Business Growth Insights

Did you start off 2010 with lofty New Year’s resolutions for your business? When you first set your eyes on your objective you were probably passionate and motivated. But before long, the energy and enthusiam fades away. Have you lost track of your business goals and reverted back to your old routines?

The good news is that you can get back on track.

Review your goals
Reevaluate your goals and their purpose. Why do you want to achieve them? Many people forget why they set a goal in the first place and their excitement about it dwindles. See if the goals are what you truly desire or if those goals were set with someone else’s expectations in mind. Many people fall wayside of the goals they’ve set simply because they haven’t really taken the time to evaluate why they want to achieve them. Make sure that your goals benefit you and your business and that they fit with your overall business strategy. Get rid of the ones that aren’t worth your effort. Be excited and passionate about your goals.

“Strong, deeply rooted desire is the starting point of all achievement.” – Napoleon Hill

Take the proper action steps
Achieving your goals isn’t going to happen overnight. Are you interested or committed in achieving those goals? If you’re interested, then you’ll only do the things that are convenient and hope that you’ll achieve your goals with minimal effort. If you’re committed, then you’ll do whatever it takes to achieve your goal. You’ll invest the time and effort that it requires. Here are some action steps that will help you stick with your commitment:

• Write down your goals
• Break down each goal into manageable smaller objectives
• Start each day with a plan and take action
• Make a deadline for when your goal will be achieved and write it down
• Prioritize what is most important so that you focus on the tasks that get you closer to completing your goal
• Acquire the essential knowledge you need to make your goal a reality and apply that knowledge
• Believe that you can and will carry out your commitments
• Take 5 minutes each day to picture what your life and business would be like when you reach your goal—this will help you to stay passionate about it
• Review your goals on a weekly basis

Get accountability
In relation to being committed to your goals, having accountability will help put you in the mindset of sticking to your goals. A friend, business coach, colleague, or a mentor will make a fantastic accountability partner. Sharing the goals that you’ve written down will greatly increase the chances of success. An accountability partner will help you stay on track and will push you through the rough times when you don’t feel like doing what is necessary.

Reward yourself
If you’ve been staying on track with your goals, then reward yourself… every two weeks, month, or two months. You deserve it. Celebrate with your accountability partner. Each small milestone that you’ve achieved should be recognized as a step closer to the big picture.

You’ve made your goals, now it’s time to achieve them!

If you liked this article, tell all your friends about it. They’ll thank you for it. If you have a blog or website, you can link to it or even post it to your own site (don’t forget to mention www.onecoach.com as the original source).

If you own a successful business, there is an excellent chance you had a great mentor somewhere along the way. Mentoring is an integral part of the growth and development of any business.  Business coaches often assign mentors within a group in order to promote good training and learning efforts.  While mentoring is a very current practice among businesses and companies, it is actually a very old and well established way of learning.  Most of us can remember a teacher, relative or friend who inspired us to learn and grow in ways that lasted a lifetime. A good mentor is first and foremost a teacher.  Instilling a desire to learn, and encouraging the ability to take risks involved with learning is a mentors greatest goal. So, how does one become a great mentor?  Here are a few guidelines to consider.

Understand the potential of the person you are mentoring. When you are aware of a person’s natural abilities and talents, you can guide them forward in the true areas of their interest.

Identify the personality traits that will help you better understand what drives a person to learn.

Establish in the beginning that you and the person you may be mentoring are compatible and can make the relationship work. Do you share similar values and beliefs? Are your work ethics basically the same? Do you share a mutual respect for each other?  And, as basic as it may sound, in order for a mentor/student relationship to work, you must like each other.

A good mentor is able to openly share personal experiences and achievements for the student to learn from both the failures and successes.

As a mentor, it is also your responsibility to help your student believe in his or her own potential and encourage them to develop their own interests and follow their dreams. Many people find it much easier to adapt the goals and directions of others rather than develop their own.

You will be there to instruct and to teach but also to encourage, reward and inspire. You will be the one to help your student up when he falters, and offer encouragement and reinforcement whenever he begins to doubt himself.

A mentor will encourage a student to venture out of their natural comfort zone to try new things and take new risks in order to broaden their horizons and expand their realm of experiences.

Understand that a mentor/student relationship will require quite a large investment of both time and energy in order to be successful.  It can be enormously rewarding and fulfilling for the mentor and an enriching and even life-changing experience for the student.

Your greatest challenge may be in maintaining the right balance of friendliness and familiarity.  It is essential to provide the right amount of support, encouragement and respect while being able to teach, counsel, and recommend ideas for change and improvement without becoming too personal and involved.

And finally, be open to the possibility that a relationship may not be working.  Not every pairing will be a good match, and it is far better to part as friends than to try and force a relationship.

If you liked this article, tell all your friends about it. They’ll thank you for it. If you have a blog or website, you can link to it or even post it to your own site (don’t forget to mention www.onecoach.com as the original source).