As one year ends and another begins, you’ve no doubt been inundated with opportunities to explore successes & failures, doors open & doors closed, goals, plans, and strategies. It’s true; this is the perfect time to evaluate where your business has been and where it’s going.
Most likely, one of your goals for your business in 2013 is growth. But what does business growth look like for you?
It’s your choice, you know. The picture of growth may be IPOs, 7-figure revenues, big teams, fame, or fortune. But that’s not all there is to growth. Growth is what you make it.
To kick off 2013, I’m proud to release my new book, The Art of Growth. Think of it as the big sister follow-up to my popular book, The Art of Earning (still name-your-own-price). This book is about both redefining business growth to reflect the opportunities we have in the You Economy and providing strategies for growth that you can adapt to fit your own values as a business owner.
The book lands January 8. It will be available as a multimedia pack here on my website and as a Kindle-only version on Amazon.
Below is an excerpt from the introduction. More importantly, I’d like to know: What will growth look like for your business in 2013? Click the link and let me know.
From The Art of Growth:
Growing your business is about maturity. Just like a child grows from a baby who needs your care to fill every need then, as he ages, requires less of your hands-on care, so does your business. Or, it will if you practice the art of growth. If you continue to baby your business with frenetic action and reactive effort, your business will remain a baby. The national news media wonders if helicopter parenting will create a generation of adults unable to to care for themselves; I wonder if helicopter entrepreneurship will result in a lost opportunity for millions of people to experience a new level of prosperity.
The art of growth is crafting a business that fulfills desires, changes lives, and rewards you without having to tend to its every need. The art of growth is about being proactive, not reactive. It’s about integrated systems and strategies.
The art of growth is not necessarily about the fastest track to a million users. It’s not necessarily about reaching the masses. It’s not about turning the people you serve into nameless, faceless numbers.
Scale doesn’t have to mean impersonal. Leverage doesn’t have to mean hands off. Impact doesn’t have to mean hustle.
As Danielle LaPorte, author of The Fire Starter Sessions, put it, “Love scales.”
That is the art of growth. It’s imagining the give-and-receive nature of business on a whole new level.
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Look for additional thoughts on business growth in the age of connectedness over the next few weeks. And, in the meantime, tell me: What will growth look like for your business in 2013? Click here to let me know.
