A 12-month business plan is one of the key essentials to have and to refer to regularly. It’s an accountability tool that will keep you on track for the year ahead. You’ll use it to measure your performance against it and see how well you’re doing.

How do you create a 12-month business plan?

• Be clear on your business vision and where you’re taking your business long term. 
• Do your planning and know what you want to achieve in your business in the next 12 months. 
• Break it down into smaller segments – quarters – so the action list doesn’t seem so daunting. 

Business Vision

Before you start creating your 12-month business plan, you need to get really clear on your longer-term business vision. Where are you going as a business and why? What’s meaningful for you to create as the business owner?

Plan

You’ll then want to do your year ahead planning by having a look at several key categories that you need to consider as you move your business forward:

1. Clients - Think about who ...

Is your business completely dependent on you as the business owner? What happens if you decide to step away or take a holiday? What happens when you want to retire or go and do something else?

Most business owners can’t step away from their businesses – even for a week! And most definitely haven’t thought about the end game and what happens when they want to exit the business.   

So how can you maximise business growth and how can you put a plan in place, so when it’s time to exit – the business keeps going and you reap the benefits of all of your years of hard work. 

One strategy is to bring on a next generation of shareholders into your business. 

A key benefit of having additional shareholders in your business is that you have more people around you, incentivised and motivated to build the business alongside you. It’s a fantastic way to leverage more people around you – helping you grow the business faster. 

Another benefit is - legacy. When it’s time for you to exit the busine...

Pricing your services is always tricky because there are so many different models you can use. Plus, you’ve got to consider your expertise, experience, and the current market situation. So, it’s only reasonable that there will be times when you have clients that challenge your pricing.

Today we’re going to work through what to do and say when a client tells you you’re too expensive. 

A very common initial reaction to this kind of remark is to back down - to really start to doubt yourself with regard to your fees & hourly rates. And what this will do is have you immediately consider reducing your price. 

Or in other words - reducing your worth.

Why does that happen?

It’s the people-pleasing trigger or part of us that gets pulled. We always want to have satisfied & happy clients, or we want to get that new client across the line (aka get more cash flowing into the business). 

But, I’m here to tell you that you need to silence that initial inner voice. Stop discrediting & downgradin...

Dreaming of growing your business and achieving those goals you set for yourself in your business plan?

And getting to that point where clients will come looking for you because you are their go-to problem solver?

I think we all fall into this category. 

But what makes businesses actually successful and stand out here is being smart and going about this process wisely.

And if there’s one thing that can really hold your business back, it’s NOT being clear on your ideal client.

This can have an immense impact on the scalability & the success of your business.

So, why is this so important?

It’s because it’s got such a domino effect on the main drivers necessary for a business to thrive.

Let’s imagine that at the moment, you’re not sure who or what your ideal client is and that you’re taking on work from many different clients that all have different needs and wants. One client asks that you do something in a particular way, and the other prefers a completely different approach … you get my point....

There’s something about starting a new year that gets every business owner or team member excited. Because we see it as a new chapter with a whole host of opportunities to grow and improve.

However, before you dive headfirst into the new year - it’s super important to reflect on what the past year has brought, and how each of those things has affected your business and you as a person.

Let’s not kid ourselves, being unhappy with how certain things played out in your business last year, or what kind of clients you were dealing with, or frustrating projects you were working on can take its toll on our motivation and performance as we build into the new year. 

I don’t want that for you this year. I want you to start the new year fresh and excited – with the frustrations of last year learnt from and left behind. 

So, let’s do this together now. Go on… take out a pen and paper, or open a doc if you’re the techy type, and create a list of things that have marked the past year for you. Ma...

There is one word that I can't stand - HUSTLE......

It seems to have become a massive buzz word in the world of leaders, business owners and entrepreneurs.

I firmly believe that if you set your team and your business up smartly and you have the right systems and processes in place - then you don't need to hustle. Your team is performing well, your clients love you and the work you do for them and your project pipeline is full.

But today I'm going to break my rule and talk about one area that does require an amount of hustle....

...and that is in the follow up!!

Most people think that a potential client will either love them or hate them after one coffee meeting. They think they'll either get work out of them straight away or it wasn’t meant to be.

But that’s absolute nonsense.

If you're a stats person (which most engineers are!) then the latest stats are that a new client will need on average 8 touch points from you before they will make a purchasing decision with you. 

Now for...

So many of us know that as leaders and business owners, we need to be more strategic with our days, weeks, months and years.
 
We know we need to spend more time on big picture thinking, thinking about where our market is going, thinking about how to solve our clients’ problems in a new and unique way, thinking about and forward planning for the pipeline of work coming in the door and making sure the team and the people around us are performing to the best of their ability.
 
So why do so many of us find it difficult or get uncomfortable when we think about or even go to take some time out of our weeks to stop and think creatively and strategically?
 
The answer lies in the conflict in your mind between the different parts of your personality.
 
Let me explain.
 
You see, you have different parts of your personality that want different things for you.
 
You have a driver / achiever part of your personality that only ever wants you to be actioning things, ticking things off your to-do list and to k...

I was talking with a client recently about a common frustration in the engineering market at the moment - which is that it’s really hard to find good people.

There is work on everywhere, but business leaders and business owners are finding it hard to actually deliver the work because they don't have the teams in place to deliver good quality work to their clients.

When this happens, there can be a tendency to just hire the next person that walks in the door....regardless of their personality, skill or ability.

A bum on a seat is better than none........right?.........wrong!!

Today I want to explore with you a concept to help you ensure that you are recruiting the right person – every time.

Recruit slowly!!

Don't rush the recruitment process. Find the right person to fill the role, even if it takes WAY longer than you want it to - otherwise you will forever be paying the price.

Yes, it can be hard when clients are frustrated that you aren't delivering quick enough - and this can ...

Today I want to explore with you why being busy means that you can't and won’t be a good leader or business owner…

Big statement I know!

You see, most of us are so conditioned to being busy. We think that being busy and ticking things off our to-do list, running around all day every day and getting to the end of every day exhausted is the way to achieving the success that we want to achieve.

However, the issue with being busy all the time and trying to get things done all the time is that you're never slowing down and taking the time to think strategically about where your team or your business is going.

Let me explain.

By being busy all the time you are robbing yourself, your team and your business of your ability to think creatively, your ability to think strategically and your ability to set a vision for where your team and your business is going.

So by being busy all the time and rushing around all the time and trying to fill your days full of busyness all the time you are ac...

Recently I ran a webinar called 'How To Avoid Competing On Price', where we explored how to increase your prices, get paid what you’re really worth, how to generate more profit and how to have happier clients in the process.

One of the aspects we explored in this webinar, was your potential blocks from a mindset point of view, as to why you don’t increase your prices, ask for variations and in general get more hungry when it comes to chasing new sales and new clients.

Today I want to explore with you these blocks in a little bit more detail.

Now if you’ve noticed that you procrastinate or choose to do other things when you know you need to be talking to a client about a variation, or that you shy away from having sales conversations with clients or in general feel uncomfortable when it comes to sales, marketing and business development - then you should definitely read on!

The first block I want to explore with you is an unconscious aversion or a negative viewpoint around sales, ma...