a deliberate halting of a person’s daily activities to be undistracted, uninterrupted, and wholly focused on what matters most.

The same is needed for your time spent looking at your business. Let everyone know ahead of time that you will not be available on that day. Then turn off your cell phone – I don’t mean put it on vibrate. Really, turn it off. Next turn off your email. Put your land-line phone on ‘hold’ or unplug it from the wall.

From the moment you get up in the morning, separate yourself from your ‘normal’ location and companions so that you don’t fall into automatic behaviors. You could call this your version of a ‘fast.’

Focus ALL Your Attention

Yom Kippur is usually spent in community surrounded by other people who have set aside their time for the same reasons. Prayer and meditations are used to guide the self-examination. And there is hours of material that help to keep my attention very focused all day.

That’s the ‘standard’ if you will. In fact, sometimes people take the fasting to another level entirely and declare a ‘speech fast’ as well. That means that they have no other conversations besides the prayers and meditations until the day is over.

Personally, I’ve had profound insights come from the ‘standard’ day, as well as on the couple of occasions when I’ve done a speech fast.

It takes extra planning to take this idea into your business review. Pick a location where you won’t be interacting with others, where you won’t even accidentally have casual ‘how are you’ conversations.

Focus On Question.

This year my personal self-examination lines up with the deep looking I’ve been doing with my business. I have all sorts of questions for myself, including whether I’m focused on the clients I want to be serving, doing the work I dream of, taking the business to the level I want.

What are the questions you’d like to taking into your review?

If you’re like most of my clients, you’ve been working to smooth out the kinks in your business. You’ve put your time into systems for streamlining activities and installed processes that make the work flow efficient.

While I was on vacation, I was bobbing along on an inner tube on the resort’s ‘lazy river’. The sun, the flow of the water, the conversation of people around me all had me unwinding and relaxing. And for a kicker, I got to enjoy the periodic 4-foot waves that tore around the curves of the river when the staff turned on the wave machine.

Just like some of the surprises that crop up in business. Fun, interesting, a brief challenge.

After those waves, I noticed all the different ways people were using that river system. The basic experience was the same for everyone: a 15-minute loop around at a constant speed, inner tubes to rest on. What changed were the variables: how people used the water, the river, the flow, the tubes themselves.

I started thinking about the way our businesses can be humming along so steadily that we forget to notice the changes we could make to enliven our workday daylight hours, and even to create High Payoff results for ourselves.

Here are some options taken from the Lazy River:

Using “The Full View”

Are you putting any energy into your business, or just bobbing along?

The basics of riding the river are to plunk your rear down in an inner tube and go with the flow. Just relax, watch the view, use your feet and hands to push off the side walls and change which way you’re facing. No other attention or effort is required.

Have you noticed where you’re facing in your business? Is your attention forward towards your Vision and Goals, or backwards along the path you’ve already traveled? Or spinning back and forth as the currents happen to take you?

Shifting Onto Your Stomach

An alternative is to lie across the tube on your stomach. It’s not as comfortable as it limits your vision and that means you’ll be making apologies to people you’ve accidentally kicked. No one really minds, and it’s actually a great way to meet others. But there’s a limit to how much control you have on the trip and you actually have to stay vigilant in order to prevent your elbow and toe skin being scraped off on the walls.

Are you limiting your own view of what is going on in your business? Are constant ‘bumps’ occurring between people that need apologies? What about with your customers? Are band-aids being used to cover the breakdowns in communication or to fix the errors made due to that limited view of how things are going?

Use Teaming Up

You don’t have to do it all yourself, even in the flow. You’ll spot as many as 5 people in a circle with their feet hooked together drifting along, each person nudging the wall to direct the group as a unit. Other folks will hook together in a chain with one leading the way and choosing which side of the mid-stream islands to use.

Just as that vacationing group is creating rapid teams and adjusting to the flow and obstacles in the river, so you need to review if your business teams are using the best configuration. Are people on the watch for opportunities and obstacles in their path? Are decisions being made as rapidly and effectively as they could be? How might your teams improve your business flow?

Loose the Tube

Not everyone in that river is on a tube! Some are walking along towing the tube. Others are chasing it or even walking and diving with no tube in sight. At least half of the children are having a blast chasing each other, enjoying the speed of their swim in the current, or even just practicing floating along.

When was the last time you stood back and took a fresh look at your business, its processes and activities and asked yourself “Is this the only way to get this accomplished?” You may find yourself towing old tubes you don’t actually need  any longer, or a new way to use your time, intelligence and energy that will open new business opportunities and growth.

Walk Against the Flow

Just because everyone else is using the tube and traveling where the current leads them doesn’t mean you have to! Not only are kids hopping off the tube and adventuring in the waters, you’ll spot me and others deliberately walking against the flow. We’re using the constant predictable dynamics of the river to create a different result: sweat free aerobic and resistance work outs by walking against the flow.

Take a Lazy River Lesson. Shift your view from the day-to-day play in your business and market to ask “What might we create if we turn our business, our products, our services on their heads?”

I’ve been thinking a lot about freedom, independence, and liberty lately. I recorded all the John Adams mini-series episodes and watched them in one swoop two weeks ago.

It was really great to learn about the challenges those early founders of the United States grappled with as they did the persistent work of getting this country organized, and launched as it’s own nation.

One of the most interesting parts of the information, at least for me, was the reminder that while those people held a common purpose, they didn’t all share the same values, goals and priorities. And so they had a lot of frustrations as their attention was pulled in many competing directions.

Just like you and me in our businesses.

I mentioned last time that the folks who tell me what they want are the ones who influence what I do in this weekly newsletter. As I continuously work to keep The Spark fresh and relevant for you, I look at the feedback you each send me.

So I’ve made it completely easy for you to let me know:

1 – What are the specific challenges you are now facing in your business?

2 – What are the specific results you wish you could create?

PLEASE, take 19 seconds, right now, to send me an email at Linda@Feinholz.com and tell me so that I can get you the High Payoff results you want.

I look forward to shaping articles, tips and programs to get you further, faster and easier! This time next year let’s be celebrating your own Independence Day

Here’s to Your Success!

If it’s been a while since you reviewed your Vision, and the action plans you’ve been following, you may have begun pursuing projects that feel like ‘shoulds’ rather than ones that have a direct, high payoff for achieving your Vision.

And if you’re keeping yourself over-worked and over-whelmed, you’re not building in time to notice that you’re putting energy into activities taking you further and further off-course.

So take a look at the most recent Vision and Objectives you set. And take a look at what you’ve got scheduled on your calendar. Ask yourself:

“What percentage of the activities I’m focusing on actually align with my Objectives?”

Make a 2-columned list – place the activities that are on track on the left and the ones that are off-track on the right.

Now create an action plan to wrap up the activities in the right-hand column in the next 10 business days. When you commit your attention fully to the actions that are aligned with your Vision, your results will be achieved much more rapidly than you ever anticipated!

Let me know the results you create!

In meetings with friends and clients this past month I asked a few people to be part of my R&D team to find out what stopped them from getting out there in a BIG way to get clients.

I also asked them to tell me the goals they set themselves being self-employed. Honestly, I was startled by the answers that rolled in, and their answers were right in line with what I hear from many other people I’ve talked to about this.

You see, most people have very LOW expectations and their actions match it. They decided that it was a fair exchange to liberate themselves from the constrictions of employment to gain full control over their work and their income. And they even capped their earnings expectations.

Using SYSTEMS and LEVERAGE techniques in marketing and managing your business, you can totally change that to create an income that is FAR beyond what you’ve assumed. I know it for a fact as I’ve helped my clients achieve it.

However, leverage and systems aren’t enough. Why do I say that? Because if you do the math, you need to target $300,000 a year in revenue to pay yourself and the people and services you’ll use to do marketing or service delivery, or administrative tasks, and so on.

The biggest stumbling block to reaching that next level is ‘habit’. The habit of thinking and acting like a generalist, serving anyone and everyone. I did it myself for years. It’s a commonly held belief that the wider we spread our net, the larger our likely result. I myself held that belief for years, even in the face of all evidence to the contrary.

Being a generalist means you’re constantly working on multiple ways of introducing who you are and what you do in the hope that it resonates with the person you’re talking to. All your attention is on adapting like a chameleon rather than shining like a beacon that calls people to you.

Get out of the way of your OWN High Payoff using these three Key Activities and you’ll see your results soar:

Key 1 – Select a Target Market and Stick To It

Your services may be equally productive to a wide range of clients and customers. However, when you pick a niche, a class of clients who share particular characteristics, you make yourself more memorable. The truth is, you increase your identity as an expert.

Elsa Lucan, a landscaping specialist in Los Angeles, recently made the shift from taking a wide range of projects, large and small, to working with homeowners who want to create completely new outdoor spaces. She focuses on using little known planting techniques that result in astounding growth and exquisite spaces.

A second shift she’s made? No longer doing the hardscape herself. Elsa now designs and supervises its installation by specialists in their own right. Her time is planned farther out, her crew knows they’re booked, and she’s seeing a doubling in her revenues in the space of a year.

That’s what people want – specialists solving their challenges.

Key 2 – Differentiate From Others Providing Similar Services

We often think of differentiation as being about our technical resume, dress and manners. Ironically, the personal story behind our choices attracts our market to us like a magnet.

One of my clients recently realized that when she spoke of her emotional reason for providing services to parents of young children – facing the same challenges she’s come through herself – her rate of closing doubled… and in half the time.

Her clients feel she ‘knows’ them and their challenges.

Key 3 – Take 5 Paths to Connect With Your Market

It’s easy to settle into habits unconsciously. Marketing by networking is one example. It may not actually get you in front of your ideal clients. When you expand your marketing activities that let your potential client know you’re the specialist to solve their issues you create momentum and business growth. Four additional activities that deliberately sharpen your identity include sending a newsletter to your contacts, writing articles, forming joint ventures with others who provide complimentary services to the same market, and asking clients for referrals.

Ironically, I’ve been implementing Keys 2 and 3 systematically for months. Yet I was neglecting Key 1. For 15 years I’ve worked with financial advisors, more than half my clients every year … yet I never said so. It’s time for me to declare my niche and use the three Keys together for myself.

How about you? What is one shift you could make to be a beacon to your ideal client and grow your business further, faster and easier?

When we recognize that unique aspect of ourselves and use it on purpose, the work we do becomes play, the conflicts we run into become interesting challenges, and the people we work with become teammates in creating a vivid, exciting world.

Someone you work with is unaware of their Gift. Yet you see it. You see it and your blessing in their life is to tell them so this week.

Take a sheet of paper and ask yourself:

“Who do I know that does something with such ease…

and they’re unaware that it’s a gift?”

List all the people who come to mind, and what it is that they do so easily. Remember, what you acknowledge in them enables them to offer it in greater abundance.

Now drop them a quick not and tell them of the Gift they’re bringing to your world, whether at work or outside it, and how much it’s appreciated.

I truly believe that each of us can create and live our ideal life.

Our Ideal Life is the life that meets our Core desires, and provides an outlet for our Gift – our innate skills and intuition. It’s the life that allows us to recognize our unique gift and use it – to purposefully choose work that lets us live our deepest self. It’s the life that inspires those around us to do the same with theirs.

Can you describe what yours looks like? Would you say you’re living it now?

All too often we have a clearer sense of our Core Desires when we’re children, yet loose track of them as the world around us bombards us with messages full of “should” and “have to” and “can’t”.

We have hints of our Gift, using it unconsciously and tune it out, waving it out of sight because it’s so easy for us to use. It doesn’t look anything like the effortful activities we’ve been told any valuable effort must be.

Imagine the life you’d create if you founded it on having every one of your Core Desires, and using that effortless Gift. Wouldn’t that be a fabulous life? I think so!

You don’t have to walk away from the life you’ve built to live that Ideal Life. My client Shannon felt out of sorts most of the time – dealing with complex international business logistical issues and fractious personalities from three different generations. She’d risen in her career based on opportunities that presented themselves and she was ready to walk from it all.

When we uncovered her Core Desires to be a peacemaker and to nurture people early in their career, she deliberately shifted her focus from managing the logistics of an international business, to solving strategic partnership challenges for the company and mentoring new members of the team.

The High Payoff results were that Shannon loved her work, the company saw turnover drop 30 percent in the first year among junior staff, and management was able to retain all the knowledge and experience Shannon had built in her career.

As for me, my Core desires are for health, continuous life long learning, and companions to share the journey. I’ve built a life that brings me each of those, and that let’s me use my gift for cutting through chaos and confusion to get to the core issues and find practical, easy, High Payoff solutions to them.

So, tell me, are you living your Ideal Life now? Or, have you spent a lifetime being sent off down other paths?

Fear, opinions of others, self-doubt have gotten in the way of your living your ideal life with ease. They’re no longer reasons for suppressing who you are. Think of them merely as the creative entertainment provided by the society you live in.

If you have fear or doubts about living from your Core, tell yourself “Fear is no longer an excuse.”

You have a purpose in being here and your only responsibility is to bring your gifts to the world to enrich it and create a vibrant life for yourself and for others.

If you’re ready to bring you Core Desires and your Gift into focus, here’s a technique I use with my coaching clients and MasterMind members. It will take you less than 1 hour and can unveil the stepping stones to your Ideal Life.

• Take 2 pieces of paper and something to write with. Divide each piece of paper with a line down the middle, top to bottom.

• On the first page, label the left-hand column “What I loved at that job…” and the right hand column “… because it let me…”

• On the second page, label the left-hand column “What I hated at that job…” and the right hand column “… because it prevented me…”

• Starting with your first ‘job’ fill in all 4 columns. Do all four columns for each job you can remember right up to today. If you need the space, carry your notes over to additional pages. Even if the answers seem similar from one job to the next, write it all down.

• When you’re done writing, read your answers out loud and listen to the pattern that will reveal itself in the answers you’ve recorded.

Even better – take this exercise into a group of others who know you well, to do it as a group. Pair off and have one person prompt the second person with the phrases over and over and act as the scribe of what is said out loud for them. Then reverse who is talking and who is scribing.

Then, as each person reads their own responses out loud, as partners you can listen and suggest patterns you’re hearing. The listeners will ll also be able to suggest what they’ve experienced as the other person’s Gift – “the thing you do with such ease that is so uniquely you.”

Engage your Core, your Gift, your entire self and watch what you can create in this life, through your work, our relationships, your play.

I so want to live in the world you’ll help create for all of us.