Clarity is an absolutely essential ingredient for you to achieve your
full potential in business. Napolean Hill, in his classic book Think & Grow
Rich, said "Whatever the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can
achieve." He goes on to explain why having a clear definition of what you
want to achieve is a critical factor in your success.
For business
owners who truly want to be "on purpose" for success and take their
business to the next level, I define "clarity" as follows:
Clarity is
determining exactly what results you want to achieve and when you want to
achieve them.
The key word in
that definition is "exactly". If you don't make the time to define
your goal in exact terms, you are not setting yourself up for success. Instead,
you are setting yourself up for a guess. A goal that is
not clearly defined will not be clearly achieved. Part of the goal may be
achieved, but you will not be completely satisfied with the results unless you
take the time to define the entire goal upfront.
So why is
having clarity so important? Without
clarity, your business moves from place to place like a ship without a rudder.
But with clarity, you run your business "on purpose" and you will
create amazing results -- both for you and for your customers!
This may be
best understood with an example. Several years ago I worked with a business
manager named Dan who helped manage a company based in Massachusetts. Dan had
some lofty ideas for what he wanted to achieve, but they were not defined in much detail. He also knew that he wanted to achieve a lot of results in a short period of time, but he didn't have a good idea of how he was going to do it.
some lofty ideas for what he wanted to achieve, but they were not defined in much detail. He also knew that he wanted to achieve a lot of results in a short period of time, but he didn't have a good idea of how he was going to do it.
In other words,
Dan was just like many business owners and managers who I have met over the
years. He wanted to accomplish a lot, but he needed help gaining clarity about
his ultimate goal and his timeframe for achieving it.
The first thing
I did with Dan was help coach him to identify his most important short-term
goal. Once that was done, Dan and I worked together to figure out what
timeframe was going to be our target for achieving this goal. And once we had
clarity with our goal and the target timeline, both Dan and I felt much more
confident about our chances for success.
In this case,
Dan's timeframe happened to be pretty aggressive and we both were confronted
with a lot of opposition from people who thought that it couldn't be done. Fortunately,
this story has a happy ending. Dan reached his big goal and he reached it
within the four month window that he had set for himself.
So how can you
learn from Dan's success and develop clarity for your business goals? Here are
some questions to get you started:
1. Remember in
Step One ("Understanding") when you were asked how you measure
success in your business today? Well, you need to use the answer to that question to fill in the blank below:
success in your business today? Well, you need to use the answer to that question to fill in the blank below:
What have you achieved in the last three months in your business in terms of _____________ ?
(i.e. typical items to fill in this blank are money, profits, or new customers)
2. What one
goal would you like to achieve in the next 90 days?
3. Once you
achieve this goal, what do you want to do with the extra money and extra time?
In other words, what do you personally get as a reward for achieving this goal?
4. Looking
back, what was your best month you ever had in your business in terms of
______________?
(insert your chosen measurement again in the blank, and then answer the question)
(insert your chosen measurement again in the blank, and then answer the question)
5. Can you
summarize what happened that month (or that period)? In other words, what
specific actions had you taken that led to those incredible results?
Let's use
another example to show you just how easy this process can be. Let's pretend a
woman named Cindy is the proud owner of Cindy's Teddy Bear Company, which makes
custom teddy bears for children of celebrities and upper class families.
custom teddy bears for children of celebrities and upper class families.
In last week's
article on Understanding, Cindy wrote down that the two biggest reasons she is
in business is to positively affect children's lives and to make enough money
to be financially free. Cindy also thought about how she measures her success
and determined that the number of customers she has is what is most important
to her.
Cindy came up
with the following answers to the five Clarity questions listed above:
1. In the last
three months, I have gained 72 new customers.
2. I would like
to get 100 new customers in the next 90 days. I have never done this before, so
this is a very exciting goal for me!
3. When I reach
my goal of 100 new customers, I will invest half of the profits into my
personal financial freedom account and spend some of the profits on a one-week vacation
to Mexico with my family.
4. In my best
month ever, I gained 30 new customers.
5. During my
best month, I think the biggest reason for my success was that I rolled out a
marketing campaign to a local community and followed up on every lead that I received.
Great job with
Step Two, Cindy! Now you're ready to move on to Step Three.
Are you
starting to get the picture and see how easy it can be to develop clarity for
yourself? When you focus on the above questions and answer them honestly, you
will be laying the next brick in your momentum foundation.
Make some time
in your schedule this week to think about your answers to these questions. And
if you have a business coach today, also make the time to review your thoughts
about these questions with him or her.
Getting very
clear about what you want to accomplish in your business in the next 90 days is
a very important step to catapult your business into massive momentum. Take
action and get these questions answered today.
You'll be glad
you did!
By Matt Zembruski
Photography by Melinda Nagy
Matt Zembruski
(aka "Mr. Momentum") is the author of this article and publisher of
the Massive Momentum Now newsletter. Subscribe today to get your free audio
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