Are You Running Your Business From A Place of Scarcity?
This was originally posted on my Seven Figure Consultant LinkedIn Newsletter. Subscribe today to get insights about how women are building powerful and impactful consulting businesses.
One of the hardest things about building a business is balancing the need for risk and the need for caution.
And careful evaluation is needed – after all, the need for risk can fall into categories of ‘good’ and ‘bad’.
Good risk comes in the form of opportunities, and saying yes at the right moment. Taking a bold step forward instead of opting for cautious conservatism.
Whereas bad risk means misreading a threat as an opportunity – or maybe even just needing to do something impulsive to ‘shake things up’, which can result in over-committing to a project that you can’t adequately deliver, or rashly saying yes to a venture that could sink the whole ship.
The balance of caution and risk is a tricky proposition in any business, especially in a small business where you may be the only person at the helm. When this is the case, you have to embody both the need for risk and the need for caution and hold these two opposing forces in tension. All the time.
And here’s where I see this cause all kinds of problems for businesses.
Often, as business owners, we fall onto one side or the other.
The risk-takers are the natural-born entrepreneurs. Full of ideas, ready to make (and often lose) huge amounts of money, quick to act, but in danger of being impulsive and easily-distracted.
Whereas the cautious are often excellent ‘business managers’. Great at balancing the books and turning a slim profit, but also prone to over time letting their ambition drop and allowing fear to determine the course they chart.
And in this case, the bad news is also the good news.
As someone building a consulting business, with ambitious plans to grow from six figures to seven figures – you need to be both of these things.
You need to be able to seize the opportunities that come your way.
But you need to be able to control the urge to run the business impulsively.
And there’s more to this than meets the eye – especially when it comes to running your business.
I see so many business owners get stuck in a ‘scarcity mindset’, where the number one goal is maximising profits through cutting costs. To the point that this becomes the main business activity.
If something costs money, the business cannot have it.
And here’s the thing.
There is a place for showing this caution when it comes to running a business.
But this approach misses out the key question that must be asked when making all decisions about business expenditure.
What will the return be on this investment?
Without investment, there is no return.
Without return, there is no business.
Making wise investments through working ON your business and not just IN your business makes a huge impact on your turnover and profit.
I have worked with clients who saw their monthly income double, triple or – my personal best – increase by 8 times, because we took simple steps to unlock the potential of their business.
We made sure they had the right business model in place. We set prices to the right level. We optimised their lead generation and sales processes. And we started using the business financials to inform the decision-making processes in the business.
I have often said to clients, if you can bring in 4K per month gross, you can usually hit 10K+ per month without too much difficulty.
But they would never have discovered this if they hadn’t made the initial investment of working with me.
How about you? Do you see yourself as more comfortable with risk or with caution?
Are there opportunities you could be missing because you’re focusing too much on turning a profit through cost-cutting, instead of looking for ways to increase your business turnover?
Free Report – The Six Elements of a Seven Figure Business
I used to run a start-up consultancy firm, and I remember all too well that when it comes to scaling beyond 100K, the overwhelm is real.
There are so many things to implement that you don’t know how to do. Websites, marketing, product offering, pricing, hiring, firing.
It isn’t easy to turn a business that used to consist of just you and your laptop into a fully-functioning business enterprise that effortlessly generates profit on autopilot.
But I’m able to bring my career experience to help women who offer consulting services to corporate clients do just that.
Thanks for reading! I’d love to hear your feedback and future topics you’d like me to feature. You may also enjoy The Seven Figure Consultant Podcast, the show that takes you from booked up and burned out in your consulting business to THRIVING as the CEO of your 7 figure enterprise.