A few people have been asking me recently about what’s important to me in business.
Understanding your business values is one of the most powerful ways to prioritise and make great choices, and reduce decision-fatigue.
If you’re trying to roll out something in your business and you’re wondering why it’s not working, it may be because what you’re doing is not aligned with your values and doesn’t have the right energy and passion behind it.
When you outwork your values in your day-to-day life, you feel aligned. You’re not going in different directions – where part of you is really happy and satisfied about what you’re doing, and another part is frustrated.
The way you know you’re not aligned, is that you get tension in your body.
When you really stop and think about what’s most important to you in business and you strip away all the external things, like the incessant need to impress other people or the need to look good… you tap into the true source of inspiration inside you.
This is the FUEL that’s going to motivate you to keep going when business gets tough.
Business gets tough. It can be a roller coaster. It’s hills and valleys – it’s rarely smooth sailing. This is why we need to make sure we’re clear on our business values, because they keep us going and focused on the right things.
When we really tap into our ‘why’, and understand and honour what drives us at the deepest level, we feel aligned, relaxed, calm, and in flow. We feel motivated, energised and inspired to KEEP GOING, no matter what.
So I decided to unpack my business values with you, to get you thinking about what’s most important to you in your business, so you can plan and prioritise your actions that are aligned with your values.
I will take you on a journey to help you reflect on your business values, who you’re becoming, how happy you are with where you’re at right now, and how fast you’re evolving.
I’ll share my top five values in business and how I outwork these business values in my day-to-day life. I’ll share how you can determine your business values, how they’re different from your personal values, and how you can outwork them.
Answering powerful check-in questions at the beginning of a day, week, month, or quarter is one of the best ways to get alignment.
The more you ask yourself and answer powerful questions, the more you get powerful answers.
I ask myself who, how, what, where, and why questions regularly. These are valuable questions that help keep you aligned.
Here are the questions…
1 – Who Do I Want To Become More Of?
The first question to ask yourself is “Who do I want to become more of?”
Who are you becoming? Take time to think of your future you – your future identity, and future vision. This activity is SO powerful.
I learned this in a coaching course and I now do it with my clients.
Future Vision Activity
Imagine you’re 75 years old and someone’s coming to your house and interviewing you. And they ask you what’s it like being such a successful…(You fill in the blank.) When I did this, I said speaker, spiritual mother, philanthropist, author, and advisor.
When I’m 75, I don’t want to be retired. I still want to be writing, speaking, and taking more of an advisory role in my business. I want to be on the board of advisors for my company, and have a CEO looking after the day-to-day operations.
When I think about who I’m becoming, I’m thinking about that ultimate future. Who am I, becoming right now? Who do I want to become more of? If I keep taking the actions that I’m taking now, what trajectory is that leading me on?
If I want to become a successful speaker, I need to be doing things in my day-to-day life and putting things in my calendar, potentially every day, if not every week that grow me to become a successful speaker. These will eventually lead me to become that successful speaker and world-class coach.
You can also place characteristics around your ‘who’. So think about the character of who you want to be. For example, I want to be more kick-ass. I don’t mean intimidating, but to me, kick-ass people, are relentlessly dedicated to creating results.
I want to be that person who is kicking goals, in order to inspire other people, because inspiring people taps into my personal value of contribution.
Perhaps in your character, you want to be more patient. That’s one of my characteristics I want to develop this year, is being more patient. Maybe you want to become more kind, inclusive, or resilient.
If you want to be braver, you need to prove this to yourself by doing things that scare you. You prove it to yourself by doing things like Facebook Live videos or running a webinar even if you’re scared of tech and don’t feel like a good speaker.
2 – How Quickly Am I Evolving?
Ask yourself how. How quickly are you evolving? How are you evolving in business, or in your personal development? How quickly are you dedicated to catching what the issue is where you need to improve and working on it straight away instead of delaying it?
In order for me to grow quickly so I can help people who are struggling and suffering, I need to ask myself these ‘how’ questions, and so do you. We need to stop being doormen and start taking the fast lane instead of the footpath.
I was sharing in my Inner Circle group today about putting the accelerator on and choosing to stop cruising. How much time are you spending in the fast lane really accelerating your growth by facing the stuff that scares you?
How long do you spend facing those things that are in the next level of your comfort zone? If you think about your comfort zone as a boundary that’s around you, that boundary is made up of your fear, because you don’t want to go over that boundary into your next level.
Your next level life outside of your comfort zone is your growth zone, so your fear is keeping you in that boundary. f you want to grow quickly, you need to step out and face your fears. It’s here that you quickly evolve for the sake of the people watching your life and for the sake of those who you will help in the future.
3 – What Can I Do Today To Live From My Values?
Ask yourself, what can you do today to live from your own values? I really love asking myself this question. Sometimes I just go for a walk without my phone. And I just take one question with me. So just get the question in my mind and I walk until I get the answer for it.
What can I do today to live from my values? This question forces your mind to come up with your answer because you’re not asking ‘am I’, you are asking actually what can you do today to make living in your values a reality?
This is a powerful question because your mind is so resourceful and creative, and it will come up with the answers for you. And then you want to take action on them and actually do them.
4 – Where Do I Need To Improve?
Be honest with yourself, and ask yourself, Where do I need to improve? Where is it that I’m sucking or really failing at right now? Maybe you can fake it with other people, but don’t fake it to yourself.
If you’re eating a bag of chips every night, yet trying to lose weight, or if you’re scrolling on your phone for an hour every morning when you wake up, instead of doing something else that will progress your business or life, then you’re not being honest with yourself.
Really face yourself and don’t fake to yourself. Instead of thinking ‘one day’, take steps today to improve yourself. Let’s face it, we don’t know if tomorrow will come, so taking steps today is what is important.
5 – Why Is It Important For Me To Go To The Next Level?
Why is it important for you to go the next level? Why is it actually important for you to step out of that boundary where you’ve kept myself safe and small because of fear?
We’ve all got a next level to go to.
For some of us, it’s going to the next level in finances or to the next level in running events or writing a book.
Whatever it is, we’ve all got a next level and we’ve all probably been putting the next level off.
I feel like that’s the most common theme that I see with my clients. I see they want to do something and they procrastinate. We don’t procrastinate typically because we’re lazy, we procrastinate because we’re not clear on the benefits and the reasons why we should be doing something.
I often ask myself why it’s important for me and don’t just give a few answers. I will write at least 50 answers – usually 80-100.
I ask myself, for example, why is it important to do Facebook Lives each week, or why is it important to learn to do Insta stories or to write a blog each week?
My Personal Values
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1- Freedom
My number one value in life and business is freedom. That’s why I left my full-time job in 2003 and I haven’t been a full-time employee since.
Freedom for me is about setting my own rules, being my own boss, and being free from the rat race I was in. Freedom is a higher value for me than security. It’s more important to me than a safe income.
2 – Growth
Look at how you spend your time and you will know your values. Look at your calendar. Is it filled with gym sessions, business events, etc. or is it filled with a whole lot of space where you sit and watch Netflix?
Look at what is on your walls and what kind of books you read. If you look at your audible account, what kind of books are in there?
You can see what your values are by looking at where you spend your time, energy, and resources. This will show you what you value.
3 – Health
Health and energy are really important to me. Having enough energy and making sure that I’m exercising regularly and nourishing my body, soul, and spirit.
Looking after my health and energy is about eating well, getting enough sleep, getting enough exercise, taking breaks, and going on holidays. These are all part of my health values.
4 – Connection
Spending time connecting with people and building relationships is one of my highest values. It’s part of the way I feed my soul. Connection is a value that I build into my business.
5 – Creation
It’s so important to me to create my own content, legacy items, and intellectual property and package it all up and share it.
My Business Values
With your personal values, you look at your life in every area.
With your business values, you want to think more specifically about what is most important to you in business. Think about how you’re serving people and what’s important to you in terms of your lifestyle. For example, to have integrity, to be honest, reliable, and give great customer service.
These are quite obvious, but there are some deeper things like what makes you unique and it becomes your manifesto. I like to set up business values that I’m aiming towards as guidelines and goals, rather than values I’ve necessarily arrived at.
1 – Radical Resilience
Radical resilience is doing what I know is the right thing to do, whether I feel like it or not. That encompasses discipline and encompasses consistency. It’s turning up with I feel like it or not – because I’ve made a commitment.
Radical resilience is also bouncing back. If I do an event and it doesn’t work as well as I wanted it to, I don’t wallow with it, I just keep going. I keep going until it works. It’s having an ‘until’ mindset.
When I look at my to-do list, I’ve got hundreds of action items on there. I’m going to just keep going through until they’re done, or I delegate them to someone. But I know that I’ll never give up. I just will not ever give up. Going back and giving up is just not an option for me. It never ever enters my mind.
2 – Authentic Expression
With authentic expression, I don’t always get it right. Sometimes I feel like I’m not fully expressing who I am. Sometimes I question who I am. I’m not really sure. I’m such a by-product of all my mentors that I’ve studied.
Am I really using my own authentic voice? This is something I keep working on and evolving towards. If you think of innovation, it’s often the combination of different ideas, plus someone else’s creativity added to it. So that’s something that I’m evolving to become.
3 – Extreme Ownership
Extreme Ownership is another of my high values. There’s a great book called Extreme Ownership. I recommend you read it. Extreme ownership is taking ownership of everything in your business and being responsible for it.
I’m 100% responsible for my reaction to what happens. I can’t control coronavirus, the economy, or all these other external things, but I can change my response to it and pivot to make my business better.
4 – Productive Organisation
Productive organisation and consistency are something I’m working towards. It doesn’t come naturally to me.
It’s something I have to train myself in as it’s not a natural gift or talent, despite people thinking that I’m very organised.
I strive to be organised. It’s like striving for excellence. Sometimes I have to launch things at 80% or 90% because the ROI of me getting that thing to perfection is just wasting time. And so I’ve got to just be consistent and be organised and just do my absolute best. But I have to let go of perfectionism.
5 – People-Focused Growth And Contribution
It’s not enough for me to just amass money, or just to build an empire. For me, it’s about how can I serve others or support them? How can I give back? How can I invest money into charities and causes that I care about?
I invite you to come up with your top five values if you haven’t already. It’s about growing every day towards your values.
P.S. Would you like to know exactly how to define your business values and outwork them, so you can accelerate your business faster?
I offer a free discovery session (first-time sessions) for people who want help to take their business to the next level.
I’ll map out a clear business roadmap for you to follow straight away, so you can get more clients and hit your freedom figure asap!
Apply for your free session here
See you soon,
Kat
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