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This week: if you’ve been chasing the same goal for months and wondering why nothing is moving, this one’s for you.
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Summer does something to me.
As the days get longer, my foot eases off the gas ever so slightly. A little less push, a little more long, boozy lunch. And while it feels lovely in the moment, this year I caught myself slipping back into my delightful Spanish lifestyle.
Mañana, mañana.
The trouble with mañana, mañana is that it doesn’t suddenly switch itself on. It’s a gentle creep.
I’ve got to admit it. My standards dropped eeeever so slightly without me even realising, and the three numbers I normally pay attention to in my business started dropping too.
The people joining my world, the conversations I was having, and the people paying me.
So for the last six weeks (hello, October), I’ve been deliberately bringing those numbers back up to my minimum.
And, more importantly, raising the minimum itself.
The Usual Suspects
When you see your numbers drop, most experts reach for the obvious explanations. Something like…
I’m not working hard enough.
I need a new strategy.
I need a new product.
It’s the summer slump.
Or my personal favourite: I need a bigger goal to pull me forward.
This year, I’m not convinced by those explanations. Here’s why…
Your same goal, on repeat
Here’s an experiment for you.
Look back over the last six months, or maybe even the last year.
How many times have you set the same goal?
Same number. Same launch numbers. Same “this is the quarter I make the big difference”. Said with complete conviction, every single time.
Meanwhile, without realising it, you’re actually tolerating the status quo. And the status quo is an anchor. You can point the boat at any destination you like, but if the anchor’s down, you’re going nowhere.
Only when you stop tolerating it, and fix your standards higher, do you take the brakes off and give yourself a real shot at the goal. When you lift the anchor and take the brakes off, that’s when you get exactly what you want.
What Rolls-Royce taught me about standards
When I worked with Rolls-Royce, I was in charge of KPIs. I know, sounds fancy. Those are key performance indicators, for the uninitiated.
We had a very narrow band we were allowed to exist in. The minimum was agreed and it was expected. Anything below that threshold and me and my team were in for some very uncomfortable conversations, and serious repercussions.
Believe me when I say this… nobody was sat around talking about aspirational goals. Goals and KPIs didn’t even enter the same conversation. Holding the minimum standard was the only job.
When you work for yourself, here’s what I need to remind you of… nobody enforces the standards.
There’s no review meeting, no awkward phone call, no spreadsheet with traffic lights going red. There’s just you, a lovely summer, and mañana, mañana.
Which means you already have a standard. You just didn’t consciously choose it.
Your current standard is the number that sets off an automatic response in your mind. The one that makes you look at your revenue and say holy smokes, this is far too low, I need to do something about it. Remember, this is unconscious. It might be four figures, five or six. It’s unique to you, and wherever it sits right now is fine. That’s the number that will ultimately push you into action.
A KPI, a standard, is a completely different animal. It’s a standard you set on purpose, for the life you actually want and for what you’re willing to tolerate in your business.
A goal is a hope. A standard is a thermostat.
A goal is something you plan for. It’s something you desire. It lives in the future, and it’s a perfectly valid way of building a life and a business.
A standard, on the other hand, is something you won’t accept falling below today. It brings the goal into the present.
Think of it as a thermostat. Set your standard at four, five or six figures a month and you’ll work towards it by default, the way a room warms itself back up when the temperature drops. Motivation and striving stop doing the work. The standard does the correcting.
The problem comes when you don’t consciously set a minimum.
You can spend all year aiming for a six-figure launch and, the rest of the time, be perfectly okay with two grand a month. Because two grand is your bare minimum.
That’s where your thermostat sits, whether you choose it or not.
Why the floor keeps slipping
Hands up if you love setting goals.
If you’re a business owner, you will love it. We love to look at the future as pure potential. It’s the dream, and that’s half the equation.
The other half of the equation is what you do right now, today.
→ The decisions you make in the moment.
And unless your minimum standard is a conscious decision, you’ll keep on staring at the goal while the floor sets itself without you.
Set your floor before your goal
If you’re sitting down to set your goals for the last quarter of the year, hear me out.
Set your minimum standards too. Not only for your business, but for your whole life.
The places you’ll no longer go.
The people you might want to see once a month instead of every week.
The hours you work.
The minimum amount of hours you sleep, water you drink, steps you walk etc. etc.
Simple things but very important.
For example, you might be perfectly okay with eight-hour days when four hours of focus would do it.
Hint, hint: that’s the one I’m working on myself. I’m sure my chiropractor will approve.
And alongside your revenue goal, set a minimum revenue standard. The number you will absolutely not drop below for the next three months.
This is all about setting your thermostat to a level that’s acceptable to you, and treating anything below it as completely unacceptable, because it doesn’t meet your standards.
And believe me, the goal will take care of itself after that.
What changes when you hold it
The standard you hold becomes a springboard, and that makes your goals so much easier to go for.
You stop chasing random, sporadic new strategies, working harder and stuffing things in around your business. You start setting things in stone, most importantly a cadence and a schedule that will actually work for you.
That’s one of the most beautiful things about building your business around your life, instead of the other way round.
If you want marketing that holds your standards
If you want to build a marketing system that holds your standards without posting every day, start with my free series, Marketing Without Social Media: A New Era of Marketing.
It’s how I build a marketing cadence around my life, and it’s the version I’d build today.
