Are You Avoiding Setting Goals?

And would like to know why?

As a business coach working with many business owners, I start to see trends in why business owners avoid planning (and growing), and I thought it might be insightful to share what I see from my side.

The top two reasons in my experience…

#1. FEAR OF FAILURE. Yep, this is number one. The situation looks something like this…the client claims to be too busy to plan. And on paper they are. They are doing ALL KINDS of stuff. In many cases they aren’t even managing to do all the stuff on their lists!

They feel justified in not spending a couple hours planning.

It’s all a game, a strategy to keep them safe. They seek out more and more tasks to fill their time up. To keep them safe from planning and not kicking the goals they said they would. Root cause is fear of failure. And often this is a result of not learning to comfortably fail as a kid and realise that they can fail and they don’t ‘die’, they can fail and still be a good person, they can fail and still receive love, and realising failing is a part of growing and moving forward. It’s a fact of life.

____

Now there are some that say ‘but I don’t know how’, or ‘I don’t think it’s going to help anyway’, or ‘that’s crazy, of course I want to grow the business, I just can’t find the time!’

Well…I still suggest it comes down to a fear of failure. I ask them to just accept the notion for a second. I ask them to imagine, if they would like to, how they would act if they had zero fear of failure. With zero fear of failure (and an appreciation of the value of planning), how would they handle the time issue? Or the ‘don’t know how’ issue?

If this resonates with you, try it. How would you act differently with your planning with zero fear of failure?

‘Busy-ness’ instead of getting down to ‘business’ is a dead giveaway of someone that is fearing they will fail – however they perceive and define failure in their mind.

____

#2 REASON? THEY DO NOT SUBCONSCIOUSLY BELIEVE THEY DESERVE TO DO BETTER, OR CAN HAVE SUCCESS = low self worth.

This is a killer of business success. This belief will sabotage all the best intentions and actions in the world. I know this one well from personal experience. It’s another one that can be a result of the life training we received as a kid. How we were treated, how we received or didn’t receive things, the conditions that were placed on receiving, and whether our parents demonstrated a feeling of deserving.

Some of the tell tale signs this belief is playing out in the business are…

1. The business owner pays everyone else first before themselves.

2. There are recurring incidents where deals fall through and other misfortune.

3. There has been no price increase for 2 or more years.

4. They seek out the cheapest deals or the free deals and don’t invest in the business or themselves.

The good news is that the power of the negative is not as powerful as the positive.

When I help them transform this belief pattern the positive results are immediate – often literally within minutes. And I’ve experienced this personally time and time again. For example on more than one occasion my client has had a positive business phone call driving back to work after our coaching session. With a different mindset, the same actions that previously delivered duds, suddenly attracts winners.

_____

If you feel you may be running some of these strategies and are tired of it, you recognise what it is costing you, and you are determined to take action, then send me an email or give me a call. I’ll ask you a few questions and be able to tell whether you need to deal with reason 1 or 2 or not. If you do, it isn’t hard or costly and definitely one of the best things you can do for yourself.

Newsletter Sign-Up

Want to keep up to date with all the latest helpful & informative resources?
Enter your email below to be added to my mailing list.