[00:00:00] Hello, I’m Portia Parker Griffin, and I want to welcome you to the career 101 podcast, a place for ambitious professionals and seasoned executives who want an edge in their career. We’re talking about all of the things you were never taught or told when it comes to career growth, development, and change.
Now let’s get into it.
What have you done in a decade? What have you pursued for 10 years straight? For me, it’s been all about Fly High Coaching. I’m excited to share that Fly High Coaching has turned 10. Yes, we recently celebrated our 10 year anniversary. And in that time, we have worked with thousands of clients through our services and programs.
When I first started this business, I was in my mid [00:01:00] twenties and coaching was not a thing. It was nowhere near as popular as it is today. I first really got clarity around coaching by reading a New York Times article about a 20 something life coach. That article intrigued me to want to know more. After all, I had a degree in psychology and had never heard of this helping profession.
I wondered to myself, is this a real thing? And if it was, why hadn’t I heard about it? After doing all of my research. Yes, I’m one of those research people. I found a coach certification program because I knew significant training would be needed. After graduating from coach training, I was so excited to go live with my website or the virtual way to let people know that I was open for business.[00:02:00]
That is when the questions, doubt, and stress began.
What’s coaching? Is this like a sports coach? I realized that the average person had no idea what a coach was 10 years ago. So I spent a lot of time educating people on coaching and trying to find my way. This leads me to one of my favorite quotes. Success is not final. Failure is not fatal. It is the courage to continue that counts.
And that quote is by Winston Churchill. We’ve already covered having courage in business, entrepreneurial mindset, and turning your passion into a business on this podcast. If you haven’t checked out those episodes, I recommend that you give them a listen. [00:03:00] If you go on our website, you can filter our episodes by category or what we call shortcuts.
So just click on entrepreneurship. We also have an episode coming up soon about solving business problems. Starting, growing, and maintaining a profitable business can be challenging. I don’t believe in lying to people or perpetuating a belief that business is easy. I’m also not one of those business owners who thinks that everyone should be an entrepreneur.
The truth is it can be challenging and demanding. If you are interested in having a full time profitable business that replaces your income as an employee and more, there will be concepts for you to learn, decisions for you to make, and problems for you to solve every day. [00:04:00] I’d estimate that 25% of our career coaching clients have a desire to start a business.
Or they already have one. So when thinking about this episode, I wanted to talk about 10 business lessons I learned in 10 years.
Number one, remove the negativity, doubters and nonbelievers. Whenever you want to try something new, there will be people who don’t believe that it’s possible or that you could do it. Do not waste your time trying to explain things to these people. Or affect your own self esteem by slipping into a lot of proving energy where you try to convince them that what you want is possible.
Just remove them from your life or severely limit your time around them. I’ll be honest, your business goals are too precious for you to [00:05:00] share them with most of the people in your life. Your friends, family, and coworkers are not the best people for you to be talking to about business, even if they have a degree of business experience, and that’s because they are biased.
You can check out our episode on Support System 101 to find out more about who you should be talking to. Number two, there’s more than one way to build a business. There’s this old saying that says, there’s more than one way to skin a cat. Meaning that there are different ways to be successful at the same goal.
Many people are going to tell you that you have to build a business one certain way. You have to pay for ads online, post on all of your social channels every single day, or be on YouTube. [00:06:00] And there are a lot of business coaches and consultants that will tell you that you have to use their secret system to build your business.
To be honest with you, I have found that when coaches or consultants say that, it is primarily to motivate you to buy their services. Our business coaching for clients provides structure, but it also gives you the freedom to design your business in an ideal way that works for you. So, no cookie cutter solutions here.
If you haven’t listened to our episode on Community 101, then I suggest that you check that out. Number three, scrutinize the business coaches and consultants you follow and work with. I’ve spoken with entrepreneurs who had a negative view of coaching, and that is primarily because they had worked with someone who called themselves a coach.
Or they purchased a [00:07:00] course from a consultant and they were underwhelmed. Everyone looks good on social media and YouTube, but how long have they been in business? What is their background? Have they achieved positive results with clients? Have they achieved the financial results that you want? Asking these questions can save you a lot of time, energy, and money.
Number four, pay for help. When I first started my business, I had already gone through coach training and built my own website with WordPress. I had done a lot of research online to find out what I needed to know because of that. I think I had developed some of what I call invincible syndrome.
The career one on one podcast is brought to you by fly high coaching, where we [00:08:00] help our clients soar to their full potential entrepreneurs are setting out to achieve their business goals, but without the right support, it can be difficult, if not impossible. You need business coaching. We’re here to help check us out on our website, fly highcoaching.
com.
I’ve written a blog post on invincible syndrome years ago, and I should probably do a podcast episode on it. It’s basically when you are overconfident and think that you can do everything yourself. At some point during your business, you are going to realize that you need help. There won’t be enough hours in the day for you to personally do everything that needs to get done.
After starting my business and launching the Fly High Coaching website, I wasn’t making the revenue that I needed. I told myself that [00:09:00] if I wasn’t where I wanted to be in six months, Then I would hire a business coach. The six months came and went and I wasn’t making the money I needed to really pursue my business full time.
And that’s when I hired my first business coach to be successful in business. You will eventually have to pay for help. Number five, develop your leadership skills. I’ve heard many people say that running a business requires a lot of personal development. I completely agree. As a business owner, you will have to put yourself out there when you are uncomfortable and you’ll have to pursue things before knowing if you’re going to reach your goals, regardless of if you have a team or not, you will be leading others.
You will lead prospective clients in sales conversations, and you will lead your [00:10:00] paying clients or customers throughout the journey of using your products or services. Whether you consider yourself to be a good leader already or not, developing your leadership skills are necessary in business. We have a podcast episode on Leadership 101, and I spend a lot of time with our clients on leadership development.
Number six, stop comparing yourself. This one is tough. Everywhere you turn, you are exposed to other companies marketing messages, ads, and social media posts. You see individuals in your social media networks broadcasting what they’re doing and all of their successes. If you are not intentional about your social media use, you will constantly be comparing yourself to other people and their businesses.[00:11:00]
There’s always someone who has a bigger following than you, has more clients than you, makes more money than you, or just seems to be doing better than you in some way. I encourage our clients to ignore the vanity metrics online and focus on quality of clients and connections. Over quantity. It is also helpful to reduce the amount of time that you spend around overly competitive people.
Number seven, understand your value. What value are you bringing to the marketplace? What is your company’s value proposition? A value proposition is a statement that summarizes why a customer would choose your product or services, and it communicates the benefits that would be received. A value statement emphasizes [00:12:00] what makes you different from competitors.
It might include how customers define your value. It is helpful for a value proposition to speak to a customer’s challenge, and it makes a case for your company to solve the problem. You can think of it as a declaration of intent inside the company and within the marketplace. Understanding your personal value and your company’s value proposition will help you know what avenues to pursue.
And what not to.
Number eight, know your numbers. Another common mistake we see with entrepreneurs is that they do not understand their numbers. This is when they are not operating as a business or truly understanding their startup costs, how to price their services, and what their profit margins are. We consider these to be [00:13:00] aspects of financial essentials.
You are in business to make a profit. If not, you should have a nonprofit or a charity. Knowing your costs, expenses, and price points are imperative so that you’re not operating at a loss and losing money. Most businesses go out of business because they run out of money. You need to understand concepts like overhead and the costs of doing business.
Number nine, build your level of resilience. Renowned researcher, Dr. Gary Voogle determined that the ability to make sound decisions is important for leaders. Business owners have to have self confidence to make decisions and stick with their decisions through tough times. Or in the face of others who do not agree as leaders, [00:14:00] they also need to have a tolerance for ambiguity because there will be many times when business owners have to make decisions without having all of the evidence or details to be certain of an outcome.
Business owners need a tolerance for stress. Entrepreneurs generally have to make more decisions than others, and they have more pressure on them based on the seriousness. Of the decisions that they have to make. Number 10, create processes. Many entrepreneurs are innovative and have big dreams, but those dreams often go unfulfilled because they can’t quite figure out the systems and processes needed to make their dreams a reality.
One of the great things about the world we live in today is that there are resources, apps, and technology to [00:15:00] help us get things done. Even though we know that we have all of these tools out there, and AI, it can still be challenging to set them up in a way to support us. Creating processes allows you to set up your essential functions like marketing, sales, and service delivery.
Execution is an area where I see many entrepreneurs struggle, and creating processes can help with that.
These are the top 10 business lessons that I can share. But of course, There’s more, a lot more. If you enjoyed this episode and are an entrepreneur or an aspiring entrepreneur, we’d love to support you. We have a membership called the Brave Bird Career Alliance, where I’ve put 10 years worth of our best [00:16:00] coaching, training, and support.
That’s been helpful for thousands of clients. For example, I’ve created the Entrepreneurship 101 course that’s in the Alliance, where I outline the foundations of earning six figures in your business. We do a deep dive into your value proposition. Business model, marketing, sales, and financial goals. We also discuss how to set up your essential business systems and incorporate the accountability you need to be successful.
Reach out on our website, fly highcoaching. com. If you’d like to know more. And that leads me to another quote that I like. If you don’t drive your business, you will be driven out of business. And that quote is by BC Forbes. Financial journalist and author of [00:17:00] Forbes magazine. How are you driving your business?
This episode was brought to you by the Brave Bird Career Alliance, the go to membership designed for seasoned executives and ambitious professionals with everything you need for career planning, strategy, training, and support. Thank you again for listening to the Career 101 podcast. I hope you have at least one key takeaway that you can use in your own career.
If you enjoyed hanging out with us, please rate, subscribe, and share this podcast. Until next time, here’s to your success!
