Remember how you felt when your business was born? You were pumped! Starting with a hiss and a roar, the desire to succeed filled you with fire. You had endless passion and boatloads of drive. Every minute of your day was consumed by working in it, on it, or daydreaming about what your awesome fledgeling business would become.
All sounds pretty spectacular, right? Let’s fast-forward a bit….
As the rhythm of daily business life took over, and you faced your first, second, and third stumbling blocks, the fact that every minute of your life was consumed with your business started to stress, more than inspire. Things were taking their toll and your business motivation dipped to an all-time low. You began to wonder how on earth to get your mojo back.
This is such a familiar story and one that many of us in business can relate to. So? Just how DO you get that pumped, energised feeling back? Well, one great way is to follow my seven favourite motivational tips. Sharing lessons learned with this one! If you find yourself in a business rut, take this metaphorical spade we are handing you and let’s start digging the heck out of there!
7 Tips To Attain And Maintain Business Motivation:
1. Set a Goal
Having something specific to work towards can reawaken your motivation. It has to be a measurable goal otherwise you will never feel like you are achieving anything. Make it specific and ensure it has a deadline. Something like ‘I want to add 500 subscribers to my email list in 6 months’.
Once you have your goal, break it down into bite-sized chunks. “What do I need to achieve in 3 months, 1 month, 1 week?” Finally, break it into the daily tasks you need to complete. Your motivation begins to grow as you start making progress and completing those tasks.
Top Tip: Up the motivation factor by giving yourself a little reward every time you achieve a milestone!
2. Revisit Your Dreams
Revisit your dreams on a daily basis. Yep, I want you to keep them ‘smack’ in front of your face in a way that works best for you. I had enormous dreams when I began my business, but sometimes they got hidden behind the daily grind tasks. What worked for me was creating a tangible ‘wish board’ so that I had a visual representation of my dreams to look at every day. Get creative with it! You could even get the team involved so that everyone is working towards their dreams whilst helping achieve the overall goals/ dreams of the company.
3. Take Time Out
Step away from the desk! You will burn out if you spend all of your time working on your business. So you need to consciously and actively take time out from it. I love to get away for a weekend for a change of scene and to recharge my batteries.
After I get home I have a renewed drive to push forward with my business. After all, my life does not just work, work, work! There has to be a balance for motivation to grow.
4. Find An Accountability Partner
Not dissimilar to a workout buddy – find someone to hold you to your promises! I have THE most amazing accountability partner. We connect on a weekly basis to keep track of how each other is doing. Having someone to encourage and support you can do wonders. It helps you to realise that you are not alone in your challenges. Making a commitment to someone else to do something is a great motivator to follow through.
When someone is relying on you stick to your word, it is so much easier to get movin’. I know I never want to disappoint the person who is taking the time to drive me to do my best.
5. Change The Routine
With business comes routine. Routine brings boredom and boredom KILLS motivation.
To find it again, I like to review my process and change the way I do things. I have tried changing when I do them, how I do them, and even my approach to them. Introducing a new way of thinking can help you push past the boredom and renew your business motivation.
Top Tip: If you find that you have a number of non-essential business tasks, then consider outsourcing them. You won’t get bored if you don’t have to do them! Get in touch with the team at Virtual Assistants. They specialise in completing those ‘boring tasks’ so you don’t have to.
6. Take Inspiration From Someone Else
When I am stuck for motivation, I love discovering someone who has successfully walked the path before. In addition to taking inspiration from their story, it is a great chance to look at how they overcame challenges, stayed focused, and achieved their goals.
7. Mistakes Are Learning Opportunities
Instead of dwelling on my mistakes, I try and use them as a learning opportunity to prevent me from doing the same thing again. If I can focus on moving forward with a solution, then it won’t suck my motivation away. I have to admit that this one is a work in progress, as errors in judgement can be hard to brush off!
Try to mentally prepare yourself for making mistakes in the future, or for having things work out in a different way than you anticipate. No one is perfect, and mistakes are going to happen. The important thing is to know that you can rise from them and strategise again.