Welcome to episode 19 of the #upyourbrave Livestream where my guests and I share tips, tools and insights on Growing Your Business During Times of Change.
Debra Chantry-Taylor is a business coach and mentor who’s no stranger to adversity, perseverance and growing business in challenging times. Having started her community and events business in June 2017, she experienced a series of unexpected tragedies including losing her brother without any warning and nursing her mother through terminal cancer. Deb forged on building the business, and while the original business model failed she managed to pivot and turn it into a profitable events space which became known as one of the most original and exciting events spaces in Auckland, with businesses from around the world booking the space to do their product launches and business social events. Unfortunately the event space became a casualty of Covid-19 and is currently in hibernation, however Debra used her learnings and experience to continue to grow her leadership coaching business. She now works with business owners and their leadership teams, using the Entrepreneurial Operating System to help them build a better life through better business, even through challenging times. Throughout the lockdown Debra launched Business Support & Survival Volunteers – a free service matching experienced business professionals with businesses that needed help.
You can find Debra here: https://www.debrachantry.com/ and https://www.facebook.com/DebraChantryProfessional/.
In this episode Debra mentions:
- Ask for help. When things are challenging you can get overwhelmed and not see the wood for the trees, and it can be difficult to lift yourself out of what’s going on. Don’t be afraid to ask for help, it can help you get through the difficult times.
- Look after yourself first and you can be a better leader all around. During challenging times we focus on the business, but without looking after ourselves first, which makes it hard to run an effective business. Start your day with gratitude – it changes the way the day starts. Set your intention in the morning without worrying how it will be achieved and then review it in the evening – you’ll find that more often than not whatever you put out there in the morning happened throughout the day Rather than worry about how it’s going to happen, connect with your why, what your want to do and why you’re doing it, be clear about goals you want to achieve and then let the universe sort out the how.
- Take time out, take some clarity breaks out of your normal environment, spend some time not thinking about anything other than the present moment, and take care of your health & wellness in terms of gratitude and from a physical point of view. Schedule your health & wellness/breaks in your diary – if it’s not in the diary it’s less likely to happen whether it’s taking a break from work or going to bed early.
- Books that Debra recommends are Life’s Golden Ticket and Fish.
Jeff Ghaemagamy is a guy who walks his talk; having built a business that has distributed approaching $200 million in products to over 30 countries. Whilst doing so, he’s built a reputation as a trustworthy leader, his fun loving and sometimes cheeky personality instantly makes people feel comfortable. Jeff is down to earth, yet driven, he has high expectations of himself and of those he works with. His is an inspirational story of a high school dropout who went from nillionaire to millionaire. Jeff has shared his story to live audiences of more than 100,000 people around the world. His training series, Proven Principles has been a massive success with more than 500,000 unique views. With a passion for helping people, Jeff works best with self-motivated people who have a burning desire to work for themselves to enjoy more time, money and ultimately freedom.
You can find Jeff here: https://www.facebook.com/jeffghaemaghamy/
In this episode Jeff mentions:
- Who Moved My Cheese. You need to ask yourself what’s working in your business/your life, what’s not working and what can you change? Don’t make the mistake of doing the same thing over and over again because it worked in the past. In the new environment with Covid-19 or with other challenges that impact your business, you need to be able to pivot and change when something’s not working. Think about the four words: can you help me; and who do you know?
- How can you outperform others in your category by giving better service, by actually thanking your customers? Reach out to them and say thank you for doing business with you. There’s nothing that will bring more customers more easily to you than other raving fans. By giving service and going out of your way and acknowledging people you’ll find everything gets richer. Try it with your customers, your family, your friends and your kids.
- A meaningful quote by Og Mandino: “I will act now. I will act now. I will act now. Henceforth, I will repeat these words each hour, each day, everyday, until the words become as much a habit as my breathing, and the action which follows becomes as instinctive as the blinking of my eyelids. With these words I can condition my mind to perform every action necessary for my success. I will act now. I will repeat these words again and again and again. I will walk where failures fear to walk. I will work when failures seek rest. I will act now for now is all I have. Tomorrow is the day reserved for the labor of the lazy. I am not lazy. Tomorrow is the day when the failure will succeed. I am not a failure. I will act now. Success will not wait. If I delay, success will become wed to another and lost to me forever. This is the time. This is the place. I am the person.” What actions can you take every single day? Be a person in action in direction and alignment with your goals and values.
Kim Baird is an inspirational speaker, award winning author, transformational business coach and entrepreneur. Kim has helped thousands of people transform their lives and their businesses for the better with her unique approach. Kim has been in business for over 18 years and has a wealth of knowledge and experience in the real world of business. Over that time she has created many great successes for her own businesses and for her clients. She’s also experienced many challenging times in business, including during the GFC where she found herself in $250,000 of bad debt with a new-born baby. She came through that time without going into bankruptcy and coming out the other side a stronger leader and entrepreneur.
You can find Kim here: https://amazingbusiness.com/ https://www.facebook.com/AmazingBusiness and https://www.instagram.com/kim.baird.nz/
In this episode Kim mentions:
- What’s going on in your inner world to help create your outer world? During times of challenge we can really contract and shrink how we’re feeling on the inside, and that can create our own stories and beliefs that will create certain results, which can often be undesirable eg: there’s nothing we can do/it’s hopeless/no one is buying/no one has any money to spend. With challenges there’s also the duality eg: people thriving in business/people spending etc. Part of your inner world is what you’re filling yourself up with in the current climate – try to focus on wins, successes and what you are going to focus on in order to grow your business, ask questions of people who are succeeding and winning, and ask for help.
- Rather than asking disempowering questions, flip that around to ask yourself quality questions like; what would it take for me to make another $X this week/$X this year/to get five new clients in the next week/to pay off debt right now? Instead of being in a state of hopelessness, expand out the possibilities by asking questions about what you can do to move your business forward.
- Important action – to get you to achieve the goals/result that you want. Sometimes you’ll resist the things that are most important eg: looking after yourself is a really important action but can sometimes be put at the bottom of the pile; marketing & sales, but in the current climate business owners can get afraid of promoting themselves and pull back. It’s the same with cutting back on expenses, but what are the important expenses that you do need to keep? When you’ve got a strong why, things that you find uncomfortable like marketing & sales actions become a lot easier when you have purpose behind them. By not doing the marketing and sales you’re not communicating what you can do for others. A lot of the important actions that we need to do are not always comfortable but by resisting them you’re essentially sacrificing your business, and won’t be able to serve people and have the impact you want.
Natalie Cutler-Welsh is your host, speaker, author, Impact Entrepreneur and mother of 3. Aka the Go to Girl and the Up Your Brave Mentor, Nat helps people to Amplify their Impact, business and wellness with her Amplify Membership and Essential Oils.
In this episode Natalie mentions:
- Don’t put all of your eggs in one basket, if you have multiple revenue streams you’re less exposed during challenging times.
- Take empowered action. People can get stuck in their head and are nervous to look bad,or don’t want to put themselves out there and seem pushy. It’s not just about taking action and being busy, but instead take empowered action to move you to where you want to go. Reconnect with what you want and take empowered action towards that.
- Make things fun, and if you don’t love it don’t do it. There will be tasks in business that need to get done, so how can you make them fun? Who can you hang out with that uplifts your energy and makes things a little more fun?
This is one of the #UpYourBrave livestream series designed to help raise the state of resilience, health and happiness on a global level.
You can find Nat here: http://nataliecutlerwelsh.com/about/. You can also check out the other videos in the #UpYourBrave series here: http://nataliecutlerwelsh.com/video-series/. You can also find more recommended tools and resources here.