Every quarter of every year, you should be sitting down and looking at where you're at within your projected goals. As we enter another quarter of the year, I'm doing mine and doing my best to recheck my mindset.
Cards on the table here, many, many moons ago, I thought mindset was an airy-fairy concept that only health and lifestyle gurus went on about. Now I know it's actually a very important part of managing a business as a solopreneur or indeed as a large corporate organisation.
Today we know that the appropriate mindset can shape a company's success and overall trajectory. A Sales Mindset and a Growth Mindset both share a focus however. Each mindset offers results and problem solving but they also offer different outcomes when it comes to how a person / company reacts to challenges and opportunities.
When you meet someone with a sales mindset, they're more looking at short term goals and making money. They tend to be more sales-oriented and enjoy closing deals, ticking off checklists and increasing their overall sales volume.
Typically businesses would apply this mindset to prioritise on strategies using discounts, short term promotions and even some cross selling techniques. They would likely focus more on leads and having people pay them quickly.
With a growth mindset, you believe that you can improve your sales skills through your own consistent hard work, learning from your mistakes, and getting feedback from your manager and mentors.
Neither mindset is wrong for your business or your team.
I’ve noticed that people in general tend to assert one persona more than the other. I’ve never been particularly good at sales myself and once I tempered my Imposter Syndrome, I got better at Growth Mindset. As I work on my own, I’ve had no opposing force to aid me in my Sales Mindset though but having an Accountability Buddy has helped enormously! They would have been more sales driven than me.
Yet as a small business owner, it would really be more beneficial to be sales driven! We need sales to survive. I have found comfort in my sales by doing through speaking and networking, not by cold calls and online offers. That’s my preference though.
If it’s time you dug deeper and improved your own mindset for the next season, quarter or even year,then this is me telling you, I hear you!
Manging a business, especially as a sole trader is exhausting. You’re the Chief Everything Officer and like it or not, sometimes you just must admit,you’re not that good at something. My suggestion to you is to do a SWOT every six months and fix that issue. What you are weak at can be fixed, serious threats can be worked on, with an Accountability Buddy or maybe a Coach or Mentor, if you need a fresh pair of eyes on the matter.
You may want to consider outsourcing somethings as well, sometimes it makes more sense to delegate to someone who knows and like it better.
There’s no such thing as having the wrong mindset in your own business. If, however, things aren’t going the way you hoped, they must change so maybe it’s time to try something different?
If you would like a fresh pair of eyes on your business, contact me today and you may find my Business Strategy Pods beneficial for this purpose!
Working with clients Nationwide from base in Mullingar.
