“Mastering others is strength. Mastering yourself is true power.” Lao Tzu

How many times on average does someone attempt a goal before giving up? Would you guess one, two or three? The real answer is less than one. Many people give up before they even try.

Self-discipline is the trait that makes the difference. It goes hand-in-hand with determination and resilience. If you know you can rely on yourself to be disciplined in your approach, you know that there is a possibility of success. Without it, it is easy to feel defeated before you even start or to become easily distracted from your goal.

I work daily with experts who are at the pinnacle of their chosen profession in business, sport and every area of enterprise. When I am asked what is the one thing that sets those who succeed apart from those who fall short of their true potential? Or what do successful achievers do that others don’t?, the answer is always rooted in their self-discipline.

Successful people are willing to do the things that they don’t necessarily want to do in order to get the results they want. They tend to put the needs of the goal ahead of instant gratification. It’s all about desire, not denial.

They put in extra hours and effort to achieve the outcome they want because they always have an eye on the long-term goal. Rather than stopping to question whether they want to do something, self-disciplined people are more likely to get on with it!

A self-disciplined approach delivers improved performance and successful results – and keeps people on track. They know that, without self-discipline, nothing will ever happen and nothing will ever change. They will fall behind and lose control.

You can plan, dream, create and think positively all you want and still not make your business a success if you don’t take action in a self-disciplined way. Self-discipline feeds self-esteem and puts winners in the driving seat. I believe it is the core trait that sets successful people in every field of endeavour.

Mastering the art of self-discipline is like investing successfully in time. Those who plan ahead and who complete tasks within the time allocated develop the confidence to know they can achieve their larger goals.

Mastering The art Of Self-Discipline

• Self-discipline creates self-reliance, which feeds self-confidence. If you know you can rely on yourself to deliver results, you are more likely to aim high in your ambitions.

• Self-discipline goes hand-in-hand with effective planning and time management. It ensures that you are in control – and leading the action, rather than reacting to the others demands.

If you know what you are doing, and when and why you are doing it, you will be less likely to be taken off-track.

• Self-disciplined people have a long-term plan that sets out their goals and ambitions, supported by a short-term plan in the form of a daily ‘do it!’ list. The devil is in the do its! Don’t just list them – do them!

If you create a plan and stick to it, you will achieve more, more efficiently, and create more hours in each working day.

• Being self-disciplined sends a clear message to others that you can be relied upon. You will attract like-minded people to do business with you and work with you.

• A self-disciplined approach to life enables your auto pilot on those occasions when the going gets tough.

•   Self-discipline drives action. It turns targeted thinking into focused doing, even when you’d rather be doing something else.

Self-discipline is easier to maintain when developed as a habit in every area of our lives. Build your self-discipline muscle, daily. Ask yourself what changes in my own approach will make the most difference to my success?

Watch your attitude to food, exercise, watching TV, using social media, playing computer games and so on. Be honest with yourself – what are your distractors?

Do you get up as soon as your alarm clock rings – even when you don’t want to? Or do you tend to press the snooze button and start your day with a delay?

Do you eat only when you are hungry or do you tend to treat yourself even though you ‘shouldn’t’?

Are you the kind of person who is punctual, who is always on time for appointments? Or do you leave everything to the last minute?

Do you spend first and worry about the money afterwards, or do you always save up for what you want?

By becoming aware of your current behaviour, it becomes more possible to be increasingly self-disciplined in your choices and efficient with your use of time.

From the very moment of waking up and getting out of bed each morning, through each area of your working day, become watchful and aware of the diversionary tactics you may use to avoid doing essential tasks.

By matching your desires to the actions you need to make your dream a reality, you can begin to apply the self-discipline required to make your future a certainty. It is a skill that those around you will begin to learn and benefit from too – by following your example.

Connect with Bev on Google+

Everyone has the same 24 hours in a day, so why is it that successful people are able to achieve so much, when many others are left struggling to complete a few tasks.

As children most of us would have learnt to tell the time by the age of nine but we may spend a lifetime trying to master it. Ultimately, the story of your life would depend on how you use the time you have been given.

Your success in life depends on how you manage your own and other peoples’ time. It is our most precious resource.

Time management is of course self-management. It is a combination of planning, realism and self-awareness. But to control time we first need to understand our relationship with it.

It may seem harmless to say time and time again (pardon the pun) ‘I don’t have time’, ‘I can’t make time’, ‘Time just runs away’, or ‘Time is not on my side’ but these phrases betray a belief that time is in control of you, rather the other way around. Instead, try saying ‘I can always make time’.

Think about time as if you can manufacture it at will and you will always have enough.

Feel-good stories often start with ‘Once upon a time…’ the future is always rich with possibility and your time can be filled with anything you choose. Here are seven questions to focus your time management:

1. What decision would make the biggest difference in your life right now?

Whatever you do for a living you probably wish that there were more hours in the day. Investing money or resources in outsourcing can be an excellent way to free yourself up to focus on the elements of your life that need more of your attention, skills and vision.

2. If you stay on your current path, where will you end up?

Is your life heading in the direction you want it to? What is going well? What can be improved? How can you spend your time most effectively? Take 10 minutes to plan your day first thing in the morning and make sure you are not busy being busy.

3. What are you tolerating or putting up with?

Most people are ‘putting up with’ something that they feel would be too time-consuming to sort out. It might be the leaky tap, the over grown garden or even a puncture in the tyre of the family car. Whatever it is, there will come a point where there will be a cost involved in putting off the moment of the decision.

4. How different would your life be if you followed through with some of the things you are ‘putting up with’?

Take one at a time and consider the steps you need to take so that you regain control of the situation. There’s no time like the present, so take small steps to complete the tasks ahead.

Remember you don’t have to be complete it straight away, but by breaking the task down you will be managing your time more efficiently. Many people get caught up with the view that they need to complete one project before they can move on to the next.

5. What will you regret not doing in your life in later years?

Few of us give ourselves enough time to reflect on the whole life picture. A common coaching exercise invites people to write their own obituary, highlighting past and future achievements. This is ‘starting with the end in mind’ in a very real sense and can wake people up to the time they have to achieve their true goals.

6. What has lack of confidence or self-belief stopped you achieving?

It’s only human to have self-limiting beliefs of some sort. I once had a self-limiting belief about being able to talk to large groups of people; now I am not fazed if I need to speak to 1,000 people. If your beliefs are getting in your way, you can choose to make time to take advice on tackling these beliefs.

7. What is your life’s purpose? What are you passionate about?

If you identify your life’s purpose you can plan every decision to take you closer to achieving your goal. Every choice you make – from actions and reactions to promises and excuses – provides clear clues as to where your true motivation and priorities lie.

There is little point in aiming for something, if every time you are faced with a time choice you are diverted towards doing something else.

Connect with Bev on Google+

“Every coach needs to run their practice as a small business owner.”

Most coaches have an absolute passion for the work they do. Many will say that coaching isn’t hard work because they find it such a pleasure. Their core motivation is rarely a desire for riches – most are driven more by the wish to make a tangible difference to people’s lives.

Being good at what we do gives us a sense of purpose and personal satisfaction, which is great for self-esteem. But a love of the task on its own will not make a profit. Without positive cash flow a livelihood can quickly be in danger and the freedom to focus on clients’ needs will be compromised.

Coaches have often make a significant investment in time and money to gain life changing skills and qualify as an NLP professional, but have taken little or no time to learn the basic principles of how to run a business.

As MD of The Coaching Academy, and the Entrepreneurs’ Business Academy for Coaches, I know that building a business is not down to luck. It is a process that can be learned, like any other.

I had already been running a series of commercially successful companies when I first trained as an NLP coach, which meant it was easy for me to combine my new coaching skills with my existing business experience and make a healthy living.

But the coaching had to be the main priority. Focusing solely on getting a financial return from my clients felt incongruent to me.

Now I am on a mission to encourage more people in the coaching profession to think of themselves as business owners as well as caring professionals and to help them to tell as many people as possible know who they are and what they offer.

My forthcoming series of articles headed Coaching Heart – Commercial Mind is all about adding value to your coaching service, remaining true to your core ideals and selling with integrity. The first is about the importance of running your coaching practice as a business owner.

PRESS PAUSE AND TAKE TIME TO PLAN

A coaching or training business can be run with few overheads and minimal set up costs. Many coaches and trainers work from home and will continue to work full or part time until their business takes off.

This reduces the risk of business failure, but the low-key approach can also lead to a complacent attitude towards business planning and personal goal setting.

Coaches often tell me that they don’t have enough clients for a sustainable business – but when I ask them how many clients they need, they don’t know.

NLP practitioners are used to encouraging their clients to set specific and achievable goals – but it is crucial that they take the same approach themselves. Coaching or training is the service the business provides – but coaches need to manage that service with the mindset of a business owner.

Growing a successful business depends first upon knowing what you want to achieve, and then finding enough clients to pay for your product or service.

It means taking time out to develop a business plan and to consider your vision of the future. For those who are motivated more by helping others than by financial success it can be a hard lesson to learn.

KNOW YOUR NICHE

Businesses fail not because therapists and counsellors are not good enough at what they do – but because they are not effective at generating enough new clients. Unfortunately it is not enough to be well-qualified and to have a website or to think ‘my reputation will do the talking’.

Being successful is not only about being professionally excellent, it is about being clear about your niche area of expertise and running your practice like a business owner: prospecting for clients, managing costs, and marketing yourself in an ongoing and cost-effective way.

START WITH THE END IN MIND

Always start with the end in mind. Commercial goal setting starts with creating a business plan. It doesn’t need to be elaborate, but it needs to be very clear.

If you know how much you want and need to earn each year, you will be better able to plan how to achieve that aim. Look at your costs; look at your prices; set them properly and view your coaching business as a business. Ask yourself:

• ‘What are my running costs?’ (Premises, bills, rent, living costs and so on.)
• ‘How much do I need to earn per year? (And how does that break down?’)

• ‘How much do I need to allow for Tax and National Insurance?’ (Consider setting up a separate bank account to put the money aside.)

• ‘What is the market rate, and what is my scale of charges?’ (Do some market research.)

• ‘How many clients do I need to make this work – per year, per month, per week?’ (People often don’t know this.)

• ‘Is this more or less than the number of clients I want?’ (Alter pricing accordingly.)

• ‘Have I taken account of seasonal variations?’ (For example, December is likely to be slow.)

• ‘How am I going to find them?’ (Target your marketing.)

Ask yourself – what is my customer profile? If you are positioning yourself as an expert (and I suggest that you do) then you are likely to become highly sought after and people will be prepared to pay more for your help.

Remember: generalists seek clients but clients seek specialists. If you are a specialist, it will be easier for other people to recommend and promote you. Very often you can charge more for your time because there are fewer people offering your service.

YOUR TIME HAS A FINANCIAL WORTH AS WELL AS A PROFESSIONAL VALUE

No matter how much you want to help your clients, you need to remember that your time really is money, which means you need to manage time carefully. Many coaches over-commit their time and under-charge for their services.

It is wise to agree a scale of times and charges up-front, otherwise you may find yourself working twice as long for half your hourly rate. Consider offering a course of treatments and encourage pre-payment, rather than charging by the hour.

Not only does it increase client commitment in some cases, it also means that if someone cancels at the last minute, or if you go over time, you can charge accordingly.

To build a sustainable business you need to tell as many people as possible that you exist and to keep communicating your business message as clearly as you can – and ask them to be proactive about recommending you too.

Selling and success go hand in hand. The more effective you are at selling, the better able you will be to provide a great service to your clients.

In the next few issues I will be writing about the importance of sales, marketing, first impressions and business branding, e-marketing and financial management.

Connect with Bev on Google+

More and nore coaching  businesses are finding social media an affordable and effective method to communicate with their clients by sharing content, asking questions, holding contests, and interacting with them.

Sites like Facebook, Twitter, Google+ and LinkedIn let you share your branding message consistently across all channels.

Social media gives you the opportunity to monitor what’s being said about your coaching business online, for better or worse.

No matter what you sell, chances are that social media can help you reach a wider audience with your message.

If you are Internet savvy you can capitalise on some of the tips below.

The social media can give you a perfect opportunity to raise your own profile and/or that of your company:

• Use Google Analytics to give you insights into your website effectiveness and your website traffic.

• Monitor the scene by Google Alerts, Google Blog search tool, and LinkedIn’s and Twitter’s own tools.

• If you are selling to businesses (B2B), use LinkedIn, a social network for businesses, to bring up profiles of your target buyer persona. There are also many LinkedIn groups where your customers may be members where you can not only learn about their problems, but also proffer your expertise.

• Consider forums & blogs of B2B magazines & professional bodies, trade associations, local & business networking groups, LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebook etc.

• Don’t think how you can exploit social media, but how you can contribute. Your messages need to be related to what people are searching for, rather than what you want to sell.

• Consider setting up discussion forums on your company website dedicated to problems/hot topics.

• You need to embed relevant keywords into your online content, but make sure they do not look out of place.

• Incorporate a blog onto your website, written by one person or several from your company.

Your company’s social media strategy will be different from any other coaches, as it should address the goals you want to achieve in terms of branding, web traffic and sales.

Use it to position your coaching business as a source of knowledge, writing about something of interest to your target audience, well and without errors. Don’t use it to overtly sell.

Visitors are more likely to buy from you  if they feel connected to you, and a blog can do just that.

Then you can consider blogging on your coaching niche and become the specialist in that area.

For more detail please refer to the DO IT! Guide To Social Media

Positioning itself in the “Top 10 Free Business Apps” during the launch week, the reviews are already coming in and are glowing. We love sharing positive news here at The Coaching Academy so read on to find out what all the fuss is about:

“Just what I have been looking for – Useful, On-Point and Inspiring – This app is amazing and for me personally, perfectly timed. Attempting to start my own business I have struggled to find information which covers all the current aspects of starting up in an interesting, informative way and in ONE place!! This app is a God send – great that I can access the resources on my phone as well as my laptop! LOVE IT!” – Abigail Sekwalor

“Awesome – Great app Bev. Clean, fresh style and look. Packed with so much practical help and advice and a great DISC tool that comes as the icing on the already tasty cake! Well done!” – Tim O’ Rahilly 

“Wonderful – Great app, love DISC even more than the book version. Free too, I’d have paid for it happily!” – Hattie Jacques

“Extremely impressive app. What I like about it is it’s simplicity, the information and the ongoing support via the Daily Do Its. Great little app – Love it and won’t be ditching it!” – Steve Jones 

“Do It! – If first impressions count (and of course they do), this app really stands out in excellence for resources and tips at your fingertips (literally!). I say Do It! Download it!” – Mariola Mayer

If you haven’t yet downloaded Bev’s app then you can do so by clicking on the button below. If you have already downloaded the app (thousands of you already have!) then do feel free to leave your review direct on the app store. Look forward to seeing them soon!