Midstream Turn About

Yes, you wrote your business plan, things are moving along and....
Oh no! Everything's changed again!
Ah yes. It has, it will and it must.
What you do right now is crucial. Let's talk.

Sometimes our initial business model has...flaws. It may address what you think the scenario of your marketplace is, but no. It's just not right. What does that mean?

• You're probably just like everyone else in the beginning
• You should re-brainstorm your whole business idea and see if there are other ways you could deliver the same product or service.
• You may have just found a new niche market that you'll want to take advantage of.
• It's time to dig a little deeper because there may be a "secret" that you don't know about what you're doing.
• You should get a grip and stop thinking about quitting your idea. It probably just needs an adjustment.

Often, we have a rather narrow idea of what our business is supposed to be. These ideas are formed by our experience in that market, perhaps working for someone else. They could be concepts formed that are void of some things you just couldn't have known. Trade secrets.

Instead of focusing on what seems in the moment to be a "dashed dream", just take a breathe, re-adjust a little, do more research and keep an open mind. The business that is meant to work for you, the business model that will succeed is there. You just have to uncover it.

You may feel a little bruised by the rock you just slammed against in that river, but give yourself a minute and you'll be just fine.

Each Day

Erica Marshall muddyboots.org

I've written a few posts here about what I can do for a small business.
I probably write less about what I am doing. Today is one of those days where I am simply teary about the kinds of connections I make in the work and how it all somehow meshes together to create this amazing thing I call my life.

People come to me with a vision. Maybe they are in it or maybe it's just a dream. For me to do what I do best, I have to understand and actually feel their passion. I get drawn into the details of this thing they want so badly to do. I see it from behind their eyes, or nearly so. I get the excitement of their dream to propel that dream forward.

It's a morphogenesis state I'm in when I immerse myself in the lives and visions of my clients. To say "vision" is to say that we are looking into the future. It's that balance of being clear about exactly where we are and where that vision is going to take us. That's the line I walk. That's the "space I keep" for each and every person I work with.

I cannot tell you how many times I say, "If you really want to do this, I'm here to help you make that happen". I will take them through the steps to get them there, but ultimately it's about a client's commitment to their own dream.

Ultimately, I'm coming to a place where I think that we should all have mentors for everything we want to do. It takes a measure of humility to come forward and say, "I don't know how to do this. Will you show me?" I honor those people who can come to me and ask and listen and work with me. I value their dreams and visions for what they see as possible and I ask them to dream it even bigger. For all of us.

How am I Different?

I spend hours talking to my clients about one of the basics of Marketing: Differentiating. I ask how they are different than other people who seem to be doing the same stuff.

15 years ago when I started working as a consultant, I really didn't think very much about that for myself. My main focus at that time was setting up financial systems and processes for very small companies and I didn't have much competition in my market.

Now, as a business mentor I have plenty of competition. I started this blog as a way for you to all get to know me. I ramped up my social media marketing and published articles elsewhere as well. In all this flurry of activity, I've been following many other folks who market themselves under this or a similar label. As I've ready their advice and watched their approach, it's been hard for me to pin down exactly what it is about me that's different. I was, like my clients, in that moment, unable to see the forest for the trees.

When posting a comment on small biz on Linkedin, it came to me: I've come from a family of entrepreneurs. It's all I've really ever known!

Many professionals enter the world of consulting after leaving the corporate world. That, for the most part is my competition. I have in fact worked in the corporate world, as a GM, CFO, CEO, all on a contract basis. The "lure of the paycheck" has never really worked on me. It's taken me quite a long time and many conversations for me to realize because from childhood, my vision of the world was shaped by the entrepreneurial lifestyle.

My first business at around age 7 was to collect wildflowers and make miniature arrangements and sell them door to door in my neighborhood. I remember this clear as day, but honestly cannot explain it given my self proclaimed identity as an introvert. (Uh, until recently...)

My first "real job" at 17 was helping this woman, who had been away from her brownstone for 10 years, renting to grad students. I keept her cool and calm and sorted through 10 years of her life and organized a sale. It was exciting and I felt like I was using all my abilities. When I headed off to college late that Summer, it was confusing in comparison. It seemed to unfocused to me.

So here I am, all these years later, telling you a bit more about how I might be able to figure out your situation and help you along the sometimes rocky road of small business. I'm not matching it to a certain business model or "ideal". Instead, I'm finding a way for you to do what you want to do and have it support you. It's what I know, down to my bones.

Shall I be corny for a moment? Your dreams are my business. Bring them to me and let's see what we can do.

Not Your Mother's Career Counselor

www.imageabstraction.com

When, if ever did you go to your first Career Counselor? After High School? During a mid-life crisis? After college? Chances are, there has been someone along the way with some opinions about what your life's work should be. They might have given you tests or asked questions and in the end, they were looking for a box to put you and your skill set into.

"Life's Work" is now an outdated concept for many of us. There will be many times we change what we do, how we do it and who we do it for. My last post was about the lifestyle connected to different professions. That's one example of some of the points that don't get covered in some career counseling.

I like to start all my new folks out with this question: What do you want your perfect day to look and feel like?

It's a kind of reverse engineering. Instead of asking a series of questions about what you're good at, I'd rather know what you'd like to do, day to day. Because when it comes down to it, you may love the "idea" of doing something, but the collection of tasks that make up that job really don't interest you.

Are you a musician who loves to be on stage but hates to practice? Are you a musician who loves to play in their bedroom but hates the stage? Ok, so that's an easy one. I love textile design, went to school in my late 20's to study it. I got my degree from Parson's School of Design, went out and started looking for a job. I was told it was going to be tough and not much pay. I really thought I was ready. I was training with professionals in the field! Two days into my first job I felt like I was in hell. A kind of hell I didn't even know existed.

I can laugh about it now, but at the time I was seriously doubting my sanity. No one asked me if I could work with no direction in a sweatshop-like environment using a set of skills I never actually learned in school. Oh, and for pennies. I've taken what I learned at Parson's and have used it a million times over in other ways. I have no regrets, except perhaps taking a tour of a studio with one of my instructors.

That experience has really shaped the questions I ask as a small business consultant. It's about all the moments that make up your day. As they say, it's more about the journey than the destination. Put yourself back in the sandbox, as it were, and ask yourself.

Taking off

Painting by Angelia's Art

There are several metaphors that can used to describe the life-cycle of a business, but the two that come to mind involve "rebirth" as in a cat with nine lives, or reincarnation. But first, let's go through the stages that lead up to that rebirth:

A Sparkle in Someone's Eye
This is known as the "dream" state in which everything and nothing is possible. It's a thought. If you do something about it, you get to the next stage.

Pregnancy
All your ideas are "gestating" and it's the start of your business. You have taken some first steps, like writing a business plan or talking to people or maybe even thinking about a name.

Labor
This is when you know WHEN your business will start but you have very little idea of how it will all get done. It's "hurry up and wait", it's reading all the "what to expect" books but knowing that it's going to all be a surprise when you really start doing business.

Birth
Well, all the "heavy lifting" of the labor ends, the first day is over, the opening party is over and you have this small being that is now alive and needs to be cared for. It is your business. It cries your name in the night and is relentless in the attention needed to keep it alive.

Infancy
There's steady growth, things are changing everyday but your business still needs constant attention. Perhaps you've taken your first bit of time away from it since you started. Hired a "sitter" for your first night out. This is often the time when it becomes abundantly clear as to whether you can really work with a partner if you have one. Maybe you need to bring in more help?

Childhood
This is the somewhat predictable early growth stages that you've heard about. There are days when you love you business and days when you think you'll not come back from lunch. Ah, then you remember it's YOUR business.

Adolescence
A period of defiance in kids, in a business it could be the time when your vendors and customers and all that has been in place from the start, are not. The steadiness you got a little used to has ceased to be. You are now experiencing "growing pains" as you try and bring more folks into your business in some way. Perhaps you've outgrown your current technology? It seems like you need to throw a lot of money at the situation but it may not be the most responsible response.

Adulthood
Ah, you've seen most all of it. You've done most all of it. You have a confidence in what you're doing and how you're doing it. Sometimes you do get a run for your money from the new kids on the block. There's the re-education that you need to do to keep yourself on top of things.

Aging
Now the question is: Can you can truly keep up? You've been doing this a long time and your long range plans have not necessarily accounted for things like just being a bit tired of what you're doing. This time it's more than a "mid-life crisis". This time it's a matter of thinking about what's next: Passing the baton or calling it a day. Calling it a life and a business and moving to the next stage.

Death
You're done

Rebirth
Maybe not. Maybe there's a way to reinvent this thing. Ah, a spark in the eye!!!

I hope you all had as much fun reading this humorous take on the business life-cycle as I did in writing it. Of course, stages and come and go several times. I'd love to hear about yours.

But How do I Get There?

photo by Erica Marshall www.muddyboots.org

For business owners who are about to hire me, this is generally where they are. Let me give you a look inside our process...

Step 1 Where are you now?

• Take a full inventory of where exactly are you in your process.
• Pull out your original business plan (hoping you have one)
• Pull out your financial statements

Step 2 Clearly define where you think you want to go.

• Make a list of changes to your current offerings
• Define what elements have not worked for you as well of those that have
  
• What are the new services or products you want to offer.

That should keep you busy for a while! Yes, those who do not learn from the past, will be doomed to repeat it. Starting with NOW before moving to TOMORROW may seem like a "no-brainer" but in our excitement to move to the next level it can be quite easy to gloss over some essential points like:

• Did I ever reach my target audience?
• Why not? Was it not the right audience?
• Was my product not priced correctly?
• Did the market change?
• Was my cost structure flawed in some way?

Sometimes I see a product or service out there that is just slightly missing its mark. Is that you? Yes, even when someone is not my client, I do find myself asking some of these questions. I can think of clients from 15 years ago that I worked with at different times in their process. I would get them up and running and then 3 years down the line I'd step in again to help get them to that next place. That "middle place" of getting to where you want to go need not look like confusion to the outside world.

Every company goes through changes and needs to re evaluate. Do it fully informed, without assumptions. This will prove to be the most essential tool in getting you to that next level.