How to Move Forward During the COVID-19 Lockdown
I have heard from so many of you about how COVID-19 has disrupted your businesses and your lives. For some, this is having a significant and severe impact on your livelihoods. And many of you are left scrambling and even more of you are feeling trapped in your homes with nothing to do but worry about your family and loved ones and obsess on social media.
We all feel perched precariously with seemingly no way to move forward constructively.
Bottom line, there is just so much to these circumstance that we can’t control. That’s really the truth. We can’t control either the virus or our government’s response (or lack of response). And this is not a political post. This is not a rant about our current leaders. If that’s what you’re looking for, feel free to follow my personal profile on Facebook – I do plenty of that there!
What I want to talk to you about is your business. With everything shut down, you may be finding that you have a lot of time on your hands. And beyond Marie Kondoing your entire home, spring cleaning, baking bread and so forth – what can you do?
In The E-Myth Revisited, (Amazon Affiliate link – and a book I recommend to all my clients – if you haven’t read it yet, you should!), Michael Gerber (a business coach, like me) talks about working ON your business not just IN your business.
And in the 2 decades of coaching business owners, I hear two reasons why business owners struggle to do these critical things:
- They’re too busy working IN their business. They just don’t have time.
- They don’t really know what to do to work ON their business. What does that even mean?
The Pandemic has taken care of the first reason for many of us. All of a sudden, we have time on our hands! And really, streaming Netflix and delving into the angst on social media can get old really fast. Watching the news is just depressing, repetitive and not at all helpful.
What’s a business owner to do? And think about this – many experts are suggesting this could last for 3-4 months or possibly longer!
My recommendation is to spend this valuable time, this silver lining opportunity, to work ON your business. What I envision for you, is that when this is all over, and the world begins to get back to some semblance of normal, you are ready to take your business to the next level.
Because you have spent this next few months developing the operations and systems of your business to be able to handle massive new growth and income.
But what are the kinds of things you can do to work ON your business? What does that even mean really?
How to Work ON Your Business
This can cover a lot of territory. Everything from creating job descriptions in anticipation of being able to hire people to fill those jobs to designing systems and operations. One of the things that holds your business back from growth is a lack of well designed systems and documented operations. This is particularly true in solopreneur businesses – where it’s just you.
My recommendation is to use this time to dream and design – where do you want your business to be in 3-5 years? Do you have a vision for that? A plan? What will you need to put in place for that vision to come to fruition?
My business coach, the brilliant Andrea J. Lee, asks this question – if you add a zero to your yearly income, what would break? Think about that and start to design systems to handle those things.
This may still sound mysterious to you. What are systems and operations? What does it look like to design these things? How, exactly, do you do this?
Get the Support and Guidance You Need
Well, you can work with me. This is something I help clients with every single day. And I do have a few slots open for working with me privately – but that’s not actually the opportunity I’m thinking of.
I’m making an offer – 50% off of my Marketing & Business Academy Mastery Lab program AND my Artist’s Marketing & Business Academy program. They’re already priced to be very affordable. But I want to make this a no-brainer for you, even if you are financially challenged because of COVID-19.
Whether you want self-study or a program with more personalized support and engagement with a vital community – there’s something just perfect here for you.
Let’s work together to make the best use of the time we’ve been given. This could be your silver-lining playbook.
Now, you may be thinking – wow, she’s using this horrible pandemic to sell us something? And I understand that feeling. But let me ask you something:
Do you feel that way about the grocery store or drug store? Are you getting take-out to help restaurants? What is the difference?
I just paid $38 for 2 fabric face-masks from an artist – doing what she can to support herself and her family. Could I have made them? Could I have purchased them cheaper? There’s someone in my neighborhood offering them for free. But I choose to support my fellow business owners in any way I can.
I’ve thought long and hard about making this offer. What convinced me is that this is how I serve my community. This is how I support the people I care about – and enable you to make an even bigger impact on the world.
I believe in you and what you’re doing – that’s why I only work with clients who are truly passionate about their work. And I believe there is an opportunity for you in this time to set yourself up to succeed at a much bigger level once we’re on the other side of this. And we WILL get to the other side.
So, don’t wait for things to change, prepare for when they will!
However you choose to move forward – work ON your business. Dream big and then put in the foundation and scaffolding that will allow you to achieve your dreams and beyond. Just follow one of the links below to find out more.
Artist’s Marketing & Business Academy – 100 hours of classes on how to succeed in your business (applicable for all business owners)
Marketing & Business Academy Mastery Lab – includes the ArtistsMBA, coaching with an elite business coach, a Mastermind group and so much more!
