The Mindset Shift That Took A Dejected Business Owner Away From The Brink
- Brainz Magazine
- Sep 22, 2021
- 5 min read
Written by: Kyle Gillette, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
On March 17, 2019, I was almost exactly one year into my coaching business when COVID 19 hit my business hard. I remember the day because I added the date into a Google Sheet I was using to track my coaching income and outreach. This was the day that three businesses decided they didn't want or couldn't afford my services anymore.
Each of the businesses cited COVID as the reason. Fortunately, I earned them all back. But at the time, it was devastating. I lost roughly 75% of my business and it sent me into a tailspin of woe is me and made me contemplate closing my business.
For the previous three months, I had set up countless networking calls and was really getting great traction in my business with new clients and was filling my funnel. I was feeling great!
This all crashed within a couple of days after March 17th. My mood shifted from optimistic and upbeat to dejected and angry.
I wallowed in my self-pity for about three months before I had this moment of clarity. It was June and I remember sitting in my fancy executive chair at my giant black desk with my head down then I said aloud, "what am I doing?"
My mindset had completely flipped. Just three months earlier I had an amazing attitude and energy, now I had this terrible scarcity mindset. I was reading a book by David A. Fields called, "The Irresistible Consultant's Guide To Winning Clients" and it woke me up to change my thinking.
At the same time, I also learned some staggering statistics about the coaching and consulting industries. The coaching industry revenue is somewhere between 6-11 billion dollars in the US alone and consulting is north of 100 billion dollars. There's enough money to go around.
As I sat there with my mouth open instead of my head hanging, I realized two things. One, there was (and is) plenty of money to be made in coaching and consulting for me. Number two, it was up to me to get out of my stupid funk and the mindset shift I needed was to have an abundance mindset.
All of this happened because of a fundamental shift in my mindset from scarcity to abundance. I still maintain this mindset (though it is a challenge at times) and I know it will serve me and you going forward.
There are many ways to develop an abundance mindset but here are 7 lessons I learned to create and maintain this mindset.
Think win-win.
In the context of business, I find win-win to be the best approach for long-term success. I can't tell you how many networking conversations I've had where I could have easily burned a bridge by trying to be salesy but instead added value and then months or even years later, that person referred or became my client. This mentality pays off in spades if you're willing to be patient.
Pick your words wisely.
How you say what you say matters. For example, the difference between having to do something and getting to do something is immense. If I "have to" have a difficult conversation it changes the tone in my mind immediately. In fact, as I write this, my body is responding to the idea of having that difficult conversation.
But if I "get to" have that conversation, there is a much different tone to the conversation. My body and mind are preparing differently. The difficulty of the conversation doesn't change but my attitude does.
Word choice is significant in every context of business. You have full control of what you say and how you say it, choose words and tones that bring about an attitude of abundance rather than scarcity or limitation.
Be Grateful.
This one is simple. Be grateful for what you have and the opportunities you have. Even if opportunities were missed, failure happened, or things didn't pan out as desired you can remain grateful. This is especially relevant when others mess something up.
Be grateful toward people for WHO they are and what they DID accomplish even if it wasn't what you expected. Help them to know you recognize there are plenty more opportunities and they have room to grow. Gratitude opens our minds and hearts as leaders to what could be and that is abundance.
Surround yourself with people who have an abundance mindset.
I'm not sure I need to say much more than that. Put people with this mindset on your personal board, on your team, and in your life. Even if you struggle with this, their attitude will impact and shift yours.
Think big. Then think bigger.
It's easy to get too practical in business. To only think in terms of what is obvious and right in front of you. This is usually from the overwhelm, busyness, or burnout many small business owners experience. But when you apply the SAGE Mindset® to your day-to-day, you'll find space to think.
In this thinking, think big. Then evaluate your thinking and think even bigger. That's abundance.
Think like a beginner.
Even if you haven't been in your field for years and years, you probably know significantly more than your employees, customers, and friends. But this gets people in trouble. When you think like a beginner, it helps you to look at things from new angles.
It helps you to ask the "dumb" questions that sometimes bring incredible insights. How many times has a child said something from a beginner's mindset that really tweaked your thinking or got you to say, huh, how about that? They also have this uncanny ability to summarize things in ways that can be profound and stick with you too. A beginner knows there is so much more to learn, so many ways to grow, and so much possibility.
The beauty of an abundance mindset is how it sets you up for tremendous success in business. As we shift our focus to the sales mindset, make sure the abundance mindset rides shotgun with this one.
You might be wondering what happened to my business after I made this shift. I have good news for you. By the end of the year, I had earned the clients who had canceled back and added several additional clients. Plus, I had done this while doubling my fees. When 2019 wrapped up, I had successfully grown my business by 41%.
How can you shift your thinking today to an abundance mindset?
Kyle Gillette, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Kyle Gillette is an expert mindset coach. After working for 9 years in a men's mentoring program and seeing how much the student's mindsets were limiting their success, Kyle created the SAGE Mindset® Framework. He now helps small business owners who are struggling with burnout, feeling overwhelmed with work, or just plain stuck create the habits and mindsets gain the clarity, confidence, and clients they deserve. Kyle is also the creator of the SAGE Mindset App, he's an author, and host of the SAGE Mindset Podcast. He's been coaching and leading people in the non-profit and small business contexts for 20 years. Kyle desires to help his clients become the leaders they were meant to be.
