A 6 Month Business Check In

As I wrote to my Monthly Mail subscribers this month, June is a good time to take stock on our year. As I wrote then, “It’s always useful to take occasional bird’s eye views on the state of our businesses, to take a climb up the mountain and survey the land below. This is not the same as dwelling, or stewing, or overthinking, but taking some time to make sure you’re on track with where you want to go and identify any hiccups or habits that are holding you back.”

Of course, we can take stock at any time, whenever we need it, but there is something about the solstice that’s so satisfying – a nice numerical halfway point, and the knowledge that there’s still half a year left to readjust our course if we need to. Particularly as we enter the summer months with their long days but endless distractions, and following that the spectre of Christmas looms large, a June check in is a great time to make sure that you can plan in some things that your future self will love you for.

Big vision check in

For my own June check in, I did something slightly different than I have before. In previous June’s I’ve looked at the goals I set in January, checked they still feel right, added in any new and cut out any now irrelevant, and then planned on how and when I would work towards them.

However, this year I felt pulled towards some bigger picture reviewing. On the back of some personal revelations garnered over the last couple of months, I had the sneaking feeling that the big vision I’d set my January goals from was actually a bit out of alignment, so I felt drawn to a bit of a do-over of that, rather than jumping straight to the goals.

I’ve written about using tarot before, and this month I used a process from the Everyday Tarot book. Now if tarot isn’t for you, before you roll your eyes and click away, I found it was actually the bit before the tarot that was most impactful, and that’s the bit I’m going to share here.

STEP ONE WAS TO THINK ABOUT HOW YOU WANT YOUR LIFE TO LIVE.

At first I kinda skipped this bit but the results I got were pretty uninspiring so then I went back and actually did it a bit more wholeheartedly. I was sat on my bed, so I laid down, closed my eyes and let my mind wander to what it wanted – not a meditation or visualisation as I’m not very good at those, more a day dream. I went immediately to a new house with a garden, pottering around in it without the weight of pressure that I needed to go to work or the invisible bungee chords attaching me to my desk.

STEP TWO WAS TO SET A STRETCH GOAL.

With that vision in mind, what would need to happen to achieve it? I realised, in that daydream, that what I really wanted for my business was for it to grow bigger than me, for it to have the ability to operate without me. I wanted a life where I could spend days in the garden knowing that the business was ticking along just fine, that I didn’t have to be present in order for things to be happening. It’s like that arcade game you get at the pier – I didn’t want to be stuck to a coin machine, endlessly putting in the pennies of my energy in order to get the pay outs.

So my stretch goal was to make that happen – to build the business both in terms of size but also process that means I don’t personally need to be feeding it every day in order to keep it going.

STEP THREE WAS TO SET A SMART GOAL.

I do kind of shudder when I see the SMART acronym – it feels like jobsworth line managers ticking the box in performance reviews. But essentially, this step is making your stretch goal real. Precisely how are you going to get that vision – what financial goals will it take, what product launches or restructuring? Set a specific, measurable, attainable, relevant, time-specific goal. Mine was (and I’m nervous to say this) to make six-figures next year – so then I had to look at how I could spend the rest of this year setting myself up to achieve that goal.

For those interested, the tarot spread very much confirmed that my goal was do-able, that I had all the tools at my disposal and knew which way I needed to use them – and that really, I just had to do it. If you’d like to have a go, there’s a version of the spread from the book available here.

Individual goal check in

So after setting the big vision goals, I needed to get into the specific detail of how it could possibly happen. I keep a spreadsheet where I see which projects I’m working on when as well as future ideas, so I checked in on that and the goals I set in January.

WHAT NO LONGER FITS?

Looking back at my January goals, two are sticking out like sore thumbs – having writing published in the national press, and doing more sponsored content. These aren’t things I’m going to turn down, but really, if I’m honest with myself, they’re more for my ego and external validation than they are for moving me towards that big vision. A lot of my energy pennies need to go into these two slot machines, and to be honest, the possible jackpot isn’t really big enough to justify all the pennies I’d be spending. So these two are goals I’m no longer going to pro-actively seek out – if they happen it’s a bonus, but they’re no longer my focus.

When you’re looking back at the goals and projects you set yourself at the beginning of the year, be honest about your motivation behind them and decide whether, of all the things that will help you to achieve that stretch goal, this particular goal would be in the top five.

WHAT CAN I GO DEEPER INTO?

Another of my January goals was to have more income coming from one-to-many than one-to-one incomes streams, and this fits perfectly with my new stretch goal. There is only one of me, and without sticking another zero on the end of my coaching prices my one-to-one services can only take me so much closer to that goal. So, to continue working towards more courses and digital products that can eventually overtake coaching as a primary income stream is a goal I can now go deeper into. It seems my intuition already had that idea – when I look at my project plan spreadsheet it is bursting with ideas for workshops, courses and ebooks.

For you doing this, which of your goals look and feel more aligned to your big vision. Unlike the goals above, what are in the top 5 of things to get you closer it?

What next?

So with your goals realigned and a clarification of your big vision – what do you do next? I always start with a timeline that I can plot which projects I’m going to work on in which month – this gives everything a place and time for me to pay attention to it (rather than have everything in my head at once) and helps me to be realistic about what can feasibly get done (I limit myself to 3 projects a month).

You can create a timeline in whatever way makes sense for you, mine is literally the months in a row with the three projects listed underneath it. This can flex slightly, but you can think about when feels the best time to launch something, how much time you’re going to need to create that thing, spacing out big projects to give yourself a bit of breathing room.

A few other questions you can ask yourself to find where to focus first are:

What’s the quickest win?
What is the easiest thing for you to do quickly? It might be chasing invoices, it might be actually finishing that ebook that’s been waiting for you to format it for three months – what’s the thing that can give you boost of confidence and start the momentum towards your stretch goal?
What do I feel most pulled to?
What is feeling most inspiring to you right now, what’s the thing you can’t stop thinking about? Follow that energy and work on the projects that inspire you to maintain the momentum of the quick win.
What will future me most thank me for?
Particularly in the summer it’s easy to push things down the to do list and then end up in September with a real headache. What are some things you can start to chip away at now which will make your life easier in the future?