Dirty Secrets of Small Business
Do you like being in the spotlight? Do you avoid situations where you know you’ll be asked to say something in front of a group? Or are you the first person to raise your hand when a speaker is finished and is looking for questions?
Heard a good story lately? Who’s the best story teller you know? Are you a good story teller? What makes for a good story? These are just some of the questions we tackle in today’s episode.
We were recently involved with some mock interviews with local high school students. The goal is to give these 15 and 16 year olds some practice at interviewing for a job. They are asked to complete an application, dress in nicer clothes, and then sit down for a 10-minute interview with some volunteer adults to “interview” for a job in a retail store.
Do you ever get people responding to you with smiles and nods? We get this response a lot. Especially from small business owners. They will often smile and nod when different business topics are brought up. We learned years ago that the smile and nod is often code for “I have no idea what you’re talking about and I hope you don’t ask me to explain myself.”
At the end of the day, we all have a mess in our businesses and our lives. The question becomes who do we share what parts of that mess with when it comes to our business. As the owner of a small business it’s likely you will go months or years without having to Present yourself or share your story.
We have been blessed to not only achieve success in our own personal lives and careers, but we’ve also had the benefit of working closely with many other successful people in all walks of life. This includes people in everything from business to politics to non-profits.
We have been blessed to not only achieve success in our own personal lives and careers, but we’ve also had the benefit of working closely with many other successful people in all walks of life. This includes people in everything from business to politics to non-profits.
Some days it’s easier to stay positive than others. For instance, those days when you land a big new customer or finally bring on board that key new hire. But there are other days when it’s really tough to keep that positive outlook. Simply flip the scenarios mentioned before where instead of landing a big new customer you instead lose a customer that makes up 25% of your business. Or that key employee gives you two weeks notice.
In This Episode This might seem like a simple question. But depending who you ask about valuing your inventory, the […]
If you’re in the business of meeting a lot of new people during the course of the week, month, or year, one of your keys to success will be to effectively share your story. What do we mean by sharing your story? It’s providing the person you’re speaking with the relevant points about your background that relate to them. You have to decide which parts of your experience you want to share. And how much of your story to share.