This week I ran a really simple but effective exercise with my clients in my coaching programs. 

Now the exercise only took about 20 minutes, but it was incredibly powerful and gave my clients some key insights into how to build, develop and deepen their relationships with their key clients. 

Let me explain.

You see, everyone is so busy at the moment. Most people I’m talking to have work coming out of their ears!!

The big opportunity I see right now is developing your key client relationships. 

All of us are working on projects with key clients. All of us have key client relationships that we are honestly not nurturing properly at the moment. 

So, as I said, this exercise is really simple and I want to walk you through it right now.

The first step is to look at what it’s like right now for you and your key client relationships.

What are your clients pain points? What are they frustrated about right now? What are the things that are annoying them and the things that they’re stru...

Hope you’re well. 

This week I was talking with a client who is super frustrated about how their team just aren't performing. 

They were really frustrated about the fact that their team members and the people around them are taking way longer to do things, are not hitting their deadlines and are just generally quite slow and not responsive.

They were their wits end. 

So if this is you, today I want to look at how do you take a team that's not performing well and build a team of high performing people around you.

The main concept I want to explore with you today is making sure that you’re leading your team and managing them in a way that suits their personality style. 

Let me explain. 

You see all of us have a unique personality style. Are unique set of personality traits. We all have ways that we like to be communicated to. We all have ways we like to be delegated to. We have strengths. We have weaknesses. We have types of work that we like doing and we have types of work that w...

This week I was talking with a client who was struggling with feelings of overwhelm and feeling like they just didn’t have the time in their days and weeks to get everything done.

As we started to explore this, it became super evident that:

• They were trying to do EVERYTHING themselves.
• They were worried about what their team would think of them if they asked for help. 

Sound familiar? 

As we dug further into this sense of overwhelm, we uncovered that they were really worried that if they asked for help their team around them:

• Would think less of them.
• Would judge them for admitting they needed help with something.
• Would think they weren’t technically competent is they were asking questions or asking for help.

Here’s the thing - as my business coach Taki says:

“If you want to go fast - go alone. If you want to go far - go together.”

Meaning - sure, you can do things on your own, never asking for help and doing the lone wolf thing. And sure - you might be able to go fa...

Procrastination is single-handedly the biggest productivity and goal achieving killer. 

Do you find yourself regularly doing things that you KNOW aren’t really that important? 

Do you even catch yourself, acknowledge what you're doing isn’t that important - but keep doing it anyway??!! 

Have you ever stopped to ask yourself: 

 "I know this isn't that important - so why am I doing it?"

 "What's the REAL reason I'm procrastinating here?"

This week I explored with my clients on our coaching call the real and underlying reasons why you ACTUALLY procrastinate. 

Think about it for yourself - what do you do when you're procrastinating? 

Some of the answers from my clients on the coaching call to this question:

• Eating / snacking.
• Getting another coffee.
• Mindlessly responding to or cleaning up emails.
• Talking to colleagues about things that just aren’t important.
• Surfing carsales.com!!

Then we got to the heart of what is REALLY going on when I asked WHY? 

Some of the response...

This week on our group coaching call, one of my clients asked the question: 

"I'm going into a meeting with a client this afternoon and I know he is going to ask me to cut my fees - what should I do?".....

.....who else has been in a similar situation here?? 

Off the back of this question, we had a great discussion with the whole coaching group as this is an incredibly common occurrence in our industry. 

Everyone left the call with a lot to think about!

Here is a summary of the main issues with you cutting your fees:

1) Lost Opportunity Cost

Before you agree to drop your fees or your project costs and do the project for love and no profit margin at all.....

Ask yourself - "What’s my lost opportunity cost here?"

Meaning, if I say yes and do this project for cheap and take up my time and my teams time on a project that's not going to make any money at all - what else could I or my team be working on that could actually make more money or create a better opportunity? 

Ask yourse...

Do you feel like you are constantly missing the mark with your clients? 

Do you always feel on the back foot even when you think you've done a good job? 

In today's video I would like to walk you through the concept of expectation vs. reality. 

Today I want help you address this issue and help you turn your clients into raving fans of you, your team and your business! 

Click Here  to watch now.

Josh ‘Expectation vs Reality’ Stone

PS: If you’re interested, here are 4 ways I can help you right now:

1. Join the Leaders In Engineering community designed specifically for engineering leaders and business owners
   It’s our new Facebook community where engineering leaders and business owners are learning the strategies and leadership skills to step up and thrive right now – Click Here to join

2. Download our FREE PDF guide – “How To Build A High Performing & Highly Profitable Engineering Team”
   Learn the skills to get the most out of the people around you. Build a high performing engineerin
...

For most in the engineering and construction industry at the moment - things are hectic!

There is plenty of work on and the biggest issues at the moment are workload, resourcing and keeping up with clients and how fast they want to go right now.

A big frustration for most at the moment is managing their clients, dealing with tight deadlines and juggling the constant workload issues (as well as the team overwhelm and burnout that comes with this). 

Today I want to explore with you 2 areas that can make a massive difference to these very real issues you are facing at the moment.

1) Deeply Understand Your Clients World 

A lot of client related issues stem from not taking the time to deeply understand your clients world. 

Slow down and take the time to talk to them and understand what their drivers are. 

Who do they report to?

What are the issues and pressures they are facing at the moment? 

How could you make their lives easier through a tweaking of your delivery program on their...

Do you constantly get to the end of each day or week feeling tired, burnt out, flat, unmotivated and like you’ve got no energy left to give to the other parts of your life? 

If yes – then this is a really good indication that the achiever part of your personality is running you into the ground. 

In today’s video we explore this part of your personality from both viewpoints – both functional and dysfunctional. 

You need this part of your personality to be on fire - keeping you accountable, ensuring that you’re ticking things off your to-do list and keeping things moving forward if you’re going to be successful at leading and growing your team and your business. 

However, if you let this part of your personality run your days, your weeks and your life in general – then you’re in trouble…..as this can lead to burn out, overwhelm and a complete imbalance with the other (just as important) parts of your life. 

If you want to learn more on this topic, follow the link below to watch the ...

In this week’s group coaching calls for members of my 10 week and Boardroom programs - we explored the traits of the people pleasing part of your personality. 

We explored as a group the benefits as well as the limitations of this part of your personality. 

It was a really interactive session and this is honestly one of the main parts of your personality that I see in my coaching work that leads to burn out, overwhelm and not enjoying the work you do.

Some of the benefits we explored of the people pleasing part of your personality:

• Allows you to be genuine and approachable.
• Ensures you do great work for your clients.
• Helps your team and your clients to like you and enjoy doing business with you.
• Helps you develop rapport and great relationships with those around you.
• Ensures good repeat business from your existing clients.

PS - mind blown moment!! We also explored how this part of your personality can help you be incredible at marketing, sales and BD as it helps potential ...

Leadership is a particularly interesting topic.

Most of the leaders and business owners I work with really want to be better leaders. 

They want to inspire the team of people around them.

They want to be able to lead with confidence. 

They want the skills to be able to go into any situation and know they will get a good outcome.

A lot of leaders and business owners I work with also really feel like they have to completely overhaul and fundamentally change who they are to be exceptional leaders. 

This is simply not true. 

Everyone has the ability to be a great leader and you don't necessarily need the job title or status or to be in charge of a team of people to turn up every day and to lead with confidence and authenticity. 

There are two areas I want to explore with you today that will allow you to dramatically improve your leadership skills. 

1) Be Humble 

People naturally gravitate to and respect leaders who are humble. 

Be willing to admit when you don't know something. ...