While many of us (myself included) are rushing to head out of town to kick off summer with loved ones and family, it's a great time to take stock of the first part of 2019. Have you built in time to complete your month end reflection AND Mid-year stock taking?

Earlier today I led my monthly month-end reflection session. Each month
I lead a live virtual session to take those interested through a 60-90 minute virtual planning session.

Next month's is scheduled for 12 - 1pm ET on Tuesday July 30th. It will also mark the one year anniversary of the launch of Coaching Business Builder. Bring your planner, and reserve your spot in this live one hour program ($39 US).

As a mid-year treat, I wanted to link you back to the 17 questions I posed a few months ago at the Q1 reflective planning session. You can view that here on YouTube - follow along - grab your pen, and journal, and use the questions to take stock of both the last quarter and/or 2019!

Enjoy,
Jennifer

Pick up a copy of PlanDoTrack (for virtual and remote entrepreneurs, remote workers and leaders) or Coaching Business Builder (for coaches). They are both a 12 month undated planner and self-guided workbook.

Jennifer Britton -Potentials Realized
Let's connect to discuss how coaching (1-1 or group) can move your business forward this summer
Phone: (416)996-8326

The tagline for the Coaching Business Builder and PlanDoTrack is “Consistent Action + Daily Steps = Momentum. In other words, it’s the small daily, consistent actions that add up over time to create movement and/or momentum in our business.
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For many years throughout the 90 Days Success Program (2005 onwards), and more recently the Coaching Business Growth Lab, I have shared the One Percent Business Rule. This framework is grounded in the notion of taking daily steps towards your most important goals.

In business today it is likely that we are working on important projects around the margins of our work and life. This is how each of my book publications has been birthed, and it’s how most of my presentations and program designs get built.
 
As you engage with the notion of Consistent Action + Daily Steps = Momentum, consider these questions:

• What is the most important goal to be working on right now?
• As you chunk it down, what are the smaller packets of work that make this up?
• What are the tasks and activities which need to get done?
• What are the consistent actions you want to undertake?
• What can daily steps look like to these blocks of work – this week? This month?
• What momentum will that create?
• What will that momentum feel like?

 
Check out other business philosophies grounded in the Coaching Business Builder here:

• Focus
• Experimentation
• Momentum
• Reflective Pause

 
Enjoy your week,
Jennifer

One of my favorite activities over the last few years has been to create a summer project list of small, and larger tasks, to complete in what some find to be a quieter time. There always are lots of project possibilities in the summer months. Have you considered:

• Updating your website
• Incorporating a new system
• Catching up on the reading you have piled around your office (or bed)
• Taking time to plan for a new program
• Writing some blog posts (and getting ahead of the curve)
• Creating a content calendar for your business
• Writing your newsletters for the next few months
• Starting a new series on Instagram

Some useful questions to consider as you go to decide what projects you want to put attention around:

• What have your clients been asking for?
• What are your key goals this year?
• What new activities would support your action and achievement of these?
• What projects would you like to move off of your “TO DO” List?
• What milestones would you create for yourself so that this is completed before the end of the month, or the end of the summer?
• What resources do you need in order to be successful with this?

For some more inspiration around this topic, listen into this 20 minute video I did last year on 2018 project ideas – check it out on my YouTube channel.

Best wishes,
​Jennifer

Building in regular pause points is invaluable in supporting focus, action and reflection. Kolb’s cycle of learning is commonly referred to as a four-step process known as ERGA – Experience, Reflection, Generalization and Application.
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Key to learning, according to this model, is that we take a “pause” to build in reflection after having an experience. It is this pause that allows us to cull learning and insights which we can then apply to other areas of our life and work.
There are many different ways to reflect including:

• Retreat programs
• Short writing activities – 2-5 minutes where people MindMap or note their learning
• Mid-point evaluations with clients
• Quarterly Reviews (see the article below)

 
Last month at the Learning Lab and Design Studio I was reminded of a great book called the Women’s Retreat Book by Jennifer Louden which is chock-full of great resources for creating and leading your own retreats. You’ll want to check it out.

Other resources you might want to explore:
Create a Pause Via Quarterly Retreats Using these questions (Coaching Tools Company Article)

Undertake a quarterly review process with me (30 minutes - VIDEO). Be sure to grab your pen and journal for this one!

Wishing you all the best,
​Jennifer

PS - For those of you who want to bring some of this into your work, consider joining me on July 9th for the Coaching Business Builder and PlanDoTrack Facilitator Training. I'll be leading a group of professionals through 6 x 3 hour facilitator virtual training sessions in July so you can lead this work with your own clients. More here.

​Jennifer Britton, PCC, CPCC
Author multiple books including the Coaching Business Builder Workbook and Planner (2018), Effective Group Coaching (2010)
Potentials Realized
Phone: 416-996-8326
Check out the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series of daily prompts for your work and business over on  Instagram @CoachingBizBuilder.

The tagline at the PlanDoTrack and Coaching Business Builder is that Consistent Action + Daily Steps = Momentum. In other words, action creates action. This is key for business success today. What does momentum mean in your business? Like the metaphor of a rolling stone, more energy is required to get the stone rolling, and then it takes a life of its own.

Practically:
Make a list. Do things consistently. Figure out what the best rhythm for the project or task is going to be.

In many creative projects it is easy to think that we don’t know where to go, when often it is more important to just get started and see where the creative process ensues.

While starting new tasks may take a lot of effort, over time these actions become habits and “how we do things”.

Resources:
Momentum: How to Build It, Keep It or Get it Back – Michael McQueen

Best,
Jennifer

Welcome to June! What are your TOP 5 Goals this month? What do you want to be able to say you have CHECKED Off the list later this month?
This month we're focusing on the topic of NICHE here at the Coaching Business Builder. As businesses, knowing who we serve, whether it's one population or several, is key to success in marketing and also design. It's hard to design a "one-size fits all" for most products or services, and with this in mind, knowing who we serve will help us shape experiences, products and services which match the needs of those we support, and also are deemed meaningful or valuable.
In the Coaching Business BuilderWorkbook and Planner there are several sections which explores this topic of niche - including Section 1 (Business Foundations), Section 2 (Solopreneur Primer) and of course, Section 3 (Marketing Essentials). You are also encouraged to reconnect with your own strengths in Section 4 (the Ecosystem) as you think about what you naturally bring to your work with clients.
This month's focus on NICHE will be valuable whether you are thinking about this the first time or the thousandth time. Like other months, each day you are invited to spend 10 - 15 minutes reflecting on the daily prompts. For a topic like niche which can feel BIG and overwhelming, chunking it down into daily questions can create new insight and keep us moving.
As we step into the month, consider those people you really want to serve with your skills. Maybe it's a group you already support or maybe it's a new one.  Grab a pen and journal and take notes as you go.
Download a copy of this month's prompts here, which also includes a worksheet for the Sweetspot Exercise.
It's the first of the month which means that it's time to share this month's installment for the 1BizStepADay. This monthly series provides you with daily prompts to get you into short bursts of action around your work or business, 15 minutes at a time. Since the start of the  year the monthly focus has covered topics related to relationships in business (February), getting things done, and CONTENT Creation (May).
I hope that you will follow along with these daily action steps. See just how much progress you can make with 15 minutes of consistent action, every day! 

Be sure to share this with others. Please pass on!

If you have a copy of either the Coaching Business Builder or PlanDoTrack Workbook planner, to add a tracing line to your Monthly Daily Tracker around the 1 Biz Step a Day.

Share with us your progress this month through a comment! 

Join us over at the Facebook PlanDoTrack page for regular check-ins, and my Wednesday Facebook Live Weekly Planning Hack.

If niche is a topic of interest to you, we explore this topic at the Coaching Biz Growth Lab, an annual group for coaches which meets the 1st and 3rd Fridays of each month for an hour or coaching, learning and connection around key business topics. Join us for the remainder of 2019.

Enjoy the start to your month and your work around your niche!

Best wishes,
Jennifer

Jennifer Britton - Potentials Realized
Author of PlanDoTrack (2019),  Coaching Business Builder (2018), Effective Virtual Conversations (2017) and From One to Many: Best Practices for Team and Group Coaching (2013). Pick up a copy of any of her books at Amazon
Book Jennifer for a coaching session to explore productivity, teamwork and business issues.
Contact her by phone at (416)996-8326
Follow the #90DaysPlanDoTrack series on Instagram