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Cobblers kids go barefoot. How often can this be applied to Financial Planners themselves? Busy looking after other people’s Financial Planning, making sure clients articulate their goals, and then inspire clients to achieve them, many Financial Planners forget 2 things:
Their own financial life plan (some feel it’s better to get another Financial Planner they trust to do this for them, and ultimately this will bring with it accountability)
If they are Business Owners, they need to spend time both “on” and as well as “in” their Business.
Looking at Point 2 above, its vital that an Owner takes a structured approach to dealing with this. This includes setting regular time, we recommend at the same time and the same day each week, to take a break from the normal role of Financial Planning (or the technician to quote Michael Gerber), and wear the Business Owners Hat.
Hitting the Ceiling
The feeling of being stuck, frustrated / things are complex and chaotic / scratching your head / can’t get unstuck, hit all Business Owners at some stage. However, there is good news and hope – hitting the ceiling is a natural part of growth. It’s normal. A study from the 1960’s “How Organisation’s Really Grow” showed that most have periods of Evolution and Revolution, ie they don’t grow in a straight line, they will have some pain associated, like children, with growth spurts. In an Entrepreneurial company it will take effort, skill and ability.
Companies hit the ceiling in 3 different ways:
Organisational level
Department level
Individual level
HITTING THE CEILING IS INEVITABLE, but there is hope!
1. Simplify
This is rooting out complexity as it grows in your organisation. If you intend to grow, the leaders must master the skill of reducing complexity, reducing everything to its simplest form – dumb it down – KISS. The whole thing can be summarized in “less is more”!
2. Delegate and Elevate™ to your Unique Ability®.
Unique Ability® is a Dan Sullivan term – what you love to do and are best at. The only way for an organisation to grow is for the leaders to build extensions of themselves and let go of responsibilities.
3. Predict
A Leadership Team predicts on two levels:
The first level is Long-Term Predicting, everything 90 days+
Short-Term Predicting, what happens on a daily and weekly basis
Leaders who are entangled in the day to day stuff typically just push the issues out of their way trying to make it to next week. As a result, the company is held together by duct tape and twine and will eventually implode.
4. Systemise
It’s going to create consistency, scalability, more profit and more fun in your business.
5. Structure
Its important to take a big step back and get the right structure for the Business, crystallising everyone’s roles and responsibilities.
This is part of the work that we do with our Clients, and gives a flavor of how we can help companies transform their performance through the consistent use of a simple set of effective tools, and in turn assist Financial Planners with their own Financial Plan.
As Dan Sullivan says “Leaders explain the ‘why’ and managers explain the ‘what and how.’”
Are you leading or managing? Do you have between 10 and 250 employees, and the leadership is entrepreneurial?
If you want to find out more and create seamless business processes so you can plan, organise, lead, control and focus on delivering growth and results visit www.evolvesimply.com
Discounts on normal rates for NextGen Planners members