Can words describe the fragrance of the very breath of spring?
~ Neltje Blanchan
Today I’ve got something fun and hopefully useful for you, as we dive right into these beautiful spring months. Over the next six episodes, I’m going to give you 30 powerful ways to spring clean your business.
Spring, or fall for our southern hemisphere readers, is a great time of year to do a little pruning, clear the cobwebs and get your business organized and running efficiently. Whether we’re just coming off a long, cold winter or a slow summer, this time of year tends to inspire action and movement. Maximize this energy by tending to areas of your business you might have ignored for far too long.
So in the spirit of you taking action each week instead of just having a long list, you read once and then move on from, we’re going to break this up into a 6-part series based on my CEO Fast Track Guide. This guide addresses one of the biggest challenges any CEO faces – how to find time for the work that matters most and how to discern what the work is in the first place.
Because I want your spring cleaning to be strategic and impactful. While updating your Twitter bio might need to be done as part of this, my goal with this series is to dive a little deeper to address some core business activities you need to put your time and attention to for longer term growth and sustainability.
In today’s episode, we’re going to look at the first CEO Discipline: Strategic Planning & Innovation.
Enjoy!
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Full Transcript
Today I’ve got something fun and hopefully useful for you, as we dive right into these beautiful spring months. Over the next six episodes, I’m going to give you 30 powerful ways to spring clean your business.
Spring, or fall for our southern hemisphere listeners, is a great time of year to do a little pruning, clear the cobwebs and get your business organized and running efficiently. Whether we’re just coming off a long, cold winter or a slow summer, this time of year tends to inspire action and movement. Maximize this energy by tending to areas of your business you might have ignored for far too long.
Originally I was going to pack these into one podcast episode, but that quickly felt like I’d just firehosing you with ideas that would be too overwhelming to action.
So in the spirit of you taking action each week instead of just having a list you hear once, and then move on from, we’re going to break this up into a 6-part series based on my CEO Fast Track Guide.
If you don’t already have the guide, you can pick it up here. This guide addresses one of the biggest challenges any CEO faces – how to find time for the work that matters most, and how to discern what the work is in the first place.
I offer much more inside the guide, but one of the core ideas is to ensure your work is centered around what I call the 6 CEO Disciplines. It’s these disciplines we’ll draw from as we look to spring clean your business.
Because I want your spring cleaning to be strategic and impactful. While updating your Twitter bio might need to be done as part of this, my goal with this series is to dive a little deeper to address some core business activities you need to put your time and attention to for longer term growth and sustainability.
In today’s episode, we’re going to look at the first CEO Discipline: Strategic Planning & Innovation.
Let me ask you…
When was the last time you took the time to really consider where your business is headed?
If you never look up from the daily demands of running your business to consider and map a plan for the path ahead, your business won’t grow. You’ll be stuck in the cycle of busywork, attending to fires and knocking off low-level tasks from your to-do list, but never pulling the bigger levers to help your business flourish.
Strategic Planning and Innovation is simply about exploring what’s next and what’s best. And spring is a fantastic time to review what’s already earmarked for the rest of 2017 and ensure it’s aligned and on track to help you reach your bigger business goals.
So let’s identify five key activities you could do with this first CEO Discipline, to spring clean your business. This list is not exhaustive but will get you headed in the right direction.
Important note: If you’re listening to this in a different season, don’t discount these ideas. While we’re maximizing the energy of spring, these can be accomplished any time of the year.
Review or set your annual plan and 90-day goals
Planning is a dynamic process requiring regular review and adjustments. Assuming you made some strategic plans at the beginning of the year, this is a good time to dust it off and make sure it’s still aligned and on track.
Set aside an hour and review your plans. Then identify your 90-day focus areas that you’ll immediately put into action. I spoke more about this recently, and you can find a link to that episode below.
Much of your work ahead will be centered around the decisions and plans you make or confirm here, so don’t skip this high-impact spring cleaning step.
Review your company’s raison d’être and key messages for changes or updates
Do you have a clear vision, mission, and values document that outline the core of your business? Don’t get caught up in language – you might call it a purpose statement or something else entirely, but the heart of it is a captured, thoughtful, strategic document that shares the heart of what’s most important to your business.
Having this will ensure you stay true to what’s important to your business, and keep you from getting pulled down rabbit holes that won’t be helpful.
And to complement this, do you have an accurate, updated set of key messages that speak succinctly to your business in a way that you can use out in the world?
Spring is a great time to revisit (or create) these positioning statements and messages for your business. They will help you feel grounded and clear as you begin to execute on your plans. And they will help you communicate more powerfully to your key stakeholders, whether they be clients, vendors, partners, employees or the media.
Dust off an old idea and see if you can give it new life
Now first, let me be clear with this one that I don’t want you to crowd out your strategic plans by adding something new and shiny to the mix for the sake of it, but if you’ve got room or you feel like your current plan needs a bit of life, this might be a strategy to employ.
As I spoke up in episode 40, I had a product idea flushed out and almost ready to go a year ago, but never actually launched it. Last month, I dusted it off and now it’s my latest offer, Communicate Like a PRO. I had the bandwidth to finish it up because a lot of the legwork was already done, and it fit well into my spring calendar.
What ideas or projects had you previously tabled that might now be appropriate to bring into your current mix?
Unsubscribe from any direct competitors or business owners who trigger you
I know this seems like an odd one to add to strategic planning and innovation, but trust me – it’s very important. For you to be truly strategic in your business plans, you can’t be bogged down by the noise of other people doing similar or bigger things.
Spring is such a fantastic season to be in action and I don’t want that to be sabotaged because you get overwhelmed by the activities of others. They will also be busy taking advantage of this high-energy season, and so it’s best to simply turn down the volume.
Take an hour this week and unsubscribe, unfollow or redirect any content whether that be blogs, emails, social media, podcasts or other channels. I promise you, it will always be there to come back to. Be ruthless in your spring cleaning – if it will cloud your judgment, trigger your fear, make you question your decisions or just occupy space, it’s gotta go.
For now, I want you to have a clear line of focus to YOUR most critical work that isn’t clouded by others.
Give your editorial calendar a refresh
Assuming you use an editorial calendar to map your content, whether that be blogs, podcasts, social media, videos, webinars or anything else, take some time this week to give it a refresh.
If you haven’t planned content for the months ahead, take some time to get at least a month’s worth of content ideas outlined and scheduled. If you can, shoot for 90 days instead.
If you’ve already mapped out your content for the coming months, make sure it’s still aligned with the plans you set or adjusted in our first spring cleaning strategy. Do you have an upcoming launch that you’ll need your content to support? Are you going on vacation and need to fill the gaps while you’re gone?
Or perhaps, you’re considering adding a new platform channel into the mix and you need to map out a strategy to make it happen.
Your content is a powerful tool to attract the right people to your business. Make sure it’s communicating the messages you want to convey. Revisit your key messages from the second spring cleaning strategy, and pepper those into your editorial calendar.
Do you need help with this? I use CoSchedule to manage my entire editorial calendar, and it’s been a lifesaver. You can read all about my review of CoSchedule and get a behind-the-scenes look at how I use it here.
***
Ok, so there are my five strategies to spring clean in the CEO Discipline of Strategic Planning and Innovation. Stay tuned next week when we continue our 6-part series on the 30 Powerful Ways to Spring Clean Your Business. We’ll be talking about nurturing key relationships and expanding your professional network.
Finally, if you are liking the Beyond PRO Podcast, can I ask you the tremendous favour of popping over to iTunes to rate and review the show? It helps this show get found by more entrepreneurial leaders like you. Be sure to share your name and website if you want, and I’ll give you and your business a shout-out on the show.
You can review & rate the show here Beyond PRO Podcast
Recommended Resources:
Communicate Like a PRO: Powerful Scripts for Courageous Conversations — use the code SPRING to save $15 until May 12th.
What season of business are you in? (and why it matters)
Sprint through the next quarter with ease
Behind-the-Scenes: How I use CoSchedule to manage my content
Thanks for listening:
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You can review & rate the show here Beyond PRO Podcast
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