How Your Mindset Affects Being Ready to Scale Your Business

Mindset. It’s all about the mindset. You can talk about growth, acquire the tools, and implement the systems, but if your mindset isn’t in the right place, you’ll still plateau or worse, fail. So, what is mindset? Mindset is a set of beliefs that shape how you make sense of the world and yourself. It influences how you think, feel, and behave in any given situation. Mindset is perception, it’s not fact-based. However, it feels like fact to you.  

I was on a call with a client and we were talking about mindset. He was sharing his most traumatic experience and how it shaped him into who he is today as a leader, a husband, a father, and a man. Do you know what his lesson was? "The mind is weak," he said. This completely took me by surprise. I use a lot of brain science and emotional intelligence in the work that I do. So I see time and time again, how powerful the brain can be. How it is designed to protect you and how it gives us the ability to reason beyond just reacting on instinct.

His framing of how the brain works stopped me dead in my tracks and I couldn't get it out of my head for weeks. Where I saw power, he saw weakness. He framed it differently than I do and it gave me a different perspective. The mind is both powerful and weak. It's powerful in its ability to adapt and reason, it's weak in that it defaults to the past--because this happened before, it'll happen again. This creates a neverending cycle until you choose to stop it. 

This is why your mindset is so important in scaling your organization. Your mindset influences and controls your thoughts and beliefs which affect the decisions you make.  Let's take Pallion Group as an example. Their strategy and mindset towards technological leadership are testaments to how a growth mindset can lead to innovative practices and staying ahead in the industry.

The leadership mindset is different than the mission of your organization. Your organization exists to change something, support a cause, or solve a problem that someone else is facing. This is different than how you lead and operate the organization. The leadership mindset sets the tone for how your team thinks, which then affects how they act, and the decisions that are made.

Passion is a part of the mindset. Passion may be what drives you, but it’s not what drives your clients to do business with you. It is not a constant; it comes, and it goes like the waves in the ocean. There needs to be something more than just passion for you to succeed. Also, your clients don’t usually share your passion. They don’t do business with you because of it. They do business with you because they believe that you can solve a problem or challenge that they have. If they don't have a problem that aligns with what you do, they may support you, but they'll have no reason to do business with you. 

So what does this mean?

It means there is more to success than tools, systems, technology, and saying the “right” things. Your mindset matters. Fixed mindsets believe that abilities are fixed traits and can't be changed. That talent and intelligence alone lead to success, and effort is not required. On the flip side, growth mindsets, believe that talents and abilities can be developed over time through effort and persistence. It’s believed that everyone can get smarter or more talented if they work at it.

Being ready to scale your organization can include shifting from a fixed mindset to a growth mindset. The culture of your organization can support this. Here are a few tips:

• FOCUS ON THE JOURNEY. See the value in your journey. When you're only fixated on the end result, you miss out on everything you could be learning, identifying unrealized opportunities, or having fun along the way.
• INCORPORATE "YET" INTO YOUR EVERYDAY LANGUAGE. If you're struggling with a task, remind yourself that you haven’t mastered it “yet.” Including this word signals that despite any struggles, you can overcome anything.
• PAY ATTENTION TO YOUR WORDS AND THOUGHTS. See if you can identify why the negative ones are there in the first place. Then reframe the focus to something true and positive. Don’t just use positive words because you’re told to, find the truth that you can embrace and focus on that.
• GET COMFORTABLE BEING UNCOMFORTABLE. You’re going to make mistakes and come across things you didn’t know you didn’t know—it’s a fact. So, instead of shying away from these challenges, embrace them and be open to learning from others’ mistakes.
• BUILD TRUST. Each interaction should have a goal that ends with the person trusting you more at the end than at the beginning. This includes interactions between employees as well as with customers. Trust creates cooperation and safety. When people feel safe with you, you become top of mind.

Being ready to scale includes more than just the business of it. Many times, it’s about a shift in mindset before true results can be achieved. This shift can be with self-limiting beliefs, team dynamics, or both. When this shift occurs with the leadership, it affects everyone throughout the organization which creates real change and real results.

Omicle delivers brand clarity, marketing strategy, and operational efficiency to prepare leaders to scale their business. If you are ready to learn how Omicle can help you, contact us today.