Are you your own worst enemy? Do you know what is holding you back from reaching your full potential? Over the last couple of years, I have spoken with many salon owners, run workshops and master classes and it’s become glaringly obvious – there are a couple of major factors that hold back the growth of their businesses. Firstly, so often when you get down to it the underlying lack of self belief keeps the salon owner playing small. This can be a conscious belief or an unconscious belief, but inevitably it paralyses the business owner from achieving all that they desire for themselves. It stops the business owner from taking risks. Believing in yourself is a personal choice. It’s an attitude that you can improve and develop over time.
Let go of past programming. Just because something didn’t work before or you had a few hurdles, challenges, roadblocks or failures, it doesn’t mean it will happen again. This is just part of business and part of your personal growth. Have you heard the expression “fail faster to success.”? Do you think that Walt Disney, Stephen Spielberg or Steve Jobs didn’t have failures along the way? As a young man, Walt Disney was fired from a newspaper job because he, “lacked imagination and had no good ideas.” Stephen Spielberg was rejected from USC’s film program on three separate occasions. At age 30, Steve Jobs was fired by Apple .
Any of these future business leaders might have given up right then and there. Thank goodness they didn’t. You have to believe in yourself when no one else does, that’s what makes you a winner. We all have automatic negative thoughts I like to call, ANTS. When a negative thought creeps into your head just stomp on it. Flip the switch and replace it with something positive. Perhaps a small victory you’ve had recently. Take a risk – Trust that you can do it. Start with small risks until you have a few wins and begin developing your self-belief.
? You get paid for risk. ? No risk, no reward ? Minimise risk – minimise reward.
Next, the belief that what ever is going wrong in your life or business is someone or something else’s fault. By this I mean that we are all doing business in the GFC. Some of us are knocking it out of the park, whilst others are being swallowed up into the abyss that has devoured so many small businesses over the last 2 years. Why is this? Well unless you truly accept that you are 100% responsible for everything that happens in your business, you won’t move closer to reaching the success you desire. I can already hear some business owners saying, “Well no one has any money, people are losing their jobs, yada yada.” This may be so, but we are all hearing the same thing. So why is it then, that some of us are thriving in the same economy and some of us are dying a slow painful death?
One thing I can tell you for sure, that it is much harder to run a failing business than a successful business. The answer is that we are totally responsible for our situation. You can choose to change it by firstly changing your way of thinking. Your current level of thinking has got you into this predicament, so to get change you will need to enlist a different type of thinking. You will need to find other ways to solve your problems. Think outside the box.
There are absolutely 3 MUSTS in getting where you want to be.
? Firstly you need to make a decision. Stop saying, “I should” and commit to actually doing. Your life will change the instant you make a decision.
? Secondly you must make a commitment to your decision and consistently commit to that decision.
? Thirdly you must make an investment. This could be time, education or money or all of these things. ?
Ask yourself this question. Are you an ambitious business owner or are you a therapist who owns a business?
Your level of success will be determined by how you think.
Give up all your excuses. You either have results or you have excuses. Are your excuses bigger than your dreams? Stop blaming and complaining because YOU have the answers inside you. YOU are the solution. Consistent action plus solid business strategies will produce results you never imagined possible.
About Anni Anni Diamond is a Gold Coast-based salon owner, author, serial entrepreneur and motivational speaker. Anni has an online programme for salon owners available at www.beautysaloncoach.biz and you can find her speaking at Cosmetex on the Gold Coast this year
