If you are a small business owner, I know that you are wearing different hats. After all, when you’re just starting out cash flow is at a minimum and so are your business resources. But there comes a point where you as the business owner can only do so much and it’s time to look at getting in extra help.
Read moreGet big marketing wins on a shoestring budget
Developing your entire marketing strategy, including your brand, messaging, copy, social media, and PR, can feel overwhelming and prohibitively expensive. In the early days of Little Pim, I know that when faced with the marketing dollars I could spend, I wanted the Italian leather boots and all I could afford were the discounted canvas Keds! But there are ways to ramp up your marketing without ramping up your spend.
Read moreUnexpected Life Lessons from the Gym
I started going to a gym when I was 13; I am now almost 36. I think this gives me my 10,000 hours of mastery according to Malcolm Gladwell. Here are some unexpected lessons I’ve learnt at the gym that can be applied to the real world.
Read moreBuilding an empire - Your network(th)
When I started my business, everyone kept telling me, "Your network is everything! Work on building it up." And to be honest, at the time, I didn't understand it. I'm not a people-person and I am definitely not energised by being around people. In fact, it drains me! Give me a good book, a good cuppa coffee, and leave me alone. I will be the happiest little bookworm in the whole wide world.
Read moreOwn Your Podium: Part 2
There is no question that your ability to communicate confidently and authoritatively is critical to your career success. Presentations are amongst your most important opportunities to make an impression, to stand out and enhance your personal brand. It’s not simply another boring meeting. Get over thinking of presentations as burdens. Just by thinking about them differently, you can shift your level of confidence, and that, as you know, is the first step to improving the overall way you are perceived. Here are some tips from ‘Own Your Space’ to make your presentations more effective.
Read moreHow can you make the most of each day and have a record growth year?
Do you ever feel like you could be making more progress in your business, or like you sometimes get off track and then have trouble remembering the main things you should be focused on as you climb the entrepreneurial mountain? Do you ever wish you had someone with whom you could celebrate the big wins and who would be there to cheer you on when you hit the deep potholes?
Read moreDone is better than perfect
As women, as leaders, professionals, mothers, and wives, in all the roles we play as human beings, we need to finally get it through our heads that there really is no such thing as perfect. ‘Perfect’ is not only a total myth, it’s a deeply destructive and limiting myth.
Read moreHow to Protect Your Greatest Asset
When did you last take a proper one or two-week vacation? One where you didn’t check email and created space to remember who you are as a friend, traveler, lover, wife, mother or whatever other parts of your identity are meaningful to you? I just came back from a two-week vacation with my boys in Europe, and I want you to have one too. It’s good for your health, your family and yes, your business.
Read moreHalf-time anecdotes
Life demands so much of us, we’re constantly performing, pleasing others and busy with stuff. Is it any reason, therefore, that we find ourselves so tired, depleted from doing our long list of to-dos, meetings to attend, deadlines to meet. We are enslaved to the other side, the other person, the competitor, the client, the customer; living in fear to secure acceptance, the deal, the market share, the sale, some semblance of happiness. When we start a business, the ‘busyness’ consumes us creating a constant avalanche of activity and expectation of high performance, and if we don’t take a break, we will start to underperform. Most performances have an interlude, a break, half-time, an interval, an intermission.
Read moreOwn your virtual space
Forget what people say about ‘vanity searching’ or ‘ego surfing’, to google yourself is neither about vanity nor ego. If you’re serious about your professional presence, about owning your space in the virtual world as much as you are about owning it in the physical world, googling yourself is an absolute necessity.
Read moreHow to scale a service business (and get your life back!)
You’ve probably heard the word on the street: investors typically have no interest in service businesses because they don’t scale easily. While scaling a service business comes with its own challenges, it’s not impossible.
Read moreHave you found your business owner identity?
Who are you? What is your identity? These discussions often lead to a reference of one’s roots, where one comes from. As a business-owner you don’t lose your identity, you just show up differently.
Read moreOwn Your Personal Brand
We hear so much about the importance of having a personal brand, but what does that really mean? Put simply, your brand is your reputation, which is the culmination of almost everything you have ever done and said. As Amazon’s Jeff Bezos says, “Your brand is what people say about you when you’re not in the room.”
Read moreConfronting the friendly giant called “The Media” as an entrepreneur
The media sometimes comes across as a scary monster. Being a visual thinker, I always imagined it to be a big creature sitting behind a desk chewing papers. To sum it up in one word…it seemed intimidating. As of late and out of my personal experience as an entrepreneur, I can safely say…the media is and can be a friendly giant.
Read moreThe importance of creating an engaging and ethical company culture
As entrepreneurs, what are your thoughts on the company culture you are creating in your own business? Bottom line is that every company should promote an engaging and ethical company culture. This will not only create a happier workforce, but we know that happy employees are productive employees and will therefore give you the competitive edge.
Read moreOwn your calendar
“You are what you repeatedly do, then achievement isn’t an action you take but a habit you forge into your life. You don’t have to seek out success. Harness the power of selected discipline to build the right habit, and extraordinary results will find you” – Gary Keller, The One Thing.
Read moreNo business owner is immune to overwhelm
Do you ever feel like no matter how much you get done in a day, your to-do list keeps getting longer and longer? In a culture and society that’s obsessed with being busy and “swamped” with work, I often hear something along the lines of this from women entrepreneurs: “I’m so overwhelmed I don’t know what to do next.”
Read moreOwn your Habits
It is said your habits are the foundation on which success is built. I was again reminded of this by an article I came across on Forbes.com that beautifully illustrates that no matter how much technology has changed our lives, some things will fundamentally never change.
Read moreWhy entrepreneurs and business owners must have a will
As a firm of attorneys, we are known for advocating the importance of having a legally valid will drafted, regardless of your age or financial standing. In my career, I have often come across hugely successful entrepreneurs who didn’t have a will in place, or if they did it was seriously outdated.
Read moreWhy You Need to Prioritize Efficiency Before Taking a Vacation
Can you unplug completely and do it with confidence? Will your business run without you? There’s only one way to find out.
Read more