Since I can remember Thomas Edison was the inventor of the light bulb.
Until I read Richard Friday’s insightful book The Great Reset and found out Edison in fact did not invent the lightbulb.
In the early 1800’s Sir Humphrey Davy began inventing a variety of safety lamps for coal miners and presented them to the Royal Society in return for accolades.
On into the mid-1800’s lamp technology began to be encased in a glass bulb through other adventurous English inventors.
It wasn’t until the latter half of the 1800’s that Edison would form the Edison Light Company and begin commercially perfecting and lighting up entire cities.
Although Edison did not invent the light bulb, he and his Menlo Park team certainly perfected the light bulb and even more importantly created a system for mass delivery which would go on to revolutionize an entire planet and it’s ensuing economic revolutions.
Last night, a massive storm rolled through our town and the dog woke us up freaked out. The power went out while we were awake, and it reminded me how grateful I am for the systematic delivery of power and light.
Building one lightbulb is transforming. Building a system to light a thousand lightbulbs is exponential.
When you build a product you impact one person. That very well may be good enough.
When you build a system you impact tens, hundreds, or thousands, or millions.
When you build a product you feel satisfied.
When you build a system for that product you satisfy tens, hundreds, thousands, or millions.
Sometimes building a system is unnecessary.
Systematizing conversations with my wife in the privacy of our walks down the street would be invasive and harmful.
Systematizing building a puzzle around our dinner table during a pandemic quarantine would position us to miss the point of that private moment.
Sometimes building a system is entirely necessary.
Sometimes building a system is entirely compassionate and thoughtful. I’m glad our healthcare workers operate within the system to help impact human life.
We are in the midst of the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic and a significant economic decline. Business owners are going to need a system for building a business that will be able to withstand this type of storm in the future.
Just in the United States there are reported to be over 30 million small businesses, and even more business owners (think partnerships). You cannot impact hundreds or thousands of business owners with one person delivering one product door to door. There is not enough time to combat the speed of chaos.
We have the necessary product in the Business On Purpose Roadmap, now we rely on a growing and compassionate system to light up entire towns and cities to liberate business owners from the chaos of working in the dark.
What is your product? Regardless of your inventive authorship of that product, the more important product is the system to deliver your product...but only if it aligns with your mission.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose, author of Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. Scott also hosts The Business On Purpose Podcast and can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
I’ve been working through the true account of Earnest Shackleton’s 1914 voyage from England to Antarctica where Shackleton, and an entire British nation were hoping he would be the first man to cross the Antarctic continent on foot.
I’m a little more than three fourths of the way through Alfred Lansing’s powerfully descriptive book “Endurance: Shackleton’s Incredible Voyage” and already the principles of leadership in light of our current global pandemic are glaring.
Leadership is no longer a nice-to-have conference topic with palatable nuggets to fill mandatory business training time. Leadership, as it stands today, is literally life and death as unemployment towers over what during the Great Recession now seems mild, and healthcare workers in certain locales throughout the world are teetering on acute burnout.
The idea behind endurance is the motion to push through hard things. The assumption in the definition is that things are hard. Today, things are hard.
This was such a challenging expedition, Shackleton reportedly posted this advertisement in the London Times newspaper:
“Men wanted for a hazardous journey. Small wages, bitter cold, long months of complete darkness, constant danger, safe return doubtful. Honour and recognition in case of success.”
The increased spike of pandemic infection and death, along with the unemployment chart in contrast to the bottoming out of the stock market chart are visual indicators that things are in the beginning stages of hard, and will likely get harder as the long hard winter of the health and economic challenge sets in.
In temperatures and conditions far worse than where many of us are situated right now, Shackleton led through unimaginable burden and courage. Here are five takeaways that we can practically install right now so that in a decade or century, future generations may look back at our actions today and name it with the banner of endurance.
First, leadership requires an internal resolve and conviction based on truth and experience. Shackleton had spent a lifetime studying, thinking, and exploring putting him in a position to have a steely, but mindful resolve.
Second, Shackleton would often go out alone late into the night and early morning to stand and walk alone.
It is not lost on me that all of this is happening in and around holy week. Likely the most infamous lonely, dark-knight-of-the-soul experience is accounted in the gospels of the Christian Bible, where Jesus is shown to have walked into a Middle Eastern garden and began sweating blood due to the immense pressure he was experiencing in anticipation for what was about to come.
Both leaders needed to retreat to have eyes to see and ears to hear.
Third, Shackleton surrounded himself with legitimate others-centered experts and allowed them to BE the expert.
On the Endurance voyage were dog handlers, navigators, boat pilots, rowers, engine mechanics, etc. The entire expedition was fueled by experts in each area. This was not the Shackleton-show...he was the producer and everyone else was an actor on the main stage. Shackleton called the plays and the team executed in Arctic temperatures and with self-less-ness.
Fourth, Shackleton had to be decisive because the Antarctic ice waits for no man. Throughout being stranded on various ice drifts, Shackleton would call the men at a moments notice to completely pack camp, load up the life-boats and switch to an adjacent drift on an experiential hunch that it would help navigate them to their rescue destination.
The Antarctic sea was unpredictable, fluid (no pun intended), and unforgiving. Activing decisively was fraught with risk, but indecisiveness was certain death.
Fifth, Shackleton ran his days within the gift of a schedule. When there were things to do a schedule made plenty of sense due to the entire crew of 28 men needing rest and rhythm. Even the menu each day was a careful selection of nutrition, preservation, and rationing. More interesting to me was Shackleton’s adherence to a strict schedule when there was absolutely nothing today while the team was stranded for days and weeks.
In the Antarctic it could be dark day and night, or it could be light day and night depending on the season. Shackleton always laid down a schedule for his team to follow.
For some of you the days are filled with darkness, for others the days are filled with light. Regardless, let’s be practitioners of good leadership. Let’s build and demonstrate resolve and courage, spend time alone to see and hear in the quiet, surround ourselves with experts and empower them to share their expertise, be decisive, and operate via a helpful and mindful schedule.
We may never have another opportunity to lead like we have right now. Let’s lead with endurance.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose, author of Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. Scott also hosts The Business On Purpose Podcast and can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
Jason had the job of his dreams. He was mostly working with people aligned with his values. Working for people who were considered vulnerable and in need. And was responsible to a board of directors who, for the most part, were cheering him on and providing the insight and support that he needed to lead this important organization towards its vision.
Daily Jason was meeting with team members and stakeholders.
Weekly Jason was holding leadership meetings to cast vision, follow up, and implement important details of their work all aligned with their mission and values.
Jason was visiting the work sites to encourage, train, audit, understand, strategize, and lead. Jason was learning more than he had ever learned, struggling through more than he had ever slugged through, and was truly working within his skillset and growing his skillset.
Jason also had a helpful team to delegate things to and run new ideas. Periodically there was frustration and misalignment, but it usually was worked through with intentionality and unity.
On an extended trip to a few of the work sites, Jason had decided to perform a simple audit of operations for the different sites. He ran through operational process, financials, and culture alignment.
Of course, as with any organization Jason found that some things needed special attention, a little extra fertilizer, and some time to grow and improve.
Jason brought the full audit to the CHairman of the board of the organization.
After a series of surprising discussions within the Board, the audit actually outed some other things that were happening that neither Jason or the majority of the board new were happening behind the scenes. Nothing illegal, but not healthy either...and even more than that, the Board felt mis-informed by some of its members.
An internal Board battle ensued, the majority of the board made a decision to resign on the spot, dissolve Jasons’ executive role due to by-law issues, and there Jason was.
Thirty nine years old, married, three kids, and totally unemployed. Silence. The tide of Jasons’ professional life had just gone out.
In life, the tide comes in and the tide goes out. The sun goes up, and the sun comes down. The clouds roll in, and the clouds roll out.
For many of us right now it feels like the tide is out and for many of us, we have never seen a tide that appears this low...or that at least seems to be getting lower by the hour.
Unknown and unexpected things have a way of breeding anxiety and uncertainty.
All of the sudden schools are out and now YOU are the homeschool teacher trying to juggle kids, a job, a home, and relationships.
All of the sudden your business is ordered to close down and YOU are the employer trying to juggle finances, employees, families, customers, banks, creditors, vendors, and inventory.
All of the sudden your throat starts to get sore and it makes you wonder…”has it come to me?”
Today I have a very simple goal: to persuade you to not live in a sesspool of fear and anxiety, worry and hopelessness, AND instead live in the bright light of belief, empathy, capability, and a sound mind.
My goal = “work on the dock while the tide is out”
We will NOT live in fear...but we will live believing that amazing things are just beyond the storm.
It is true...for many of you, your tide is going out right now.
The stock market looks like this, but all you hear is this:
RIGHT NOW you have a choice.
Will you mourn the loss of the tide? Will you be saddened over the possible lack of luxury and wealth found in money, expensive stuff, and overextended housing in our subtle effort to impress people we don’t even really like?
OR…
Will you find NEW wealth in a walk around the block with your spouse, in four straight nights of dinner at home around your rickety table eating on mis-matched plates, cups, and plastic wear?
Will you find NEW wealth in a lingering conversation with a friend? New wealth in a quiet moment standing on a marsh flat throwing a fly rod? New wealth playing four rounds of ping pong at home because there is really nothing else to do?
When the tide is out...there is either mourning and sadness...OR there is opportunity and hope.
In the Business On Purpose community we are making a declaration, planting our flag in the ground that THIS will be a community of hope...THIS will be a community of opportunity...and
THIS will be a community where the anxious find freedom
There are three real challenges to acknowledge when the tide goes out in your life:
BUT, There are also three subtle opportunities to acknowledge when the tide goes out in your life:
When you work on the dock while the tide is out it affords you time to RE-INVEST in the things that matter most
While the tide is out we must…
While the tide is out…
While the tide is out, and as long as you are a member of the Business ON Purpose family and community…
While the tide is out, and when the tide comes back in (and it will come back in)...
While the tide is out, we will plan well for when the tide comes back in.
We will not speculate...we will build a simple 12 week plan.
We will not moan and grumble...we will build a simple 12 week plan.
And when news breaks tomorrow...we will go back to our 12 week plan.
And when the news breaks next week...we will go back to our 12 week plan.
Earlier I told you about Jason and where we left Jason was in a place of confusion, despair, loneliness, and not knowing what was coming for himself, his wife, and his three kids.
I lied, his name was not Jason.
Just over five years ago on Friday February 27, 2015, I walked out of a North Texas boardroom unemployed.
On Monday March 2, 2015 we started The On Purpose Group LLC...or what you know as our DBA Business On Purpose.
Mollie Sandman sat across the bank desk and opened our bank accounts.
Chris Dalzell, Justin Harvey, and Gerrick Taylor all risked a coaching fee and a long 12 hour day in a small conference room to determine their vision...and today Business On Purpose has had the privilege of walking with hundreds of heroic business owners in over 40 countries around the world.
All for one purpose, to liberate heroic business owners from chaos.
For many of you this time feels like chaos.
Please let me persuade you otherwise and encourage you with this…
The tide is out…NOW is the time to make old things new
NOW is the time to work on your dock and in the words of Michele Williams let’s begin asking a simple question…
“What does this make possible”
TAKE 5 MINUTES TO WRITE DOWN EITHER BY YOURSELF, or WITH YOUR TEAM new ideas, new dreams, new visions that you have because the shift that we are living...and in 5 minutes I’ll give you instruction on your 12 week plan and then we will send you off to spend 1 hour working on the tactics of your 12 Week Plan
Starting out in the survival stage of your business meant you spent most days dreaming, doing, and making sure that everything is being held together.
Growth slowly (sometimes not so slowly) begins to creep in and before you know it you are maxed out not knowing how to get it all done in a 24 hour day.
Jason has spent years on this hamster wheel and his health and family are starting to really pay the price. Sure, he has some access to cash and resources but absolutely no time to enjoy any of it.
Part of the reason he started his business is to create margin to spend more time with his family and more time giving to the passions that he and his wife share. Instead, Jason is spending the majority of his time with other families making sure their home is maintained...neglecting his own maintenance.
How do you jump off the hamster wheel and start to grab and enjoy the margin that is so widely promoted to entrepreneurs (aka, “you can be your own boss...set your own hours…”)?
There is a high likelihood that as a business owner you have a driven personality...you’re a dreamer, a pioneer; an “out there” thinker. You take risks and often fire before ever really aiming.
Aiming is important...but you don’t have to be the one doing it all of the time.
How do you find someone to complement your skills and your responsibility as an owner?
How do you work with that person in a way that doesn’t drive them or you crazy?
For goodness sake...how do you afford them?
First, let’s just step back a minute and take a deep breath...although it may feel like your world is imploding let’s just remember that the world is not. The sun still comes up and goes down...the tide comes in and goes out...the rain comes and goes.
In most businesses that operate with great purpose there is a Visionary and another person who acts as an Implementer or what Dan Sullivan would call a Project Manager (not the same as a Construction Project Manager).
In most cases you are the Visionary which means in most cases you are on the hunt for an Implementer.
But where are they and who are they?
The role of the visionary is pretty straightforward; dream, pioneer, see, push and try your best to describe what you’ve concocted in words that the Implementer can understand.
The Implementer then takes that jumbled, fast, and often confusing collection of words, ideas, and concepts back to their workstation and goes to work in three major areas.
First, the Implementer translates all of your dreams and visions into an articulate form so others can understand it.
Next, the Implementer begins the hard work of distilling all of that vision down into a collection of systems, processes, and easy-to-digest implementables. Essentially that are “packaging” the vision into a brand that the Doers can understand and go to work IN.
Third, the Implementer embeds this new vision “package” into the rhythm of the Doer-team via team meetings, 12 week plans, dashboards, and reporting so progress can begin on the destination (aka - the vision).
Finally, the Implementer updates both the Visionary and the Doers of the progress towards the vision while the Implementer heads back out to pioneer the open country to see what other visions await in an effort to constantly exercise their mission.
So how do you afford an Implementer? You begin saving up NOW. Setup a separate bank account and title it “New Hire Account” (literally, have your bank title that account) and begin adding the salary you think you’ll have to pay an Implementer into that account every month.
If you don’t have enough each month, then you know you're not ready. But as you accrue it will help provide the confidence you need. In the meantime, be on the hunt for your Implementer.
They will be the ones dressed in the variegated colors of vision, the muted colors of process, and the pleasant colors of collaboration.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose, author of Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. Scott also hosts The Business On Purpose Podcast and can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
The first time I stepped foot onto Nigerian soil it was clear, “this was way different than home.”
We have been traveling in and out of Nigeria since 2006 and have developed some dear friends and partners during that time allowing us to work on important projects.
While in Nigeria the climate feels different, the food tastes different, the accents are different, the business climate is different...it’s just different.
Yet still when I look up in the evening against a dark sky what I see is exactly the same. The same stars and moon as I am used to back home.
When you coach business owners their offices look different, their teams look different, their products look different, their customers look different...they are all different.
So how do you systematically liberate business owners from chaos when everything is different?
I realized a few years back that the coaching playbook I would walk business owners through was not a set of strategies but instead a toolbox of principles. It is a toolbox that has not changed over hundreds and thousands of year.
This toolbox would have been useful to a silk trader in the Ancient Near East in 100 BC, a Middle Eastern tent-maker in 100 AD, an entrepreneurial printer in 1713 AD, and an ice cream shop owner in 2020 AD.
A toolbox of principles is differentiated from a set of strategies in regards to their change-ability. Strategies change all of the time (think of soap operas in the 1950’s vs. Facebook ads in 2020). Principles never change (think vision, mission, values, systems, and process).
The Business On Purpose Roadmap (aka Four Steps) is a system that I built while in the trench-like laboratory of coaching business owners at a pace of 800-1000 hours per year.
Each day I would sit with a heroic business owner and listen to the chaos they were submitting to. Themes tended to center around employees, lack of process, lack of clarity, and the unpredictability of people, schedule, or capital.
As we worked to situationally resolve each of their major and minor challenges a pattern began to emerge leading to the question, “what are the non-negotiable basics that every business owner must install whether they are selling art, ice cream, medical surgery, or roofing shingles?”
We were able to reduce what we saw into a construction metaphor that mapped out into three major layers.
The first layer holds the five foundational cornerstones of a business: vision, mission, unique core values, team meetings and huddles, and the hiring process.
The second layer holds around 13 ingredients which make up the “concrete slab” of a business (Dashboards, Bank Accounts, Job Roles, Org Chart, Process Roadmap, etc.)
Finally, the four major wall structures or the “systems” of the business; administration, operations, marketing, and sales.
Business owners must first commit to what’s behind the aesthetic, stop obsessing about marketing, product design, office interiors, and logos before obsessing about the foundational principles all of those strategies are sitting on top of.
To own a business is to commit to building a principled substructure that lays a predictable, stable foundation for every else that sits on top that the world sees with their eyes.
Without these layers, your business is a house of cards.
With the daily implementation of these layers your business becomes (over time) a force for sincere transformation...personal, professional, local, and global.
It’s been five years to the day since we launched Business On Purpose and the stories that are shared with us of genuine life-change are powerful...exciting...moving.
We press on with our laser-focused mission to liberate business owners from the chaos of working IN their business.
As you go, we hope that you will make time for the hard work of liberation so that others will benefit.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose, author of Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. Scott also hosts The Business On Purpose Podcast and can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
Over the weekend I devoured John Eldredge’s new book, Get Your Life Back: Everyday Practices For A World Gone Mad.
A line in his introduction had me hooked as he was laying out the purpose of the book, “I found myself flinching when a friend texted and asked for some time. I didn’t want to open email for fear of the demands I’d find there…It made me wonder -- am I becoming a less loving person?”
How I wish that line didn’t resonate when I read it. But it did.
Towards the final pages of the book Eldredge diagnoses what is really going on, “these are symptoms that we’re running on fumes.”
Chaos is a gas-guzzler and has a high emotional fuel burn rate especially for those in the service and “helper” industries.
As you build and grow your business, here are low to no-cost steps you can take to both re-fuel while burning less fuel.
First, make time for a daily walk. This may or may not be your regular sweat-exercise. The goal with a walk is to get outside. The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimates that Americans spend 93% of their life indoors.
Eldredge puts it in a deeper perspective saying that if you live to be 100 years old, 93 of those years have been spent indoors.
In her article The Daily Routines Of Geniuses, Sarah Green Carmichael reflects on the outdoor walking habits of the greats like Dickens (3 hours per day), Tchaikovsky (2 hours per day), and Kierkegaard who would “often rush back to his desk and resume writing, still wearing his hat and carrying his walking stick.
I have been taking a walk most days just around my street (it’s a big circle) for the last few years. It is restorative.
Second, time block your week. We have business owners tell us regularly that time blocking their week has been one of the most clarifying disciplines they have installed. One business owner even told me a few weeks ago, “it has literally changed my life.”
Why?
Time blocking your week means that you own your week instead of your week owning you. Time blocking means that when someone reaches out to you to connect, then you get the share the times you are available while feeling confident in the times that you are not available.
We delivered a powerful webinar called Owning Your Schedule: Stop Wasting Hours Every Week On Small, Boring Tasks That Never Really Add To Your Life. You can watch the replay here:
http://bit.ly/bophiringwebinar
One humble suggestion as you layout the hours of each day in your time block. Go to bed earlier and wake up earlier. There is typically not much good happening late, and there is a whole lot of peace and quiet if you are willing to get up early.
Third, find a private workspace without distractions. The open office concept is cool to look at and yet is killing focus and deep work.
We rent a space in town where we have the majority of our in person, and online client interactions, but then I retreat to my upstairs home office overlooking my backyard most Mondays and Fridays.
Those are the days that I spend preparing for the Tuesdays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays.
Although we have minimal general foot tracker in our conference room space, distractions still abound.
In most cases, your workspace as an owner is too accessible. You don’t have to rent a separate space. Do you have a home office, or a study room at the local public library, or a corner booth at Panera bread with a powerful set of headphones?
Time block segments of your week at your private office where no one except your loved-ones can find you.
Finally, ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life.
I wish I had come up with that, but it is a line from my favorite author and thinker Dallas Willard.
Theologian Robert Banks points out that “our society is rich in things, but poor in time”.
Last week I sat with a dear friend in Nigeria for a little over an hour and then mentioned that I needed to head to the next meeting, his response was quiet and simple, “you can be late.”
The West African context is rich in relationships and time, but poor(er) in things.
Even writing this I am already looking forward to the next thing...as I am sure you are too as you read or listen.
Stop.
Go for a walk.
But you respond, “none of that will work for me...you don’t understand my world.”
Then you will need to embrace chaos.
But you don’t have to.
Want to invest more time in building a business on purpose? You can register for our next Business On Purpose Webinar free here at BOPWebinar.com.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose, author of Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. Scott also hosts The Business On Purpose Podcast and can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
There are seven things you will have to obsess over and implement if you wish to be the “leader that your looking for is looking for”
BONUS POINT! The leader you're looking for is looking for a leader who MAKES TIME FOR solitude to read and write.
Want to invest more time in building a business on purpose? You can register for our next Business On Purpose Webinar free here at BOPWebinar.com.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose, author of Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. Scott also hosts The Business On Purpose Podcast and can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
We are wrapping our fifth calendar year as a business and in pursuit of our mission to liberate business owners from the chaos of working IN their business so they can build a business on purpose and leverage their business AS their mission in life.
Why We Are Doing This Work
E.F. Schumacher says there are three purposes to work:
To us, our work is a display of our faith. Faith is the conviction of something that does not exist, and work is the creation of that thing that we see only in our minds that would be useful to others.
When we coach, plan, prepare, market, support, encourage, and research we are doing so to create something useful to others and to ourselves.
As to our mission, we have an enemy that hastles our dear business owners. Chaos.
Chaos has set the ground work for many of our beloved, heroic business owners (those we work with and those we do not) to be distracted from their purposed work. It is our work to help liberate them from the stubborn and filthy grips of chaos and instead guide them into the diligent world of healthy and fruitful work so they themselves can fulfill each of Schumacher’s three purposes of their own work.
When they enter this world of what Schumacker calls “Good Work” then we have the joy of knowing our work was useful.
2019: The year of “Aha”
Looking back I am compelled to see 2019 as the year we arrived at the peak of a very small mountain.
Of course this mountain seemed unscalable in March of 2015 but now is a source of incredible joy when we think about the business owners who have been able to climb their own mountains with our encouragement, coaching and support.
Between the one-on-one coaching, our new LIVE/LOCAL group coaching, the BOP Roadmap, and Architect’s Coaching program, we have had the honor and responsibility of directly impacting a powerful numbers of owners and key leaders in just this year. To our best estimate, at least…
443 Families!
...this does not include subcontractors, vendors, and suppliers.
2020: A little nervous...a LOT EXCITED!
I’ve got loads of clarity both for our Business On Purpose business and for our heroic business owners and their key leaders in 2020.
I’ll be honest, I’m a little nervous about two things. Greed and Complacency.
In 2019 a critical mass of our business owners really figured out how to recognize real cash profit thanks to the a) multi-bank account structure, the b) level two dashboard, c) financial barn, and d) a lot of discipline. It worked! The profit accounts started filling up and will continue to do so in 2020.
If we’re not careful it can lead to a mindset of coasting, or even worse...greed.
To push beyond that, our word for 2020 is REINVEST, and I am A LOT EXCITED about that.
We are going to be relentless with our heroic business owners to REINVEST in vision, mission, values, systems, and process.
REINVEST in identifying purpose.
REINVEST in team meetings.
REINVEST in processes and process roadmaps.
REINVEST in knowing our team through roles, org charts, and personality profiles.
REINVEST in knowing your numbers through our accounts, dashboards, financial barns, budget, etc.
REINVEST in owners connecting with other owners and key leaders connecting with each other.
REINVEST in our 12 week plan LIVE event.
REINVEST in our common goal and responsibility of building a business on purpose.
I’ll use Business On Purpose as an example. Our major internal business focus is broken down into three tracks…
In March of 2020 we will celebrate five years of liberating business owners from chaos. Over the next five years, we WILL see overwhelming waves of liberation among existing and new businesses and their owners that will lead to a bona fide movement of purpose, generosity, and progress in marriages, families, and communities. This WILL happen and we want you to be a part.
You can begin to REINVEST in your own business by joining us for our next powerful, free webinar “Stop Hiring The Wrong People”, where I will build a hiring process from scratch right in front of your eyes!
You can register for free here at BOPWebinar.com.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose, author of Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. Scott also hosts The Business On Purpose Podcast and can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
Michael Beaumont was doing a masterful job yesterday of teaching about the priority and necessity of vision. I was in my happy place. There were friends who I could here in our small church meeting space snickering and chuckling as Michael talked about vision, as if to say, “Scott must be lapping this stuff up!!”
Michael then shared a story about Matthew Emmons that made me immediately think of you, the business owner.
Emmons is University trained in finance and management and moonlights as one of the world’s premier rifle marksman having won multiple Olympic medals.
Emmons was competing in Athens, Greece during the 2004 Olympics and was on his way to winning a gold medal. It was time for the three positions competition where competitors “fire .22 caliber smallbore rifles from the prone, standing, and kneeling positions at targets 50 meters downrange. The bullseye is 10.4 millimeters in diameter, smaller than a dime” (Washington Post).
It was time for his final shot and he drilled it. A bullseye.
The official score was posted and Emmons was confused. It read “0”.
Zero.
What happened? It was a bullseye.
Emmons was aiming at the target in the next lane over. Zero. He would not earn the gold medal.
Sometimes we have vision but find we are aiming at the wrong thing. The Independent later reported Emmons admitting, “I didn't look at the number above the target before the last shot...I usually always look [through the scope] at the number first and then drop down to the target. I was just working on calming myself down and getting a good shot off. I should have looked.”
Over the past month I had multiple conversations with people who want to start their owxn business. I asked them one simple question, “do you have anything written down?” Typically the answer is “no”.
Here are three realities to know when we choose not to take a look at the right target. Three realities of not writing your vision down on paper.
First, if you do not have a vision you will feel chaos. Do not be surprised by that feeling of restlessness, confusion, frustration, and detachment like things seem out of control. That is is the natural result of a lack of vision.
The question now becomes, “do you wish to continue living in the uncertainty of chaos?” If you do, and believe it or not some go looking for chaos, then please be a solopreneur and do not bring others into your chaos. It’s cruel and we have seen it lead to damaged relationships.
If you wish to not spend your time in chaos, then let’s move onto the second reality.
Second, if you do not write your vision down then you do not have a vision.
There is clear historical precedent in understanding vision and seeing out vision gets distributed. A Jewish story gives us insight into the priority of writing a vision down. The Jewish prophet Habakkuk is in a tense conversation with God and God responds, “write the vision down so those who read it may run” (Habakkuk 2:2).
Think of all of the visions, ideologies, convictions, instructions, and master plans in history that have been written down. You cannot imagine walking into the Pentagon to a high level meeting among four-star Generals with battle plans...in your head. “Greetings Generals, I had this idea…”
Global religions do not lean on the oral traditions along, they all have a “book”.
I heard it said, “if you do not write it down it does not exist.”
The reason we do not rush to write things down is because it is hard, and because it feels so elementary. We have got to get over both.
Hard things breed endurance and thoughtfulness. Elementary things usually remind us that life is a series of living out fundamentals.
Do the hard, elementary discipline of writing down your vision either with pen on a real piece of paper, or on a digital document that you will review regularly.
Final reality. If you do not have a written vision then no one will run with you. You will be alone.
Periodic isolation can be restorative and valuable. Continual isolation is predictably damaging and punitive in most societies.
What may be worse is perceived companionship where you think you are surrounded by like-minded people and wake up one day realizing that you are running alone.
How does that happen? Not having or communicating your written vision.
Let me encourage, motivate, and persuade you. Please...
Write your vision down so you have confidence in the target you are aiming at.
Write your vision down so your kids know what Mom or Dad’s ambitions are when you are not around to share them.
Write your vision down so you don’t live a life in the slow drain of chaos.
Write your vision down because WE WANT TO RUN WITH YOU!
You can write out your own vision by going to our website at mybusinessonpurpose.com and click “Get Your Free Vision Story Here”.
We want to help you run and liberate you from business chaos.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose, author of Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. Scott also hosts The Business On Purpose Podcast and can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
Over the holiday break I had a chance to restructure my bookshelves and do one of my favorite things...meander through my books!
Books are NOT just for nerds like me. Books are a wise conversation with an old soul.
Hemingway said, “no friend is as loyal as a book.”
Jefferson said simply, “I cannot live without books.”
Or how about this more modern Game Of Thrones reference, “... a mind needs books as a sword needs a whetstone, if it is to keep its edge.”
You will need to keep your edge throughout 2020 as it is an important year, and books will sharpen you.
Here are four books that I recommend you load up for 2020 and spend time re-investing in yourself (in no particular order)...
This is not a list of my top books of all time (that may come later this year)...but some powerful reads to keep you engaged in this important year of re-investment.
Re-invest in yourself...set a timer for 10 minutes per day and commit to reading.
Just read.
“But reading is boring!” Read anyway until that mindset changes:).
Be like my buddy TJ who does not consider himself a reader but realized last year the impact that reading has on his family...look closely at one of my favorite pictures...
It is a life-discipline that will TRANSFORM you.
P.s. - you can add my book Let Your Business Burn to your list, and while you’re at it register for our next free BOP Webinar in February RIGHT HERE “Start Hiring The RIGHT PEOPLE: Watch Me Build A Predictable Hiring Process Right In Front Of Your Eyes”
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose, author of Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. Scott also hosts The Business On Purpose Podcast and can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
Last month we hosted our 9th BOP 12 Week Plan LIVE Event with over 130 business owners and key leaders in the room all culminating with each person working on their next 12 week plan.
Each event we ask for feedback on what people are struggling with, it was overwhelmingly clear what the current headache is in owning a business. One owner said it this way, “I need to cut the distractions, and get a real employee to help me!”
The curse of the business owner is taking the superhero mindset into their business and setting a stage where they are the promoter, the actor, the director, the stage hand, the writer, the ticket seller, the janitor, and everything in between.
We believe that no one is equipped to help. We say things like, “I hate having to have employees.”
In reality, employees generally want to be useful and valuable to the organization that they are a part of. We tend to be the missing link.
Here are five clear things you can do to make sure that your mission gets the help it needs.
First, do you really believe in your mission? If you do, there is no way to do it alone. If you do not have a written mission then go to work to create one sentence that is less than 12 words that will capture why you do what you do.
At Business On Purpose we are obsessed with liberating business owners from the chaos of working IN their business.
Second, write out every task that you are currently doing yourself or that you know needs to be done. Once you can visually see those tasks and how much time they take each week you will awaken to the sober realization that you cannot do it all yourself and remain healthy.
Third, write out a simple job role. Take those tasks, lump them into a role, articulate how each of those tasks are done and then go find the right person. Make sure to spend the extra time putting together a budget for the role based on your actual financials...do not guess.
Fourth, go find a person to match the role. Don’t focus on a person with a pulse, instead focus on someone who has the personality, the skill, and the desire to work this role towards the mission you have laid out.
Finally, empower, equip, deploy, rinse and repeat. Take the role and the processes of each task and walk through them with your new team member. Send them out to do the task and provide a weekly (at minimum) set time and place to follow up with progress of their deployment.
Let’s put an end to the mindset that we “hope they do it right”, and instead own the mindset that will work to empower, equip, and deploy so you can have some real help so you can impact your real mission.
You don’t have to do it all yourself. You yourself can be liberated from the chaos of working IN your business.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose, author of Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. Scott also hosts The Business On Purpose Podcast and can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.