So for the past, goodness, close to a decade, I’ve had the privilege to support gobs of clients. And one of the cool things about being in the industry for so long is I’ve been able to see a lot of things that really work and help to grow a business to 6 and multi 6 figures and I’ve also seen a lot of things that don’t.
You’ve heard it before, what got you to 6 figures won’t get you to 7. And that is definitely true, and we’ll talk about that more in subsequent podcast episodes.
But today I’m really excited to share the number one thing I see keeping business owners stuck from hitting 7 figures. Are you ready for it.
95% of the time it’s the business owner. And 95% of the time they are the ones keeping things stuck. They are the ones who are, essentially, a bottleneck in the business. Not what you were expecting right?
Long story short: if you are the bottleneck, that likely means that work is backlogged, you’re stressed all the time and you feel like you can never catch up, you don’t have time for anything, and in the meantime you’re still running a business, you’re still serving clients, you’ve still got a full plate with your personal life, and ultimately, what you’re doing right now is capping your growth potential, keeping you stuck, and making it 10 times harder to actually scale your business and hit 7 figures.
Now there can be bottlenecks in multiple different areas of a business. Operations, sales, client support, project management, etc. There can be old, outdated systems. There can be a lack of communication internally and with clients. There can be team members who don’t have adequate training. There can be inefficiencies in workflows. There are lots of different areas that bottlenecks can pop up in business.
The term bottleneck is exactly as it sounds. It refers to the neck portion of a traditional bottle, so that’s where the most narrow point is, and if you tip that bottle upside down, that is the section that moves the slowest and causes everything else to back up.
So in business, if there is a delay somewhere – in your processes, in your delivery, in your communications – there’s a bottleneck.
So as a CEO, business owner, someone running a 6 or multi-6 figure business, how can you get unstuck.
And, the literal million dollar question right here. How do you stop being the bottleneck?
↠ Realize you might be the problem – and come to terms with it – if you are being the bottleneck
I’ve seen so many clients have a literal a ha moment when this is brought up like “oh my goodness yes, you’re talking to me”, but I’ve also seen business owners who struggled to accept that they were a big part of the problem. It’s really hard to fix something if you’re not able to get to the root of the problem. So if this is not relevant to you, no worries. But I would encourage you to take a good, hard look at some of the things that you’re doing in business and get clarity on if you are holding things up.
Okay so how do you do that?
↠ Identify where you’re the bottleneck
Are you doing everything manually? This could look like creating custom projects for every client instead of having standardized packages, or writing personalized email responses every single time instead of having canned templates that you can tweak.
Are you constantly needing to check things were done “properly” before the process can go to the next step? This could look like double checking a VAs work or wanting to review everything prior to it going out.
Are you scared to invest? So maybe you already have an entry-level VA like we mentioned before, but investing in higher level support in your team just feels really intense, so it’s easier to just keep going back and forth with your current VA.
Are you over capacity? This goes along with being stressed all the time, feeling like you can never catch up, and more just keeps coming in that gets added to your to-do list.
While one or two of these on their own may not feel like a super big deal, they add up. And long-term, they have significant ramifications. What they end up doing is eating up your time. They end up taking you away from being able to hold the big vision, steer the ship, and keep the business moving forward in a scalable, sustainable way.
↠ Bring a team onboard and/or delegate
A team can help you free up your time so you’re able to focus on those high-level CEO tasks. But when I say team, there are a couple of things to remember here. There is a very big difference in hiring a couple of VAs randomly and having a solid support system that you can trust to run things on your behalf behind-the-scenes.
And honestly bringing on a team can make or break your business. It can be time-consuming to go through and interview people, find the right fits, and make sure it’s going to work long-term. So while it may feel tempting to just hire the first person you see to try to offload things off of your plate, that’s not sustainable either.
So what’s the solution here? If you are at the multi-6 figure range right now and you currently have support that you trust and has been a great fit, see if there are more opportunities for them to support you and grow with you. Audit where you’re currently spending your time in regards to team management – are you having to double check work? Are you micromanaging? Is that because you’re scared to let go or because you need to monitor your team? It can be so easy to want to keep track of everything happening and know what’s going on when and where and how and all the things, but that’s a great recipe to disempower your team, keep you stuck, and create a dicey work environment, so if you do struggle with micromanaging, really try to rein that in. The answers to those questions can really determine your next steps.
If the problem is that your current team is just not supporting you in the way that you need, you need to get crystal clear if that’s because you’ve created that environment (for example they need approval before anything goes out or if they’re scared to take initiative because they’ve got in trouble for stepping up but doing something wrong in the past) or maybe they’re just not the right fit.
If they are not the right fit OR if you don’t currently have a team, my best recommendation is to bring on an integrator who already has a team or even a full-service agency that has service providers with specialties in multiple areas for an online business. This is something I help clients with so if you’re shaking your head or thinking “oh my gosh this is exactly what I need” – pop me a message.
Now the reason why bringing on a team is so crucial is because if you’re stuck in so much of the day-to-day and you just can’t catch up and you don’t have time to even breathe, you need to be offloading some of these things off of your plate. One common misconception, however, is that you need a huge team to support you. That’s not always the case. You can be pulling 7 figures and have a small team of just a couple of people. Alternatively, you can be pulling 6 figures and have a team of 10. A lot of that is going to vary on your business, your business model, and how you want to be running things. But the point here is if you’re constantly in the weeds and you want to actually scale, this is likely one key area that is keeping you stuck.
↠ Leverage automations and workflows
Now this one also has a lot to do with having a GOOD team in place, but I still want to highlight a super common area that business owners get stuck. I have heard from so many business owners that it feels impersonal to have automated processes. That “oh this email will just take me 5 minutes.”
But let’s break that down into something quantifiable. Okay so let’s say you “only” have 10 emails to respond to each day. If you work Monday through Friday, that “5 minute email” is actually taking you OVER four hours every single week. Four hours. Imagine what you can be doing with four additional hours. Either in your business, in your personal life, whatever. That’s four hours that have been freed up.
Now yes, you have to spend some time initially crafting these things. Templates, workflows, canned emails, packages, etc. But if you are constantly finding yourself in the thick of things and you are personally having to respond to messages, queries, client emails, etc, you’re customizing absolutely everything and don’t have anything standardized, you are the bottleneck in your business – or at least a bottleneck in your business. And again if we’re just taking that “quick 5 minute email” example, you’re probably doing that with multiple things in your business – things you’re likely not even realizing right now. But if you can take a step back, remove yourself from that bottleneck, you’re able to shift and set your business up to be in a position to scale.
Here’s the thing. As the CEO, you need to be involved in the business. You need to be clear on the direction that the business is going and you need to essentially, steer the ship. But where you do not need to be is spending your time in the nitty gritty day-to-day and if you find that you are and that’s where a huge chunk of your time is going, it’s imperative to analyze WHY and then take steps forward in order to shift that. And once you follow these steps, you’ll be amazed at how quickly you can actually scale and start to hit that multi-6 and 7 figure mark.
Thank you so much for joining me today, and I’d love to know. Is there anything you’d add to this list?
Have you found that you were the bottleneck in your business, and if so, what things did you do to change that?
I’d love to hear from you and thank you again so much for tuning in! I’ll see you next week and have a wonderful week ahead.
