12 Mar The Dream is Free*
*Hustle Sold Separately
That’s not just a catchy slogan to inspire you to reach for the stars. And this isn’t a speech to remind you it’ll all be worth it when you’re working 16 hours a day. This is a short story about Dreaming and Doing and the importance of both for Copreneurs.
Maybe you’ve been called “dreamers” at different times in your lives. Chances are, it hasn’t always been meant as a compliment. Maybe you’ve even labeled yourself that way, as if it’s a good or a bad thing.
That certainly has been true for us. Back in 2010, Margaret decided it was time to leave the firm she’d been with for a long time. Ron had already been running his CFO business for a few years before that. Wanting to join our talents in a new venture and finding ourselves at liberty to do so, we dreamed up CopreneurCPR.
As is often the case, the reality was a little different than the dream. We had a great business idea. We did our homework. We drafted a business plan. We pitched it to some smart people and they thought it was a great idea, too. We wrote articles, launched a website and got active on social media.
Not that those activities weren’t important. The problem was we couldn’t seem to get past the starting gate. We procrastinated and called it preparation. We were busy but didn’t have a business. (It’s not a business until people are sending you checks on a regular basis.) Here’s how we got things going again.
- We stopped researching and started experimenting with real, actual customers.
- We surrounded ourselves with Doers to help us stay on track, including an accountability coach.
- We made it a rule that we could only say “here’s what I did,” not “here’s what I’m going to do.”
- We let go of perfection and started thinking in terms of evolving our product over time.
- We gave in to our fears, because fearing CopreneurCPR would flop was preferable to not doing anything and regretting it forever.
Dream big. Start small. Keep going.
This Week:
What are your tendencies to dream or do, as individuals and as a business couple? What fresh approaches would benefit you?
Dreaming and Doing must be solid partners for partners in business.
For families in business, success is not just measured in fiscal years, but over generations. Yet often, leaders are so focused on the day-to-day that they aren’t able to step back and focus on the issues that impact long-term sustainability. We help leadership teams assess where they are now, where they’re trying to go and how they’re going to get there. Our expertise in the areas of organizational strategy, structure, process and performance is a unique feature of our work, and integral to our transition management approach.
Most leaders accept that at some time in the future, their time at the helm will end and the business will be given into the care of the next leader. However, just thinking about the transition can be daunting and overwhelming for the senior leader. If that weren’t enough, most owners experience their own succession just once. Tandem Partners provides the experience and professional guidance needed to move through the strategic, operational and interpersonal issues that are all a part of transition.