Are you the bottleneck?

Let's ask: Are you the bottleneck?

Welcome to the Self-Performance-Strategies (S-P-S) Newsletter

The Quick Strategy:

"In most organizations, the bottleneck is at the top of the bottle."

- Peter Drucker

The 2nd Strategy:

Why do some lessons take a few times to learn?

When I look back over my life, at any time there was a bottleneck, I was the cause.

But at the time, I would 100% blame other people or circumstances.

This would cause me to stay stuck in a rut for months or years.

I remember always getting a hard time from a regional manager when I ran a clothing store in my 20s.

I would complain to other managers about them all the time.

I felt unfairly treated.

Then one of the other managers, who I got on with, sent me an email.

This email gave me a little slap.

He sent me the last 1/4 calendar and highlighted the five Mondays I had called in sick or swapped shifts with the regional manager's permission missing the weekly management meeting.

That’s five Mondays out of a possible fifteen, 1/3 of the whole 1/4.

Damn.

Only one other manager had missed more than one Monday, with a grand total of two.

It was the summer months, June through to August.

And I know I had been out partying hard all those weekends.

And my regional manager knew it too.

This was why they were hard on me.

If I wanted to party and play the system, my results should be above average.

But they weren’t.

I had created my own bottleneck.

I was the constraint in my life.

My actions had caused a knock-on effect that created issues for me down the line.

I could blame the external all I wanted, but it was me.

Now years later, I don’t party like that and have seen myself climb quickly through several organizations.

But the bottleneck has changed from my actions to my thinking.

As an entrepreneur running a coaching business over the last year, all my bottlenecks have come from my thinking or emotional response to situations.

Changing your actions is a good place to start.

However, changing your thoughts and developing your mindset will always be the bottleneck you must overcome to take those big leaps forward.

The 3rd Strategy:

7 reasons why you're the bottleneck in your life and business.

Harsh truth… 

You are the constraint or bottleneck in your business. 

You think you are working effectively, but your thinking might be wrong. 

If you're busy all day and are roughly in the same place as you were months ago. 

You have constraint issues. 

Let's fix this:

You don't have clear goals:

The number one issue I see from the frustrated business owners I coach or speak to is a lack of specific goals broken down into daily actions.

If you don't know your real goals, you could be very wrong about many things in your business.

You track the wrong metrics:

Without clear goals, you end up tracking metrics that have no impact on improving your business growth.

A trap I see business owners falling into is tracking hours worked and tasks completed.

But not linking this work to results/revenue produced.

You focus on the wrong work:

With poor metrics, low-$$$/value work becomes the main focus.

Keeping busy is not the same as producing results.

Again, I go to the wisdom of Peter Drucker:

"There is nothing quite so useless as doing with great efficiency something that should not be done at all."

You overreact and switch directions:

Without those specific targets, you often switch directions and start new projects in the chase to create any type of result.

You then overreact and switch again when results don't appear fast enough.

Your random movement is slowing you down.

You do too much:

Every business owner I coach always ends up delegating or dropping work.

The 1st time we speak, I can tell they have far too much on their plate.

You are the same.

Your time should be spent on high-$$$ activities 60-80% of the time.

Delegate all other work.

You over-schedule yourself:

A full calendar is a fool's calendar.

A full calendar means you are stressed out, frustrated and stuck doing busy work you should not be doing.

Did you start your business to work 12 hrs a day, or did you start it to create more freedom in your life?

You need time to rest, relax, and recharge.

You overcomplicate life:

You get stuck in drawn-out planning sessions.

You think you need 10 steps processes to make things work smoothly.

But you forget the basics of less is always more.

To multiply, you have to simplify.

Everyone gets this wrong, not just business owners.

But wait...

There is good news

There is a simple process to fix it all:

If any of the last 7 points stood out and hit a nerve, here is a 3-step process for making some changes:

Focus on:

1- What to change

2- What to change to

3- How to cause that change

Take out your journal and write down anything you think is a bottleneck in your life.

Internally or externally.

Think about what is affecting you mentally, emotionally, or physically.

Pick at least one thing to work through these 3-steps.

Then keep simplifying and refining until you get it right.

Don't be a bottleneck.

Big love.

Make it a great one,

Stephen

P.S. Need help overcoming your bottlenecks?

I will help you do that in less than 30-Days guaranteed. 

Find out more here with the 30-Day Accelerator.

Give me 30-minutes, and I will show you how to reclaim hours and focus on the right activities.