I was sitting in a café the other morning with a friend. Coffee arrived, the usual catch up started, and somewhere between the first sip and the second he said something that made me smile. (I wish I had this videoed as it was an EPIC 1-2-1)
“I feel busy all the time… but I’m not sure I’m actually getting anywhere.”
I hear that a lot from business owners.
So I asked him a simple question.
“Can I ask you something… how many real decisions have you made about your business lately?”
He paused.
Not tasks. Not emails. Not reacting to things that landed in his inbox. Actual decisions.
Things like:
What market am I going after?
Who are my best referral partners?
What activities will I do every week to grow this business?
What am I saying yes to?
What am I saying no to?
I then said…
Once a decision is made, life gets easier.
Most people don’t struggle because they lack ideas. They struggle because they haven’t decided.
When you decide something, your brain stops negotiating with itself.
You stop waking up wondering what you should be doing that day.
You stop chasing random opportunities.
You stop saying yes to everything that lands in front of you.
You simply follow the decision.
And that’s where efficiency comes from.
Take business development as an example.
If you decide that your growth will come through strategic partnerships, then suddenly your activity becomes clear.
You focus on building relationships with the right people.
You invest time in 1-2-1 meetings.
You connect people together.
You stay close to those partners.
You help them win.
That one decision removes hundreds of other distractions.
The same happens with focus.
When someone has made clear decisions about their direction, you can hear it in the way they speak about their business.
It’s sharp.
It’s confident.
It’s clear.
People understand them quickly.
And clarity leads to something very powerful in business.
Predictability.
When your activities are consistent and based on clear decisions, results start to repeat.
Your partners know how you operate.
Your clients understand what you stand for.
Your network knows who to introduce to you.
And that’s when you become referable.
Because people can’t recommend confusion.
They recommend clarity.
They recommend consistency.
They recommend people who are decisive.
As we sat there finishing the coffee, my friend looked at me and laughed.
“So you’re saying I don’t have a productivity problem…”
I smiled.
“You probably have a decision problem.”
The good news is that decisions are available to all of us.
You can make them today.
Decide who you serve.
Decide how you grow.
Decide what activities matter.
Decide what you will ignore.
Because once the decision is made, something interesting happens.
Your energy improves.
Your focus sharpens.
Your results become more predictable.
Your network understands you better.
And when that happens, success becomes far less complicated.
All from one simple act.
Deciding.
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