What Struggling Entrepreneurs Have In Common

 Why are they feeling so tired, confused, overwhelmed, under-resourced, and alone?

Whether it's just you, or you have a small team helping you, there's enormous pressure in being a modern entrepreneur, a full-stack entrepreneur. 

You can feel pressed from all sides because like a full-stack software developer, you are responsible for everything, from the front-end to the back-end of your business.

 As a full-stack entrepreneur, you are responsible for every aspect of your business growth including revenue strategy, methods, technology tools, tactics, and every piece of the digital marketing and customer acquisition puzzle ... all with little or no help.

+ strategic vision and clarity
+ product/market fit
+ digital ecosystem
+ customer acquisition

You are responsible for connecting the pieces of a very complicated puzzle. Miss this and your revenue will fizzle.

It's really easy to do tons of activity, keeping really busy, yet feeling lost and confused at the end of each day, week, month ... this will totally exhaust you! 

>> Here's the culprit, a blurry sense of Priority. Schedule. Focus.

Every couple of months you have to HIT PAUSE to refresh your strategy, timeline, priority, schedule (what you will be doing with your time) and focus.

You are pausing to reset your business GPS. I set aside a full day or two every few months to reset and refresh myself. It’s how I continually grow and scale.

And it doesn’t hurt that my initials are GSD. I just GSD. (google it)

I do this >>

 #1 - I make a fresh to-do list, separating my daily/weekly repetitive tasks from my project tasks. I write down what must be accomplished and then reset my goals. 

- right now
- this week
- this month
- this QTR
- this year

#2 - Then I rank my priorities. I use Trello to make monthly columns dragging action items up and down by priority. I also use Toggle for projects over many months. It’s a year at a glance. (all free)

#3 - Then I schedule my tasks in my calendar. If I miss something or don't get it done, I just drag the task to another time slot on my calendar.

#4 - I only focus on one task at a time, so each task has my complete focus.

Sounds simple, yet most struggling entrepreneurs don't do this. 

Over the past 22 years, I've helped Founder/CEOs launch, relaunch, and turnaround hundreds of businesses.

I would say 99% of the struggling small-business entrepreneurs don't own their time. They allow distractions and fires to dictate their priority, schedule, and focus.

At the full-stack entrepreneur accelerator at CanaGlobal, most mentoring sessions start with a look at where they’re at with their timeline. 

** Remember the stop-drop-cover-and-roll drill from school.

This one is for grown-ups: Stop. Pause. Reset Your Priority, Schedule, and Focus. You’ll breathe better.

Something that has proven very successful for me, and brings me into ZERO stress and 100% peace ... I spend a lot of time reading my Bible studying biblical promises, praying to God, asking Him to teach me, and establish my plans and steps. 

I ask God to reset my thinking and doing so I can be prosperous and successful in all that I do.

OK. Your turn. Take the pause.

And look, you don’t have to do this alone. 

-Gerald