Robert Gerrish is a coach, author and professional speaker and the founder of Flying Solo (www.flyingsolo.com.au), the Australian online community for solo business owners.
Recently, when addressing a group of business owners, I asked them to share their greatest business challenges. Not surprisingly, the responses were immediate and ranged from issues of marketing and time management, to staffing and finances. We had a short discussion and soon realised...
Try as we may to stuff up our planet and numb our brains with unnecessary junk, there remains many delightful human behaviours. One is how we instinctively help the people we like. In business, this translates to acquaintances and friends who rave about us, promoting us to...
I have a client who runs a small professional services business and it's killing him. No, really it is. He's quite brilliant at what he does, but totally unable to say "no". Here's how I see it. It's either: Too many clients = too...
There's a little cafe near where I live that used to be a great place in which to hang out. Then earlier this year, under new ownership, everything changed. Suddenly it became one of those places where the customer gets in the way … or at least is made to...
If you could monitor the value of your life as closely as you watch the value of your share portfolio, would you know what external factors have an impact? What's more, are you doing enough to build value? Life is not about who has the most toys,...
I have survived a couple of noticeable business downturns, in both hemispheres, and I have to say that, in hindsight, some goodness comes from them. I am not advocating that there's anything terribly good about hardship, more that such a period can have positive consequences some time...
The way some businesses treat their brands never ceases to amaze me. Near to where I live in Sydney, a new real estate agency burst onto the scene a couple of months ago. Their signboards were dramatically different to everyone else's, some of them even appeared upside...
Some people are never happy --- more work and income than they can poke a stick at and still they grumble and complain. Others scrape to make a living, yet whistle away and smile all the time. How does that work? Well, it's either...
How often do we see businesses getting in a right kerfuffle with their marketing? Far too often in my book. There is a better way and that's to develop a series of actions that you undertake, each day, each week and each month. Let's look at some:...
Networking can manifest itself in a number of ways. Today I'm going to explore a quite intimate version that can be undertaken without pain in your local cafe or restaurant. It has to do with growing your own network and the network of others. The premise is...
Last week I was talking to a friend who was suffering a high degree of angst. She had a particularly large --- pots of money --- potential project on the cards for which she'd recently submitted a detailed and time-consuming written proposal. Many hoops had been jumped...
There are a mass of companies and products directed at improving time management and no doubt they all have their merits. The thing is though, I've spoken with quite a few people in business who continue to struggle with time even though they've spent a fair chunk...
There's just so much to distract us these days, isn't there? Bring back the discipline of the typing pool I say. Well, maybe not. If we see distractions for what they are and confront rather than succumb, we can quickly get on with tackling our real business priorities....
Whether you're in the business of selling your expertise for money or selling products, it's likely you'll prefer an ongoing client or customer relationship, to one that's more a "love 'em and leave 'em" encounter. Alas, the love 'em and leave 'em strategy is often more a...
Now bear with me please, this is a tricky concept to introduce. I must start by clearly stating that I totally endorse the maxim "under-promise, over-deliver" as one that is essential to carry with us in our work. There's nothing like blowing a client's socks off to...
We spend a fair few hours in our offices don't we? If your office is at home, the chances are you spend more time there than in any other room (save perhaps for your bedroom, where for a good chunk of time it's presumably dark and you have your eyes...
I recently worked with a client who told me of a disappointing meeting she'd had with a cosultant who she was planning to use on a project. This consultant has a high degree of expertise in an area in which my client was lacking. A meeting was...
How often do we curse others for moving the goalposts? Back in my design consultancy days I was sure some clients didn't even notice the existence of goalposts until the artwork was on its way to the printer. But hey, that's another story. In our own businesses...
Clutter can be, and often is, made up of seemingly small items, yet collectively those items destroy our focus and reduce our energy. Key offenders can often be linked to incomplete projects (like tax returns!) or unfinished business (closure on a business or personal relationship, perhaps). ...
If you're forever hearing great things said about your work, yet not seeing these translate into sales and revenue, it could just be because you've fallen into the innovator trap. This is where we can end up if we confuse educating with marketing and I see it...
Robert Gerrish is a coach, author and professional speaker and the founder of Flying Solo (www.flyingsolo.com.au), the Australian online community for solo business owners.
