From Passion to Profit: Heart Centered Strategies for FitPros

009 Unleashing Your Business Potential: Harnessing Your Strengths for Success

• Nichola Page • Season 1 • Episode 9

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Welcome to "From Passion to Profit," the podcast that delves into the world of creating a thriving health and fitness business that works for you as much as it does for your clients. I'm your host, Nichola Page, and in today's episode, we're going to explore the essential topic of identifying your strengths and how to leverage them for business growth. I'll introduce you to a valuable tool that I use in my own business and recommend to my clients for identifying their strengths and aligning them with their entrepreneurial goals.

In this episode, we focused on the significance of recognising your strengths and using them strategically to enhance your business. We introduced the Clifton Strengths Finder test, a powerful tool to identify your top five strengths, which are categorised into four domains: strategic thinking, influencing skills, executing, and relationship building.

I explain the importance of understanding where your strengths lie and how they align with the various roles in your business.  I walk you through the 3 key hats you wear as the business owner —the entrepreneur, the manager, and the technician, and how each of these roles demands different strengths.  From this you'll understand why it's essential to identify where your natural abilities excel.

Key Takeaways:

  1. Identify Your Strengths: Take the Clifton Strengths Finder test or a similar assessment to understand your top five strengths and the domains they fall into.
  2. Leverage Your Strengths: Maximise your strengths in your business role to ensure your business thrives. 
  3. Delegate Wisely: Recognise tasks that don't align with your strengths and consider delegating them to others or utilising software solutions.
  4. Build a Harmonious Team: If you have a team, encourage them to take strength assessments to ensure everyone is working in roles that maximise their strengths.
  5. Hire Strategically: When bringing new team members on board, consider their strengths and how they align with the role you're hiring for.

Understanding your strengths and using them strategically can lead to a more enjoyable and successful entrepreneurial journey.

Thank you for joining us in this episode of "From Passion to Profit." We hope you found this discussion on strengths and their impact on your business insightful. Don't forget to leave a review and share your key takeaways from today's episode. Your feedback is invaluable to us.

Make sure to subscribe to the podcast to stay updated on future episodes. We look forward to having you with us in the next episode. Goodbye for now!

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Nichola Page:

Welcome to From passion to profit, where we talk about all things related to creating a successful health and fitness business, one that works for you the owner, as much as it does your clients. I'm your host, Nichola Page. And in this episode, we're going to be looking at how to identify your strengths, and then use them to grow your business, I'm going to share with you a tool that I use in my business and one that I encourage my clients to use in theirs. It's a tool that helps you identify what your strengths are, we'll look at how can you put your strengths to better use, and then how you can use them to build a a winning team to really grow your business. When you run your own business, particularly when you are starting out, you wear three different hats, you have the entrepreneur hat on, that's the one you've won. Majority of that time, that's got you to this point where you've set your own business up, okay, that's where you have all the creative ideas, you've got the vision, you've got the passion, you know where you want to go, that's the entrepreneur hat, then you have the manager hat, that's where you're doing all the day to day operational stuff within your business. So all of the back end work that needs to go on. It's how you get your business from where it is now to the vision that you've got. That's your manager hat. And then you have your technician hat, which is where you're delivering the service. Again, that's when you probably were really well because that's what got you to having your own business in the first place. You love working with your clients, you're great at what you do, you wear that that technician hat really well. Now, there'll be one or more of those hats that are just not suited to you at all. That your way your strengths, they don't they're not fit for it. Now, it doesn't mean to say you can't wear it. It just means to say that your natural ability doesn't lie within the tasks that that role requires you to take. Now, in terms of identifying which of those hats you are better suited to. So should you be aiming to wear the entrepreneur hat more? Or should you be are you better suited to just be the technician and have somebody else manage and grow your business? Or do your strengths align actually all the day to day operations of your business. There's a tool that I use, it's called the Clifton Strengths Finder, top five strengths, there is a there's a more in depth one, but I primarily would use the top five strengths, it gives you what you need. There are many other different they're basically their personality tests. There's lots of different types out there, you might have heard of Myers Briggs and disc and there's all sorts of ones, the ones that I use, because it's easy, and it's relatively cheap for you to for you to get the test done is the Clifton Strengths Finder, top five strengths. When you take the test, what will happen is it will generate five words that the five words that describe where your strengths sit. And those five words will sit in one of four what they call domains. Okay, so if you can, as I'm speaking this, if you can visualise right now, four quadrants four quadrants in front of you, one of them has got the heading of strategic thinking. Okay, so I'm going to give you some colours to see if this will help you. So think of strategic thinking as this green box. That's one domain. The second domain is influencing skills. Let's say that that box is orange. So influencing skills is orange. So we've got the green box strategic thinking, the orange box influencing skills, then we've got a purple box, which is executing. And then we have a blue box, which is relationship building. So if you can visualise we've got these four different domains, these four boxes, the five words that this these tests will generate will sit in one of those boxes. So one word might sit in strategic thinking. Another word or couple of words might be in relationship building, you might have one in executing, but the five words that come out of it will sit somewhere in one of those domains. I'd be following this. So if you've got more of your words, in the strategic thinking, that green box if more of your words that have been generated sit in there, so maybe you've got two or three words in there. Maybe you've got four or five. Some people have all five in one box. That's not uncommon. i For me, I've got two that sit in strategic thinking. And then I've got one that sits in each of the others. So if you've got more, if you're more dominant in the strategic thinking box, where your strengths lie, are going to be more around being able to analyse information, information situations, being able to make more informed decisions, create better outcomes, outcomes. So think about this in terms of the growth of your business, you'll be able to think clearly, how'd you get from A to B. So it's, it's kind of like that, you saw that strategic thinking of how do you grow the business, if there if more of your strengths sit in that box, there is no right or wrong with this, this is you where you're sick, and then how you're going to use them to your advantage. Okay, so if you've got more of your words, that sit in the influencing box, that orange box, you're going to be great at taking charge of things speaking up, making sure that other people around you round your herd, you'll be great in selling ideas and concepts to people and therefore, your natural strengths will lie in selling your products and your services, you'll just have a more of a natural talent. And you'll be drawn to the selling part of your business. If more of your words sit in in influencing. If you have more words that sit in executing, then where your strengths are here are taking the ideas and making them happen. So yours are better at I'm going to excuse my French are getting shit done. Okay, your skill is going to be there, you will be the person that loves it to do list and just ticks it off in no time at all. It's like, tell me what I need to do, I'm gonna get it done. That's where your strengths lie. If more of your words lie in relationship, building the blue box, then you're going to be great and nurturing really strong relationships, building relationships with other people. If you've got a team, you'll be great at holding that team together, you'll be the glue, you're probably in your circle of friends, you are the one that brings everybody together helping people feel really connected. So we've got very different kinds of different strengths in different areas and everything I've said there is what a business requires. We need the strategic thinking we need the you know, how do we get from here to there? How do we need to be able to analyse information and to be able to grow the business, we need influencing skills because we want to be able to get make sure our opinions are being heard, that we're taking charge of a situation we're selling concepts and ideas and more importantly, selling products and services, we need that we also need to be able to get stuff done, we need to make things happen. No point in having an idea, a great vision of what you want your business to be and do and look like if nothing ever gets done. And we also need to be able to build relationships. So we need to have a strong relationships with our customers, our clients. If we've got a team, we need to be able to build relationship with the team. So if it's just you and your business right now, your business requires you to have a bit of all of that. That said, your strengths are going to lie in one or more of those areas. And it doesn't mean to say you can't do the other things. I want everyone to make that clear. This is not about your strong here and you're weak here. Your your your strengths, determine what your let's call it your unique ability, what you love doing, when you can spend more time doing those things, you feel energised, you're great at it, things happen, things move forward. When your time is required to do the in the air work in the areas where your strengths don't sit, you find that harder to do, it drains your energy, things might fall through the gaps or you put things up doing things because they're just not where you doesn't kind of lift your energy I've set as I've said, it's like not your unique ability. So it's it's harder for you to do. Once you understand where your strengths lie, it makes things it just makes so much more sense. Let's say as an example you do the test and you find that you've got nothing in influencing and remember the influence in the orange boxes where you are your natural strengths will be around selling your your products and your services. Okay, so if you've got nothing in that box when it comes to getting signing people up If you want, you will start probably most probably, you'll feel more awkward, you won't enjoy that part of your business, you will start to dread that side of your business. You might even go like kind of avoid it avoid asking people, if they want to sign up just like let them sell, let me know, if you want to do anything or just send them information rather than having a conversation about it. It's not that you can't do it, it's just that your, your natural ability doesn't lie there. But it makes once you know that, it makes so much more sense. And then you can approach it in a different way, rather than you may like compare and despair of other people. It's not, why can't I, you know, sell or sign people up like they can what's wrong with me that there's not anything wrong with you. It's just that your natural strengths don't lie in that particular area. But it all starts with you understanding what those strengths are. So if you, as the business owner, right now have, if you want to kind of keep that entrepreneurial hat on your head, if you have a vision that you want a team to build a team, for example, and you want them to take over delivering the service. And you want to get somebody else in to manage the business, do all the day to day operations, but you want to be the visionary of that business, you want to come up with all the strategies that you're going to use, and how we're going to get from here to there. And this is, you know, like map out how it's going to be done, and let other people take over, then your your strengths, the words that come out need to sit more across strategic thinking and influencing. So if if when you do the test, they do great, you are going to be naturally drawn to that role within your business. Now you might be thinking, well, it's my business, I've got to have that role in it. Surely, as the business owner, I must do that. What do I do if my strengths don't lie? In those areas? Does that mean I can't have my business? No, not at all. It just means that you might get somebody in to prop that part up for it within your business, that where you use them to come up with some of the ideas and some of the strategies and you use your strengths. In other areas, it's still your business. But you're you're working smarter, not harder. It might be that your words fall across more prominent across strategic thinking and executing. Because this is where you will be great at the day to day operations of your business things will not fall through the gaps where you're concerned, you'll be able to manage people you'll love doing that, you'll be late, if you've got a project, something new that you're launching, it is going to happen because you cross all the t's and dot all the i's. What if your strengths don't lie there, then you need to get somebody in to fill that gap. Now maybe you can't get anybody in to fill that gap at the moment. Maybe the your finances won't allow for that. But put that as a goal for the future. But just knowing that this is not where your natural strengths lie? Well, sir, I can only speak for myself and others that have done this test whom I've worked with it just it kind of takes the pressure off. It just it kind of eases that tension got RK are getting now All right. So then you go into doing whatever tasks are required with it with a different mindset and a growth mindset. More than a fixed mindset with like, Okay, this might be a little bit more challenging, but I'm gonna, I'm going to try. If you've got more of your strengths, that falling across the boxes of executing and relationship building, then you're going to wear the technician hat really well. Because you'll be great at service delivery, great with the whole customer service element of it, you'll probably be good all the backend admin type roles. That's where your strengths will lie. And you and you might be thinking, well, that's not what my vision is. For my business. I don't want to continue to stay in those areas. You don't have to you can get other people that do that you can choose a different role. This is just about showing you where your natural strengths lie, maybe you you kind of move across to being more of like a lead trainer or a lead coach and you become the person that's going to be responsible for training up people that come into your business model because that's still relationship building with your team. You're still going to get the job done. You're going to teach them the way that you want it to be done. And they'll they'll model Will the way you work and how you like things, how you like things to happen in your business. And if you've got more words that sit across the influencing and relationship building side, then you will naturally thrive in more of a sales environment. So if that is you, and you are not the person that is at the moment, who is having all of those sign up sales conversations, you really want to think about how you can change your model so that you can because that's where your strengths lie. Or you use those strengths to show others how it needs to be done. To do the test, whether you do the Clifton Strengths Finder test, or you do one of the others, that there's so many out there, they're all pretty much similar, they'll come from the same kind of premise, really, but the one I've just described talks about those four domains, do that test, first and foremost, to identify where your strengths lie. So then you can look at, okay, what am I currently doing? That's making the most of my strengths? What would I be better off doing? Or doing more of, so I can really leverage the strengths that I've got? And what areas of my business what things am I doing at the moment that do not lend themselves? Well, with my strengths, maybe there's areas where you have no words in a certain domain. For example, if you've got no words, in executing, that means you're probably not great at seeing things through, you'll start to do some things, then you'll get distracted with something else. And you'll end up with a whole whole heap of uncompleted tasks on your hand, then you need to look at how can you delegate those things, that where your strengths do not lie, where it's not your unique ability, those things that drain you of energy? How can you start to delegate those to others? If you've got people that work for you already? How can you get those off your plate and over to other people, maybe it's not even a physical person that can do some of those things. Maybe you just need some software that will help with it, there are there will be solutions out there. The first thing to do is to identify what should you be doing in your business? Where do your strengths lie, and if you can leverage and maximise on those will help to really grow the business? And what parts of your business should you be staying away from that where you may will cause a bit of havoc, if you do too much of it, or too many things fall, fall through the gaps when it's down to you, how can you plug those gaps with people, or with software with systems, think about that. And at the moment, if it is just you in your business, just be aware of this right now. So when you come to the point where you are ready to bring somebody into your business, you bring the right person in, that will plug the gaps that you have got. And if you have a team, get them to do the test. Let's see whether they are in the right roles that where they're utilising their strengths the most maybe there will be an opportunity if you've got a few different people working for you to shift some things around so that you get your team utilising their strengths to the maximum because the more you can do that, the better the harmony will be within your team. But also, you'll be able to grow it it will, it will feel a lot smoother, a lot easier. And when you come to look for someone new to join your team, so when you're interviewing for people, have them do the test as part of the interview process. Get them to do that first before you do anything else. Because trust me, I've been doing this for a long time, over the years of building different size teams I've had, I've had the responsibility of interviewing people for all different roles within the business. And what I learned quickly was to part of that interview process, I would interview them against their values. First and foremost, that's a whole different topic. You can't teach values, values and beliefs are within you. So I would always interview against their values. First of all, that tells me if they're a good fit for our culture. And then I would interview them, get them to do the test to see where their strengths lie. So if I needed somebody in the role in within the business that required them to be more of like an admin role, if their strengths didn't line executing, they were not going to get through to the next stage. I was not going to sit there and spend any more time having a conversation with somebody and risk going oh, this person is really nice. I liked them a lot. What they're saying is great when I know Oh, their strengths don't lie in that area. So at some point down the line, we're going to have some problems, they're going to start causing issues because things are not going to get done. So identify your strengths. Where do they sit? What where can you currently maximise? And leverage your strengths? Where do you need to start handing those strengths those tasks over? Maybe you've got to take, maybe you got to take the manager hat off a bit more? How are you going to do that? Who have you got that could do that. Delegate where you can or get software in place that takes some of the pressure off of you, if you have a team, get them to do it. And when you come to the point where you're bringing somebody new into your business, please, whatever you do, have them do, whether it's the Clifton Strengths Finder test or something else, have them do this test just to make sure they are the right fit for the role. So I hope this episode has left you really keen to find out your own strengths. And if you have a team to find out, there's any you know, way you can do this for a team, if getting team on board of this is you're not suggesting that if their strengths, don't lie in the right areas, that they're going to be you know, out the door. Don't let's not do that. It's just so that you can find out how you can get how you can allow them to work more to their strengths. So we're going to position it that way. But make sure you do that if you so I want you to be keen to do this test, and have your team do it too. Once you know your strengths, you can leverage them more. You can plug the gaps. You can plug the gaps with people or systems, you'll start to enjoy the process of creating a successful business a whole lot more once you understand this. And one last thing. If you found this episode useful, would you kindly take a few minutes just to leave a review and share what your biggest takeaways are from this session. And once you've done the test, feel free to come back and look and tell me where your strengths and I'd love to know and don't forget while you're there to subscribe so you get notified of future episodes. So that's it from me for today. I look forward to seeing you on the next episode. Bye for now.