She Did It Her Way

The biggest thing here is to remember that everyone’s journey is different. For some of you when you walk in and take THE leap you could have a sense of calm come over you, excitement and for others it may be something like “Oh my gawd. What did I just do?” and that is okay. Those feels are totally normal.

The biggest thing here is to remember that everyone’s journey is different. For some of you when you walk in and take THE leap you could have a sense of calm come over you, excitement and for others it may be something like “Oh my gawd. What did I just do?” and that is okay. Those feels are totally normal.

One thing I have noticed is that the journey of an entrepreneur the first year in business is different from that of second year, third year and so on.

If you can get through the first couple of years, have a strategic plan and surround yourself with the right people you can continue growing your business long-term.

For the sake of this podcast I’m going to walk through some of the first year woes ;)

Also, stay tuned at the end of the show to hear from Tess Wicks who will be presenting on how to price for profits.

In this podcast episode I’m going to cover what to do when you want to start a company and know exactly what you want to start and what to do when you want to start a company but have no clue or too many ideas that it becomes overwhelming and you shut down.

In this podcast episode I’m going to cover what to do when you want to start a company and know exactly what you want to start and what to do when you want to start a company but have no clue or too many ideas that it becomes overwhelming and you shut down.

Write down the list of ideas you have:

Keep in mind what you're good at. If you're in a full-time job, what is it that you do well at and what do you enjoy doing

This is a judgement FREE zone. Let your mind and creative process flow.

Be patient.

Ask yourself what are some daily frustrations you have? What are problems that you want solved in your own life?

Focus:

Circle the top 5 ideas that you have that you're excited about

Number them 1-5, 1 being the first thing you're going to explore and 5 being the last thing you're going to explore

Iterate:

Remember that iterating is a process. In the beginning you may feel overwhelmed because you're doing so many things, that is okay. That is part of the process. Each time you do whatever it is that you do, you get to iterate it, make it better. 

Be patient. Entrepreneurship and creating a business requires a ton of patience and persistence. 

Once you're in the the thick of it....

If you're struggling because you can't figure out the name of what you want the business to be, use what I like to call a place holder. Create the content and the meat of your biz and then go back. Don't get hung up on trying to create the best name for your business. 

Chose the correct business entity

Apply for an EIN in order to obtain a business checking account to help keep personal and business expenses separate 

Create a one-pager business plan. Be sure to include a marketing plan, path to revenue and service/product that you're offering and what need are you solving. Check out this interview for a full rundown of what goes into your one-pager. 

Hope you guys enjoy! And for today's mini episode I'm sitting down with Katie Lord who will be covering all aspects of marketing at the She Did It Her Way Summit.

Is your passion in life really what you should be building into a business? How would you go about figuring that out?

Megan Minns, went all through that painful epiphany, and her business today offers project management services to higher level business owners. However, she spends most of her time helping new business owners develop productive systems to keep them organized and efficient. Her underlying passion and fulfillment in her work comes from helping people make their dreams into reality by encouraging them to see their potential and start building their brighter future.  One area she flourishes in, and offers the most guidance in with her services, is the technology realm. As a kid, she was able to master new technology with ease, and with her programs and tutorials she offers simplified methods to navigate scheduling and organizing software and apps; such as Asana.

Is your passion in life really what you should be building into a business? How would you go about figuring that out?

Megan Minns, went all through that painful epiphany, and her business today offers project management services to higher level business owners. However, she spends most of her time helping new business owners develop productive systems to keep them organized and efficient. Her underlying passion and fulfillment in her work comes from helping people make their dreams into reality by encouraging them to see their potential and start building their brighter future.  One area she flourishes in, and offers the most guidance in with her services, is the technology realm. As a kid, she was able to master new technology with ease, and with her programs and tutorials she offers simplified methods to navigate scheduling and organizing software and apps; such as Asana.

Originally, she almost went into the medical field with a concentration in psychiatrics due to outside pressure. While she loved science and the medical field, she found herself spending a lot of her free time sketching because half of her heart belonged to the arts. She eventually gave into practicality and stability, and with her degree in psychology, she got a full time job in human resources and recruiting. In this role she felt that it was a nice blend between the creative and science thought process.

She also found a way to mix her two loves with a blog she started in college called, Organized Meg. Admitting that her blog wasn’t that good, she said it introduced her to the blogging world, as well as website building and design through blogging platforms like Zanga. She said she also learned that there was a way to build a business without a college degree, and following a structured corporate ladder. About a year later she began to actively seek a creative outlet, and in May of 2013, she officially launched MeganMinns.com in which she offered creative services. Through MeganMinns, she offered branding, web design, and custom handwriting for projects like logos and wedding invitations.

As her business began to take off, she started to live an unhealthy lifestyle due to balancing a full time job, gaining a masters in organizational and human resource development, and MeganMinns. She started working during the nights and weekends and isolating herself socially, butby January she had relaunched her MeganMinns as an LLC. While she was proud of her of her growth, running her business became a chore and the creative workload was no longer something she loved.

She said being in the art industry left her in a bad mindset where she was comparing herself to other artists, and felt less than when she didn’t meet their skill. Art and creativity was something she loved expressing for herself, not for other people, and she didn’t like having her creativity up for debate. And so, she took a break in 2014, and began re-evaluating her business direction. With the help of a mentor she curated her strengths and found what passions she could express in a business.

She asked her what are some things that she was good at, what comes to her with ease, and what projects are people thrilled with of hers in the corporate world. Through those questions, she found that she was good at identifying areas of improvement within companies, creating a plan for improvement, as well as managing and executing that plan. She also remembered her savvy-ness for software and tech, and concentrated that skill into the world of corporate HR.

From there, she relaunched MeganMinns with virtual assistant services focusing on implementing new tech systems, establishing new work flow and processes, and organizing digital files. In an instant, she was booked out via Facebook groups she had been blogging through. By summer 2015, she successfully launched her first online course, and the positive reaction from clients showed her that she can launch a profitable product, and it validated that she could develop her business so it would provide a steady income. By that November she finally quit her full time job.

Hear more about what it was like for Megan making that transition, uplifted her clients, grew her passive income with downloadable products, and learned how to be a CEO!

In this episode you will…

Learn how to balance and blend your opposing passions

Figure out if your passion is better expressed for yourself or for clients

Find what strengths and passions are applicable in a business

Be able to evolve your business as well as your personal brand

Learn how to remain the CEO of your business while keeping the personal touch with your clients

Find a place for yourself within your business once you have a team

INSIGHTS

“My deeper purpose in business and in life is kind of helping people realize that they…can accomplish their dreams, and just encouraging them to take the action, make the commitments, and start actually doing the work to make it a reality.” –Megan Minns

“I can do web design…I can do handwritten logos, but it really boils down to this realization that even though I can do those things, that’s really not what I should be doing. And it was this painful, but really good ‘Aha’ moment…this has all been a path of self-discovery for me, and that was a harder one for me to learn.” –Megan Minns

“I was amazed at the reaction, and I was amazed at how happy my clients were, and I loved doing the work because it was finally back in my zone of genius, things I felt good about doing, things that felt easy…it was this awesome validation and it totally made the pain of pivoting and the fear totally worth it.” –Megan Minns

“I’m a huge fan of change and pivoting and evolving, and I think as a business owner you have to evolve, and be open to that, and even though it’s hard and scary you’re supposed to evolve. All businesses are supposed to evolve.” –Megan Minns

RESOURCES

Megan Minns Website

Megan Minns LinkedIn

Megan Minns Facebook

Megan Minns Instagram

Megan Minns Twitter

Megan Minns YouTube Channel

Asana

Brain FM

Slack

The Pomodoro Technique

Productivity Planner

She Means Business by Carrie Green

Profit First by Mike Michalowicz

You Are a Badass by Jen Sincero

Today's solocast is part 3 of a six part series in honor of She did It Her Way Summit and I'm sharing how to create flow and focus in your business.

Today's solocast is part 3 of a six part series in honor of She did It Her Way Summit and I'm sharing how to create flow and focus in your business. 

What is flow and how do you create focus?

Finding flow is about managing your time, energy and attention which results in creating focus. If we can understand how to manage our time, energy and attention better we can produce better results in our business. 

1. Identify your big 3 for the day.

What will move my business forward?

Will this help me achieve my goals?

Will I feel good after I accomplish this?

2. Eat clean.

Remove as much processed food from your diet

Limit the amount of sugars as possible, especially added sugar. Sugar causes you to have increased energy but quickly followed by a crash

3. Manage caffeine intake. Note effects on adrenal glands.

Adrenal fatigue is when you put your body under emotional, mental and physical stress.

You could have trouble getting out of bed, tend to be tired or in a state of fog, struggle to think clearly.

I am not a doctor only someone who has gone through adrenal fatigue

Find ways to destress (meditate, yoga), eat a clean diet, regular sleeping habits.

4. Create buffers to avoid stressful situation.

I wrote about this in last week’s blog post. Create buffers, not the bowling ones but time buffers. If you think it will only take you 10 minutes to travel from one meeting to the next, double it.

5. Avoid checking email right away when you wake up.

Create space in your day to get the important things done. Spend time doing those activities that require your full attention and energy.

Tim Ferris Energy ZAP theory

Create space to accomplish your big 3.

6. Attention and focus are muscles. The more you practice using them in the right way the better they will serve you.

Being able to maintain focus is like exercising a muscle.

If every 5-10 minutes we’re being distracted by our cell phone we’re actually conditioning our muscle to only hold attention space for that short 5-10 minutes. Similar to practicing meditation. In the beginning we may only start out at 5 minutes but over time we grow to 10 to 15 minutes because we’ve built up that practice.

6. Limit distractions

Airplane mode

Clean desk

Shutdown email

Close all tabs

7. Become aware of time leaks.

Start to purge the items on your to-do list that don’t produce results

Start to outsource tasks that don’t need to be done by you

If you’re having trouble outsourcing, don’t think about “Who am I going to outsource to?” think about the tasks and then record yourself on your computer (screen flow) doing them and start collecting a database of tasks so that when that moment comes you’ve already created a library.

8. Take advantage of your time gaps.

These are the 30-45 minute time gaps in between appointments or while we’re waiting somewhere. Take advantage of them, do tasks that don’t require a ton of energy to get done, quick email, make phone calls.

9. Get outside. Fresh air.

When working from home it is soooo easy to roll out of bed and go straight for the office or wherever you chose to work and start diving in. First, take a moment and step outside, do a quick 15 minute walk around the block.

I don’t do this every day but on the days I do do it I feel much better and more awake.

9. Schedule time with friends who feed your soul.

10. Give yourself grace.

No one is perfect

This has been something that I’ve been working on and I was talking to a close girlfriend of mine. All of us listening to this podcast I bet are go-getters and as go-getters we tend to take a ton of responsibility for our actions and we’re always striving to grow and move everything in life forward. So that when that moment comes and we feel like we’re stuck or we made a mistake we can be hard on ourselves. Which friend, serves no one, not us, not the people we surround ourselves with, not the people we do business with. Because if we can’t give ourselves grace first, we can’t give others grace. Remember that no one is perfect, perfect doesn’t exist. We are all right where we need to be in our journey and living life with grace is way more enjoyable than if we don’t.

On today's solocast, Part 2 of a 6 part series I am sharing the 5 things you must do before quitting your job. These 5 things I'm sharing is a compilation of my own experience along with many other women whom I've interviewed, coached and worked with.

On today's solocast, Part 2 of a 6 part series I am sharing the 5 things you must do before quitting your job. These 5 things I'm sharing is a compilation of my own experience along with many other women whom I've interviewed, coached and worked with. 

1. Do Your Research and Maximize Your Time

Start attending events that are entrepreneurial focused to start surrounding yourself with like minded people and also to better understand what entrepreneurial life is like. Start asking questions to get you in the mindset of what to expect when you’re fully out on your own.

For example:

What’s the biggest challenge you’ve faced as an entrepreneur?

What is something you’ve experience that could have been avoided?

What is something you wish you would have done prior to quitting your job that you didn’t do?

This is a time for you to get really focused and maximize your time. Create an ideal schedule from when you wake up to when you go to bed. When are you scheduling these events, when are you sending emails, when are you meeting people for coffee? What are you saying yes to and what are you saying no to?

2. Make a List of What Needs to Happen Before You Quit Your Job

First, the biggest thing to remember is that everyone's risk tolerance is different. This is only for YOU to determine what are YOUR goals and what is on YOUR list. Write out what sort of savings goal you need to hit in order to feel comfortable, how many clients you want to have before taking the leap, write out your fears, what's holding you back, what are you afraid of? 

Use these as talking points during our conversations with other entrepreneurs...chances are they went through the same thing you're going through and can help navigate the waters with you. 

3. Know What You're Good At

Not everyone who wants to be an entrepreneur knows what they want to do. You might know exactly what you want to do while others have no clue and some of you don’t know which idea to chose to grow. Knowing what you’re good at can help you figure out what you want to do.

Email 10 people in your network (or call them) and ask them what is it about you that believe you’re really good at

Take the fascinate me quiz HERE. Use Lewis Howes code "schoolofgreatness"

Identify the activities that give you energy and makes the time pass quickly

4. Set Goals

Now that you've identified and collected information you are now ready to put it all together. Assuming you want to start a business and leave your job, take a look at your calendar and selected the date one year out from when you are reading this post. I recommend at some point getting a paper calendar that you can write on that shows all 12 months. There's something about being able to see the entire year in front of you that makes you thing BIGGER. 

Okay, now break that year into 2 parts - first 6 months and the second 6 months. Let's say that right smack dab in the middle is when you're going to launch your business. That means the first six months are focused on researching, collecting, prepping for your big launch. Then after your big launch your focus is around the new set of mini goals you've established in the second half of the six months. 

For Examples:

Goal: 1 year I am leaving my full-time job and taking the leap

First 6 month goal - Prepare for the launch of my business

Second 6 month goal - Grow my business to replace 75% of my monthly income

Then, within each of those 6 month buckets break it down into quarters, months, weeks and put goals to each of them. Here are some questions to get you started for the first six months:

What business do I want to launch?

What am I good at?

Who are the people I need to surround myself with?

How much money do I want saved before taking the leap? How do I get there?

What does my ideal schedule look like?

When am I going to make time for my business?

What entity will I be?

How will I manage cashflow?

What does my marketing plan look like? 

5. Take Action

Planning is always fun but then it is time to take action my friend. Find an accountability partner, someone who is either going through the same thing you are or someone who is one step ahead in the journey. Stay connected to stay inspired. 

Today's mini interview She Did It Her Way Summit series is with Helena Swyter. All about accounting - you know, the fun stuff ;) Be sure to tune in and listen all the way until the end.