Mindset Archives - Page 3 of 4

Get out of the building

I’ve done over 20 coaching calls in the past three weeks. While the topics of each call varied, one piece of advice came up more than any other.

The advice applied whether I was coaching someone just starting out or someone who already had a thriving business.

This advice is my go-to when it comes to getting clarity and confidence about business strategy, both for myself and my clients.

It’s a treasure trove of inspiration and validation.

It’s a simple piece of advice, and yet so many overlook it.

In the words of renowned entrepreneur and author, Steven Blank.

“Get out of the building.“

In other words, get out and have in-depth conversations with your intended market in which you ask them meaningful questions about their experience.

Scaling a thought leadership business means you have to continually hone your ability and your company's. Here are seven quick ideas to do that.

To scale your business, you must also scale _____

Everyone’s eyes glazed over.

The instructor continued drawing on the whiteboard, explaining how sounds are made up of a mix of frequencies.

The class was The Physics of Sound — a joint effort between the music and engineering schools.

The music students struggled to understand waveforms and the physics of sound. The engineering students struggled to grasp the concepts of pitch and timbre.

I could feel the confusion and overwhelm permeating the room.

What was missing?

In a word…

While we’re all feeling beaten down by everything going on in the world right now, we can keep taking one step forward at a time.

When you’re feeling beaten down and are tempted to give up…

I lay in my bed staring at the ceiling, feeling crushed. Not a single cell in my body wanted to get out of bed.

I’d put everything I had into finding the right apartment in Brooklyn by August 1 when I needed to move and now all hope of making that happen had been dashed.

It was now July 29. The day before, I’d found out I didn’t get the apartment I had my heart set on. The landlord strung the application process along for a week just to choose someone else in the end. They’d received numerous applications and chose someone else.

(Getting an apartment in NYC is akin to putting an offer on a house and going through the process of applying for a loan).

Who’d have thought there would be so many people looking for apartments to move into during COVID?

What to do when nobody seems to care about your message

I paced back and forth on the rooftop of my building.

(I mean, what else are you going to do when you need a change of scenery for work and all the coffee shops are still take-out only?)

On the other end of the call, a colleague was passionately explaining to me the message she felt driven to share with the world.

“There’s only one problem,” she finished.

“Nobody seems to care enough to listen to why their mind-gut connection is so important. It’s like I’m pulling teeth to get anyone’s attention. Am I just wasting my time?”

I quickly let her know she wasn’t wasting her time. She just needed to make one simple shift in the way she shared her message.

Can you imagine if Maya Angelou had given in to that voice and kept silent? How many people would have never been inspired by her words and actions?

The one about Maya Angelou feeling like a fraud

I’m worried I don’t have the credibility or credentials to help people the way I want to.
What if I do more harm than good?
I’m afraid I’ll be criticized.

I hear statements like this regularly from clients, even ones who have experience and credentials coming out of their ears (not too mention hearing these things at times in my own head).

At the root of this concern is a mix of thoughtfulness and humility (healthy and helpful) and Impostor Syndrome (not so helpful).

It’s good to be humble and teachable. As I wrote in a Facebook Group this past week: “A coach that is not teachable is dangerous.” (This was in response to a number of popular, influential leaders who have done a good deal of harm lately by not knowing when and how to listen and learn.)

On the other hand, Impostor Syndrome hinders us because it is a pattern of doubting our experience, accomplishments, and abilities that leads to a persistent fear of being exposed as a “fraud,” all of this despite evidence to the contrary.

Archive for category: Mindset