Archive for July, 2010
Striving for perfection can keep you from enjoying life, undermine your relationships, severely drain your energy and your self-esteem. For many it's a habit, started early in childhood, and can be difficult to change, but a little bit of effort can go a long way toward changing the pattern of perfectionism. Here are 8 strategies for stopping the quest for perfection:
1. Weigh the cons and costs
List all of the ways in which your perfectionism is hurting you, your family and friends. This exercise will help motivate you to make a change.
2. Take note
Try to document your perfectionist, negative thoughts throughout the day. If this is impractical, then at the end of the day think back on your day, remember any feelings of failure or inadequacy, and write down your thoughts at the time. That way, you'll become more aware of these detrimental thoughts when they resurface.
3. Think positive
Mitigate your tendency to focus on the negative by making a conscious effort to notice all that is good about your own and others' efforts. If you notice something negative about yourself or your work, find five or so positive qualities to counterbalance those thoughts.
4. Change your inner voice
Silence (or at least muffle) that negative self-talk by taking some concrete steps to change your focus. For example:
- Keep a journal of your thoughts and examine them later
- Stop negative thoughts in their tracks by literally saying "stop" in your head when such a thought arises
- Keep a rubber-band around your wrist and snap it when negative self-talk starts
- Replace negative statements with milder, neutral or positive statements
- Change negative statements to questions - for example, "I can't do this!" could become "How can I do this?"
5. Take baby steps
Instead of setting unreasonable goals as perfectionists tend to do, reduce your big goals into smaller, bite-sized objectives, and reward yourself when you meet them. This will help you forgive your mistakes more easily, helps you to enjoy the process, and actually increases the likelihood that you'll achieve your big goal.
6. Stop and smell the roses
Focus less on results and more on the process of reaching your goals. Some ways to do this might include joining a group working toward the same goal or keeping a journal of your feelings and what you learn along the way. Even if you don't meet your goal, you can look back and see what you have gained in just working toward a goal.
7. Take criticism constructively
Instead of perceiving criticism as an attack and reacting defensively, receive it as a helpful suggestion for improving your performance. Then your less-than-perfect performances can become stepping stones toward achieving excellence.
8. Look at the big picture
Concentrate less on the little imperfections and more on what matters. For example, giving a birthday party for a friend matters much more than the fact that your dishes didn't match your tablecloth.
So give yourself a break, embrace your gifts and talents, and correct those little lies that run through your head. A concerted - but not necessarily perfect! - effort to change your perfectionist habits will go a long way toward achieving your ultimate goal: a happier you.
Deanna Maio, Business Trainer & Coach, teaches business owners simple, powerful processes to stop wasting time and start making more money, and create a business that acts as a vehicle for living the life they desire and deserve. For FREE tips on how to increase your income and use your valuable time more wisely, visit http://www.savvygals.com/
I'm often asked, "What could an intern do for me and my business?", by the entrepreneurs I meet at networking events and speaking engagements I attend. For many of them, the term "internship" brings to mind images of a young college student making copies, digging through filing cabinets, and sending faxes. While this is may be the stereotype, there are many more things an intern can do to help you reach your marketing goals and further their own learning and skill building.
If you have a business, whether it's full time or part time, run out of your home or an external office, an intern can be a great asset to support your marketing efforts. There are lots of things you can hire an intern to do that will help you out and provide a learning experience for her at the same time. Here are seven projects that are great for interns:
1. Managing your database
Every business owner should have a place to keep contact information of the prospects, partners, leads, and vendors they know. Imagine going to a networking event, trade show, or speaking engagement and having someone else to do the data entry of that information into your system. They can also:
- Add contacts to a follow-up or drip marketing sequence
- Schedule time on your calendar to make a follow-up phone call
- Complete regular 'maintenance' on your system by removing old email addresses and add missing fields like zip codes
- Call your contacts to get mailing addresses for thank you notes
- Run reports to check on email open rates and bounces
2. Social networking
Interns know how to use social networking tools like Facebook, LinkedIN and Twitter. They can save you a great deal of time by posting and scheduling your status updates, adding or finding new friends, accepting or declining group and event invitations, creating events and inviting guests, uploading photos, keeping your profile up to date, or messaging new friends to encourage them to join your Facebook fan page or email list.
3. Finding reciprocal linking partners
Inbound links are a valuable commodity, and reciprocal linking can get you those links at no cost. But it does take some time to find webmasters of relevant sites who will link to you. Why not get your intern to do it?
4. Managing emails
If reading and answering email from networking partners, prospects, and clients takes you a good deal of time to manage, let your intern help. He can screen the emails that come into your inbox, decide whether it needs action or just to be read, answer the ones you tell them to using a template you write, bring the ones he can't answer to your immediate attention and archive the rest.
5. Running email campaigns
From the nuts and bolts of setting up autoresponders to tracking results, there is much to be learned from an email campaign. Letting your intern work on one will benefit both of you.
6. Setting up shopping carts
A shopping cart is a key component of any Internet marketing site. Allowing your intern to set up shopping carts on new sites will free up your time.
7. Promotion of special events
When you are planning a special event, teleclass, or program launch, it's always nice to have an extra hand. Your intern could handle the promotion aspect of it, freeing you up to do the planning.
If you find you are spending time working "in" your business more than working "on" your business and any of the above tasks keep you from doing the important activities only you can do, hiring an intern is a great way to get help managing the administrative functions of your operation while helping a student get valuable experience at the same time. And that's what I call a win-win.
Deanna Maio, Business Trainer & Coach, teaches business owners simple, powerful processes to stop wasting time and start making more money, and create a business that acts as a vehicle for living the life they desire and deserve. For FREE tips on how to increase your income and use your valuable time more wisely, visit http://www.savvygals.com/
Deanna Maio joins Stephen Covey, Les Brown, & Dr. John Gray in a new book,
GPS for Success!
Goals & Proven Strategies from the Industry’s Leading Experts
SEVIERVILLE, TENNESSEE— Deanna Maio, keynote speaker, business coach, and author, has been selected from a nationwide search to be featured in GPS for Success; a highly successful book series from Tennessee based Insight Publishing. The book features best-selling authors Stephen R. Covey (Seven Habits of Highly Effective People), Dr. John Gray (Men Are from Mars, Women Are from Venus), and Les Brown (The Power of Purpose). Deanna Maio, Covey, Gray, and Brown, are joined by other well known authors and speakers, each offering time-tested strategies for success in frank and intimate interviews.
Deanna Maio is the Founder of SavvyGals Coaching & Consulting, LLC in Portland, Oregon. Her specialty is teaching women business owners how to stop wasting time, start making more money, and live the life they deserve and desire. Known professionally as The SavvyGals Coach, Deanna started coaching in 2005 to help business owners people get the information, systems, support, and accountability they needed to deal with the sometimes overwhelming prospect of growing and running their business while still having a fulfilling personal life.
Prior to starting her own business, Deanna spent over 10 years as a manager, instructional designer and workshop facilitator. An unconditionally supportive coach and sought-after speaker and facilitator, Deanna is known for her passion and dedication to helping her clients create better results faster and easier than ever before.
You can learn more about Deanna and her programs, coaching, and do-it-yourself products at her website, http://www.savvygals.com/ For more information on Deanna Maio and to order your copy of GPS for Success, contact: Deanna Maio 503-922-2688 or support@savvygals.com http://www.savvygals.com
