5 Critical Ingredients to becoming a 7-fig CEO
There is the common idea that not all business are capable of becoming a 7 figure business, and certainly continuing on to 8 figures. In fact, that couldn’t be further from the truth.
Have you ever met a CEO and you thought “I just don't understand how that person is killing it!?”
There is a statistic from the Small Business Administration that says 50% of businesses fail within the first 5 years. What that doesn’t take into account is the number of business owners that just quit trying, or decide it isn’t for them.
If you take that statistic apart and you weed out the riff raff, the numbers become wildly different. The key differentiator for those businesses that fail and those that get on a rocket ship is simply how quickly the struggling entrepreneur assumes their rightful role as that of the 7-figure CEO.
What these high performance leaders do differently is they apply a framework in their business that makes growth and scale extremely repeatable.
Here are the key ingredients:
Unbeatable Plan
Blue Ocean Product
Masterful Placement
Repeatable Processes
High Performance People
Do you have a plan for 2022 to win the year? What is your 1 critical habit you would share with the group that will help you win the year?
No Recipe for success = Guarantee to Fail
Owning a business is much like being a chef- if you add the right ingredients at the right time and cook it for the right duration, the results will be scrumptious. I don’t have to tell you if you miss a single ingredient or skip a step in the recipe the results will be quite less than stellar. It isn’t near as disappointing to own up to a dry cake or a burnt steak as it is to tell your friends and family you closed the doors to your business.
All too often struggling entrepreneurs think they can just “wing it”- toss a few ingredients in hear and there. They put a little effort into some marketing, ask for some referrals, even bribe people to do business with them. The income is erratic at best and unpredictable at worst- and if you lose a single client, the whole house of cards is likely to come crashing down. The great news is scaling a business to 7, and all the way to 8 figures follows a quite predictable framework.
In my own businesses, I apply a framework called the Entrepreneurial Accelerator Framework. But, since I cant invest in ALL of your businesses, the next best framework is called the Entrepreneurial Operating System created by Gino Wickman.
So what’s more important? Trying to figure it out the hard way so you can wear the scars like a badge of honor, or implementing a repeatable system to grow and scale your business?
Over the next couple of weeks I am going to give you some fundamental books to add to your reading list this year. The first book is Traction- by Gino Wickman. If you haven’t already read it, its a must read!
The single change that led to enormous growth
Let’s face it, I spent 10 years as a fighter pilot, hardly an entrepreneur I’d say. There is an enormous amount of merit to becoming a high performer and learning the behavioral science surrounding how to persuade and influence people.
My first shot at business was clearly fueled by a passion to win and the tenacity to back it up. That lasted for about 3 years- I was fat, grumpy and consuming everything that guaranteed I would live a SHORT life.
The day before Thanksgiving, 2017 I found myself sitting in a grocery store parking lot unable to breath. I called my wife and told her I was quite sure I was having a heart attack. (Yes, she chastised me and told me to call 911 or go to the hospital) But instead of making that smart decision, I decided to go to an urgent care. The short story is it wasn’t a heart attack- it was a panic attack.
Even though my business was booming, there was literally nothing else “right” with my life. My health was in the dumps, my relationships falling apart and any amount of wealth sure wasn’t worth the price I was paying to get it. So I set out to figure out how other successful people were doing it.
As I looked around at other 8 figure entrepreneurs, I saw them running marathons and taking long vacations- so I made it my plan to be them.
The result was very simple- my business needed a framework that didn’t need me to be everything at all the times. Instead of being the crewman, I started acting like the captain- and the rest is history! My framework is called the Entrepreneurial Accelerator Framework and I apply it to all the businesses I invest in .
=I gave you the first book to read earlier in the week, here’s the next must read for your Christmas List
