A few months ago I bought a book by Marcus Buckingham called "Find your strongest life". I had heard of Marcus Buckingham before because he has done lots of what I call "serious work" advising big businesses such Disney and he is famous for being the world’s leading expert in personal strengths.

But most excitingly he has also done heaps of stuff on Oprah!

In the book he talks about being on Oprah and the women he met who, by circumstance, were a bit stuck in their lives. Familiar stories such as those of Mums stuck in jobs and businesses they don't much care for, unable to explore alternatives because of a lack of time, money and confidence.

I have passed the book on to friends, who have passed it on to other friends...and so on and so on. It really is a thought provoking read!

And now Marcus Buckingham is coming to Sydney!

He is going to do a morning seminar called "Find your strongest life". So if you can get to Sydney on 23 May 2010, I absolutely recommend it. The details are all here and you can get a discount by putting using promo code Butterfly and if you are quick you can get the early bird discount too (finishes Friday 14 May).

You can also do his online 'Strong life Test' for free, and for fun, and for amazing insight right here!

Here's a little snippet from the website:

Marcus will what the happiest and most successful women do and will show you how to find your strongest life by:

• Helping you set a direction for your life without fear that you’ve chosen the wrong one.
• Revealing how to handle the responsibilities on your shoulders without guilt that you aren’t doing enough.
• Guiding you to build fulfilling relationships with your boss, your co-workers, your spouse and your kids without resenting what they are demanding from you.
• Discovering the successful strategies of other women like YOU!

PLUS A panel of highly successful Australian women in business will share their journey with you.

If you are making a cake the end product is only as good as the starting line up.  Fine flour, fresh eggs, room temperature butter and the right process will yield a great tasting cake. But even the best Kitchen Maid mixer or other equipment won’t be able to turn less-than ingredients into an awesome cake.

Same with the product/service you are selling. Great ingredients (quality raw materials, good manufacturer, well trained staff, decent packaging) will set you up for a great product.

Of course you might not want or need to sell a great product. But if you do, here’s a tip: check the freshness of your ingredients. And it goes to follow that if you want to bake a great business, the ingredients going into that need to be pretty good too.

You can't work 10 times harder so how are you going to increase your income?

It's a big tough question. So how about for the next 7 days you spend a few minutes thinking of (and doing) a very small step that will get you towards being a little bit cleverer with every hour or dollar you spend.

It might be as simple as starting a proper to do list ( I love this one here) or it might be it's as big as increasing your prices...

 We women are funnyosities about our bodies. We stand in front of the mirror and think we are the only ones who have potbellies, saggy boobs and thunder thighs.

We are the same about our businesses.

Last week I spoke privately to 15 small businesses run by women. Each women thought her business was the only one that wasn’t profitable*. None of them were!

As women we dress carefully to hide our wobbly bits, as business owners we are measured in the way we talk about our businesses.

Let’s make a resolution today, International Women’s Day, to be kinder to each other. Let’s be honest about what doesn’t work in our businesses, let’s take heart from the fact that other businesses are a bit less-than too, and let’s help each other build better businesses.

*When I say “profitable” I mean making enough money to compensate the owner for the (usually huge) effort she is putting in. A business can make a profit but not be profitable because it’s taking way too much owner-time to make that profit

In my quest to help women run profitable businesses I stress that profitable means "making enough money for the hours that you put in". And that's a big sticking point. Hands up if you don't think you are making enough money to justify the hours. Yep, that's most of you.

Here's a little tool I found that will help you keep track of where you are spending all your time. Of course it can't trim your hours but when you discover where you are spending all your time you can make better decisions about what you do and what you don't do.

The tool is called Rescue Time and you can find it here. I've been using it for a few months and I love it. It cheekily asks "what have you been doing?", I was honest and told it the truth. I got a nasty surprise at the end of the week how much time I had wasted (browsing) and it helped me focus on doing proper tasks. Give it a try, it's free, fun and useful.

 Here is a short video in which I explain the Basic Business Recipe. The Basic Business Recipe is a must have for all businesses. Throw out the business plan and do this instead, it's much more intuitive! The video is short so it's a very quick summary. The book (of course) has the detail in it......

Robert Gerrish from Flying Solo is the interviewer. If you don't know Flying solo take a look at the website here, it's a great resource for one-man bands.

 


Here is a short article I did for Prevention Mag and Girlfriend mag - it's about how to find a goal and achieve it - 5 easy steps. Make 2010 fabulous for you by starting today.

Here's an article I did for Prevention magazine; 4 easy steps to make sure you achieve those 2010 goals. They all work!

Here's a link to a webinar I did with Smartcompany. Some tips around starting up that you may find handy. Was a fun panel. Enjoy

  We all go a bit mad at this time of the year, from a business point of view I mean. We can’t help but organize to catch up with anyone vaguely related to our business for a bit of Yuletide cheer. And when we are not doing that we are dashing off gifts to important customers and going slightly deranged writing a plethora of Christmas Cards.

But we are actually wasting our time.

A few years ago I remember going to hear a sales guru speak, his name is Jack Daly and if you ever get the chance to see him, do. One of the points that he made was that everyone makes a fuss about Christmas, so your card/gift/drinks invitation gets lost in the melee of a thousand others. No one remembers it

So his advice was, don’t bother with Christmas, do something when no-one else is doing it instead.

I remember quite a few years ago now receiving a lovely card from Emma Isaacs (Chief Chick at Business Chicks). We had had a meeting and I was wearing a pair of red shoes. She sent me a card shortly afterwards and on the cover was, yes, a pair of red shoes. I kept the card on my desk for ages and I’ve never forgotten it. But last years Christmas gifts (business ones only of course) I’m ashamed to say I can’t remember.

I love a Christmas card as much as anyone, and I don’t mean to sound like Scrooge when I say don’t give them. But if you think giving Christmas cards and gifts is a good marketing ploy think again. In a small business you need to get the best out of every dollar you spend, so don’t bother with Christmas, surprise someone in February instead.

PS Slightly concerned that friends and family will strike me off the Christmas card list, so I should reiterate that I am talking purely in regard to  business purposes…..