For those of you who are regular readers of my blog you would have seen that over the past few weeks I’ve been concentrating on the topic of money.
In particular how your family’s money legacy can impact the amount of income you’ll make (or not make) in your business, and the three common money habits that can stunt your income and profits.
Money is often something we don’t talk about with our friends and colleagues, other than the occasional complaint that there’s ‘never enough’ or ‘it’s something you have to work hard for’ – or another similar comment.
The reason I’ve pulled back the covers on this ‘taboo’ subject is because the relationship you have with money can seriously undermine your business’s success.
A few months ago I met Susanna – a Life Coach. She had been marketing her services on a daily basis and attending regular networking meetings. However despite all of her hard work her dreams of building a thriving business remained out of reach.
What Susanna failed to realise was that even with the best business-building strategies in place, because she hadn’t addressed her mindset and the beliefs she had around money, these were now keeping her stuck from reaching her income goals.
The money stories she had grown up with; the way her parents managed their money – in particular her mother’s spending habits – had become a major influence on Susanna’s life.
Taking a step back in her business and asking herself some poignant questions she was finally able to see how her family’s money legacy and her beliefs were the reason why she was struggling to reach her income goals.
Here are some of the ways Susanna’s relationship with money was showing up for her in her business.
By not standing in her power with money, Susanna would often:
- Reduce her fee when providing a quote to a prospect
- Cave in and offer a discount even after she had quoted her normal fees
- Go over the allocated time in her coaching session
- Not track her income
- Not check her bills/accounts/credit card statement to ensure all the charges were accurate
- Not follow up on errors she had found on her bills / accounts / credit card statement
- Not chase up overdue accounts that other people owed her, to name a few
Recognise any of them? What about these?
Not Charging What You’re Worth:
- Not contacting a client to re-negotiate your fee when you realise the project they’ve hired you for is clearly far more complicated and involved than what they led you to believe
- Not putting your fees up even though you’ve been charging a far lower rate than your competitors AND you’re delivering far better results than everyone else
- Putting WAY too much content in your coaching programs
- Being at the beck and call of your clients and dropping everything whenever they contact you – even the smallest of things which should have been handled by your team
- Being far too accessible for your clients and not charging enough for that privilege
- Thinking you’re not good enough and NOT launching your programs
Ineffective Systems:
- Not having a bold money goal
- Not putting away money and having a kitty that you can draw upon for any unexpected situations
- Not keeping a filing system to streamline the tracking and scheduling of your accounts
- Paying your accounts late and getting late fines
- Not regularly reconciling your bank accounts / statements / credit cards
- Not knowing how much money you owe
- Not taking an interest in your business’s financial situation and saying “Oh, my accountant/bookkeeper knows all of that’
- Not being able to understand the important elements of your business’s profit and loss and other business reports
- Not having a budget in place
- Not sticking to your budget and overspending
Tolerating Support Team & Supplier Inefficiencies:
- Bartering and doing contra deals being the ONLY way you get support for your business
- Making excuses for one of your team members who’s NOT pulling their weight
- Not following up with a supplier when they haven’t met a promised deadline
- Settling for second best and/or accepting something from a supplier when the quality they promised is not delivered
Your Spending Habits:
- Buying things that you clearly don’t need and that just end up collecting dust, alongside all of the other things you’ve bought (that you also didn’t need)
- Buying things for other people that they didn’t need and just end up collecting dust
- Spending outside your means because you want to fit in with other people
- Spending money – not because you need the item but because the act of spending makes you feel good
- NOT spending anything on yourself and being too frugal
How many do you recognise?
To step into your power with money (and no longer throw money away):
- Plug up those money leaks by making a commitment to yourself to NOT do any of the things I’ve mentioned above
- Develop some systems/processes to keep you on track to avoid falling back into those old bad money habits
- Get creative and make a Money Vision Board
- Stop complaining about that team member and finally hire someone that will provide you with the level of support you need to take your business to the next level
What do you think? Do you recognise these money habits? If you find this article helpful please share by clicking the Like button below. And, as always, please leave a comment. I love hearing from readers.
Your rewarding, abundant life and business is within your reach.
To your money breakthroughs!
As you know, Annemarie, my entire focus is on how money mindset issues affect women in all facets of their life, particularly as they start thinking about personal long-term planning. This is a terrific article showing how the same issues affect their businesses specifically. Great job!
Thanks Sharon. It’s amazing the amount of money that we can let slip through our fingers when we’re not managing our money correctly, whether this be personally or in our business. Personal long-term planning is so important too. I’m sure you’ll have lots of wisdom to share with your clients too!
Annemarie, this is valuable information and I’m looking forward to your webinar tomorrow! As you know, my focus is on creating a “living family legacy” and help others to have healthier family legacies, including financially… your teaching is much appreciated!
Thanks Susan – I’m so thrilled you’ll be joining me! I had another breakthrough when preparing some of the content for the webinar – so will be sharing that tomorrow as well! Creating a healthy and empowering family money legacy is crucial. In fact, I have a husband and wife that are working through one of my coaching programs. They DON’T want to pass on any negative money beliefs/habits to their children. How cool is that!!
WOW!! This is SOOOO true! I can nod my head (sadly) to a lot of these things. But thankfully I in the process of shifting my mindset so that I can get on the other (BETTER) side of the track.
GREAT ARTICLE!! 🙂
Thea, when I started to write this article I was looking for a dozen or so areas I could provide as examples. Drawing from my own experience and that of my clients, the list just kept growing. It’s amazing how we can get stuck in these habits because of our self-worth and money beliefs. Glad you enjoyed the article and very pleased that you’re in the process of shifting your mindset too. Fantastic!!
Great post. When I read this post I thought of Sharon O’Day. I see she has already commented. Great valuable article. Some are not aware how to change and I believe you are their source to offer that wisdom. One factor of running my husband’s seasonal business is that I will never compromise his value for the price they are willing to pay him. If they want cheaper then they have to find others who are not as great as he is but willing to short changed their profits. Sometimes small business people, that I am best familiar with, compromise dollars to just get the job.
Thanks Carol! Yes, Sharon’s work around ‘Money after Menopause’ is such an important area too! You know, I am constantly surprised by the money beliefs and self beliefs that cause business owners to doubt themselves, which is often reflected in the prices they charge AND the people they continue to attract to their business. One of my mentors once shared with us ‘you will continue to collect the evidence you need to prove your beliefs are accurate’, which means if we think that clients won’t pay – then you’re absolutely right, they won’t pay. The good news is that you can change this very easily – just by changing your beliefs and actions.
This is amazing info and can’t wait for your webinar! My work is focused on the messages parents pass on to their children and based on my experiences, sadly money is at the top of the list of “negatives”!
Hi Denny, it is amazing the messages we get from our parents both from what they say and do. Actions speak louder than words, so often, the way our parents manage their money is now the way we manage ours. Many of my clients can’t believe it when they start to see the pattern. Very enlightening! Or, we can go the exact opposite (which happened in my case). I’m so thankful to have been taught this information. It a message that everyone should have the opportunity to listen to. There’s learnings for all!! So pleased you’ll be joining me today Denny!
Annemarie, as always a great insightful article. Was not able to attend your webinar, schedule conflict. Hope you got it recorded.
Hi Claudia – thanks! Yes, the webinar was recorded. The link has been sent out to everyone that registered.
Oh, my… do I recognize myself here, particularly in the ‘charging what you’re worth’ department. I spent 12 years working for government where the wage was less than half what the private sector was/is charging for the same work, and I still have a hard time sometimes quoting my hourly rate (waiting for the client to cringe). Thanks for the reminder that we are worth it!! :o)
Hi Victoria, I think we can all recognize areas in our lives and business where we are not charging what we’re worth or not stepping into our power with money. Very much so for women in comparison to men. As women we are so good at ‘not’ recognizing our skills and talents and tend to devalue our time, especially when it comes to charging what we’re worth! Thanks for stopping by!