6 | Ask for Accountability
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[00:00:00] Hi friends. Welcome to the dream with me podcast. I'm Heather, Birge an entrepreneur for nearly half my life, and I'm so excited to help you break down your bucket list. Business goals into bite sized. Do you have big dreams for your small business or side hustle that have no idea how to actually set, let alone achieve your goals?
Or are you a goal setting high achieving numbers, nerd like me who enjoys the process as much as the end result, either way. This podcast is for you together, we will break down your goals in each bingeable episode with a simple acronym based around the word dream. I'll help you de decide what you really want.
Our reverse engineer, what it takes to get there. E embrace your numbers, a ask for accountability and M make some momentum. Are you ready to dream with me today? Break out that notepad in your calculator and let's do [00:01:00] this.
All right. Yay. Let's dive into our next letter of the dream acronym. And this is something that has definitely been a struggle for me in years past, but it's something that I have made a lot of intentional effort to grow, and that is in the area of accountability. So the AE and the dream acronym that stands for ask for accountability. And today we're going to dive into some of the basics of that.
And it's my goal to share five ways that will help you stay focused towards your goals and drive action in your business. By simply leveraging the power of accountability. So I'm curious. How many of you guys know exactly like you've got this big goal in your heart with your business, maybe it's to grow your business, to add another business.
And, you know, the steps that you need to do to actually make that goal become a reality, right? But how many of you guys actually struggle to take those steps? Right? Like you've got the vision, you've got the inspiration, [00:02:00] you've got the clarity around what it is that you want and likely you have the path outlined for you. The steps that you know, that you can take to get there.
It's just the one thing that's holding you back is the accountability around actually doing the work that it takes to get there.
It's something that actually I centered my entire word of the year for 2020. It was accountable because I knew what I wanted in my life and my business, but I wasn't doing the steps that i needed to take to get there.
Okay. So it's like this. If you wanted to lose five pounds this month, and I don't know many of us, you probably don't have that as a goal. Right. But if we wanted to lose five pounds, it's pretty simple. Right. We know what we need to do to make that happen. It's calories in calories out, maybe up your exercise level a little bit. So the steps that you would take to make that happen would be to maybe cut out sugar shift your diet a little bit, maybe eliminate carbs for the month.
Maybe add on [00:03:00] another one or two days of working out and doing the things right. It's not knowing what we need to do that holds us back from our goals. Most of the time it's actually doing the work. And that's where accountability steps in. So for me in my business, I'll use this podcast as an example, I knew exactly when I wanted to start a podcast. I had this very clear vision in my mind and my heart of what I wanted that to look like.
But I had to find ways to hold myself accountable to actually making that happen. And so the five ways that I'm going to focus on today are simple steps that you can take to add that extra layer of accountability so that you can get the things done. And. Achieve those goals in your business. So the first one that we're going to focus on today is self accountability. So it starts with you, right? And it starts with doing the steps that we've already outlined in the stream acronym. So go back and listen to the first few episodes so that you can [00:04:00] get clarity on what it is that you want, why you want it.
And I encourage you to write it down. That starts when we've talked about this before, when you can actually on a piece of paper and a planner and your weekly calendar, even in your notes app, if you're more of a tech gal, I want you to write down not only your goal, but also those non-negotiable action steps that are going to get you to that goal.
First step for self accountability is writing it down. The second step is something that I'm super passionate about. Actually just shared this on a friend, Kate Jones, she just launched an awesome podcast centered around it's called three-day work weeks. And. It's focused on helping millennial entrepreneurs work their business in three days a week. And you can go head on over there to listen to I'll share the link in the show notes, but you can listen to one of my favorite ways to implement systems for entrepreneurs. And that is through time-blocking.
And if you're not familiar with that concept, it's literally [00:05:00] putting on your calendar, whether you're a paper planner, kind of a gal. I love using my eye towel because it is on my computer and on my phone, it all ties in together. And it's such an easy thing. I have it it's on my home screen. It's the first thing I go to is my calendar.
And I put everything on there. You guys, and I even take it a step further where I put the things that are a priority outside of my business. So my family priorities, the weekly commitments that I have, like I'm hosting, just starting a Bible study on Mondays at my home. Those things. I block off on my calendar and I commit to them.
Also speaking of losing five pounds, I just started taking yoga again. And I have now blocked off those yoga classes every Tuesday and Thursday at nine 15. And I even blocked off going to coffee with my friends after that, because that is something that starting my day with something that's going to benefit me personally, is something that.
Gets me fired up to actually do the work after that. So I'm, [00:06:00] time-blocking my personal things and actually color code it to you. I, I put in there Anything that's personal is blue. So if it's something that is for me. I color code it and my calendar is blue. And then if it's something that's family related. So that might look like getting my kids on the bus every morning or taking them to gymnastics or golf.
I blocked that off in green. And I, even my 12 year old, I link that up to her calendar. You could leverage the, the tech options to include someone else that's important. Maybe it's a business partner for you. Again, maybe it's her husband, maybe it's a spouse. Somebody that you, that you want to keep in the loop right on the things that you want to do. And we'll get to the power of a partner in a second. But lastly, I time block my business. And if your business is a little bit more vague, like there are a lot of different things that you could do in your business, or maybe you.
Need to block off. I like to call them power hours for myself where I'll block off an hour of time and make a little quick [00:07:00] action step list. Like I told you guys to do, and I will punch out those things in that hour.
So another example would be catching up on messages or emails. So I lead a team of almost 4,000 amazing women and we use an app that I love called telegram.
And so you can imagine the amount of messages that I get in a day. And actually it doesn't take me much time to catch up, but if I were sitting on my phone, Looking at every single message when it comes in. I might be spending a lot more time. And a lot less time doing the things that I need to do. Right. So what I do is I time block in times to work.
And I will check those messages. In that timeframe bright. And what that does is it even sets up boundaries for my team and an example for them to show that. There are no emergencies. First of all, in network marketing. Second of all. Usually they can figure out and find the answer somewhere, or I've also set up [00:08:00] amazing group chats where there's somebody else that can, that can help them.
If I'm not available, but essentially time-blocking can really help you by not getting stuck in the scroll. Maybe you, your business, you run on social media and you can tend to just get lost in your messages or in. The Instagram scroll or getting down a real rabbit hole. And time-blocking in your business, it will help you. First of all, I'll have a deadline. So again, if you're setting an hour to work your business,
You have got to do a lot of things in those hour and that hour, right? So you're automatically going to stay a little bit more focused on what it is that you need to accomplish. And here's the thing I'm going to give you a little bit of tough love friends. If you're sitting here feeling like you don't have time. Cause I know that some of you guys are probably thinking that I don't have time to add on another business or.
I don't know where I'm going to find the time. To do these action steps to grow my business. I'm good. I encourage you to whip out your settings app on your phone and head on over to your screen time. [00:09:00] And in that screen time, you're going to find a lot of very telling things. And that is based around how you're already spending time on your phone, because my guess is that. And not that this is a bad thing, but my guess is that you're spending times a lot of time on social media.
Potentially if you're watching things like Netflix or you know, maybe you play Dames or I even love to read the news app on my phone. You certainly will be able to see the time that you are spending on your phone. And I bet you anything you can get back an hour or two and your day by just being more intentional with how you spend your time, especially on your cell phone.
So the first way to hold yourself accountable is to focus on self accountability. So the second way is to work with a coach. So back to the exercise. You know, example. I know that if I hired a coach, Health coach. I've done that before. And it's certainly a great way to get my butt in the gym. Right. Because they're expecting me, I'm [00:10:00] paying them.
And the same goes for your business. There is so much power in hiring a coach, a business coach, or a mentor in your business. And you want to make sure that you of course align with them and I've done group coaching. Most good solid coaches will offer a group coaching. And that's a great baby step, just to make sure that the value that they provide is going to serve you well. And if you love the group coaching, you can dive into individual coaching with that mentor.
And this is something that has been such a blessing for me. It's something that I'm doing now. And it's so funny because even yesterday I said, what was at the time seemed like a really serious something that was on my heart. And I sent my coaches. There's two of them, two lovely ladies. Michelle Myers and summer Phoebus with she works his way.
They are awesome. And. I sent them a message. And when they responded. It honestly made me feel a little dumb, not, not in a, in a bad way. They were so gracious and sweet, but basically they're like, yep. You're ever thinking again, Heather. And sometimes just having someone kind of put you [00:11:00] in your place a little bit and give the kind of advice. I love that they are Christians like me. And so I know that the, the wisdom that they're going to share is founded in.
Scripture. And for me, that helps me to know that I'm not in this thing on my own. Right. So having a business coach or a life coach or a mentor. Is an incredible way to hold yourself accountable, to doing the things that you need to do in your business. So that's number two. Number three is a partner, and I'm not necessarily talking about a business partner because I know that not every business model is situated for having a business partner.
What I'm talking about is someone who has a similar goal to you. Maybe again, if you're in network marketing like me, it might be someone who's going for a reward trip or an incentive or. At rank that is in a similar place where you are. And when you partner with them and you maybe do a group chat again, that's one of the reasons why I love [00:12:00] telegram as it's a different app for my text messages. And.
I have done this many times with, with a one or two or five people where we will have a little group guide, will we be like, how's it going? You know, how did you do the thing that you said you were going to do? And just by having that partner, and sometimes you can even pick like a pump you up song, like pick a song that you play together and you commit to touching base preferably daily, depending on what it is that you're going for, or even weekly. And.
Maybe you spend that time working together, right? So maybe it's the two of you guys hopping on zoom and getting to work. But the power of having a partner that is aligned in the same goals as you is an incredible way to leverage accountability for your business. So number four would be a small group. So when I say partner I'm usually mean one, two, maybe three people. When I say small groups, I feel like that is better suited in groups of say five to [00:13:00] 15 people who again, or aligned in a similar goal as you. So going back to like the group coaching, I'm doing a podcast group coaching, and we, there are about 30 something of us, I think in the bigger core they're taking the course together, but we have a small.
Small group of about 12 of us. And it has been so unbelievable to share. What's working to share the tools and resources to come to each other. With problems or with ideas, and we're getting to know each other and it's just really something really special. So there is such power and accountability that comes from small groups.
And specifically if you're in network marketing, one of my favorite ways to do that is something I learned from my mentor, Bob Heilig, this I think I've been mentioned in my first episode. And I think I said something like, I like to call it weekly accountability meetings. And let me go back and say,
I didn't make this up. This is all Bob Heilig. He is absolutely. A brilliant network marketing mentor. His company is actually your virtual upline. So if you are [00:14:00] in network marketing and don't know Bob and haven't followed him, go find his podcast immediately. I will link it in the. In the chat and specifically his weekly accountability meetings have been a game changer. And I know that the format that he uses for that is available in his higher level leadership program called next level, which again, I am a part of, and I have found so much value in the accountability.
I have other top leaders sharing. What's working for them. But essentially a wham stands for weekly accountability meeting and there is a very specific framework that you can do in your business. And I'll let Bob tell you all about that. And there's an episode, episode number 2 25, where he talks, he shares a story of someone named Jen who used that for their business and the power of what that looked like together. So.
Uh, wham weekly accountability meeting, go find Bob Heilig. Nobody does it better than him. And maybe I can even get him to come on the podcast and, and talk about that. In a certain episode because it is something that I know for sure. I [00:15:00] was a game changer in my business. And it's what helped me take my business. Honestly, it was probably what helped me 10 X my business in.
About a year's worth of time using the power of a weekly accountability meeting. So again, look forward to a future episode, all about that. But essentially it goes back to having a small group. To hold yourself accountable to the goals in your business. And then the last is something that I'll admit. I even sometimes struggle with.
But it's something that I absolutely know is effective and works and can be done. Right. Especially if you're in game goal is a worthy goal. Like what we talked about in episode two, I think it is. How does that, where the goals and that is to share your worthy goal publicly. And publicly can be certainly on social media. You know, maybe if you are again, you're in a, in a small group or a group coaching and you have a big goal sharing it in a way with other people is no doubt going to [00:16:00] help keep number one, yourself accountable, but you're going to have those friends or the people who are gonna be cheering you on.
They're going to want to support you and your business. And people love following the progress and stories of what other people are doing in their lives. Right. We live in this very voyeuristic. Society at the moment, but you can use that in your favor by sharing whatever your goal is publicly and keeping your followers updated along the way.
And that I think it was maybe two or three years ago, I made it a, one of my action steps was to go live on Facebook every single week for, I think it was about eight weeks, the last eight weeks of whatever year that was maybe 2019. And I shared one of my major goals that I had for that entire year.
And I gave a little update for where it was, how it worked for me. Maybe what didn't work for me. And I shared that goal publicly, and I know that that's actually one of the ways that I grew my, my my social media following. And I know I even [00:17:00] got business partners from that because they felt connected.
And aligned in having the same. Or similar goals. They got to know me better, which leads to knowing, liking and trusting me enough to link arms with me either as a customer or as a business partner. And so sharing your goals publicly is a way that again, is going to trigger that self accountability. But it's also going to be a way that you can.
Just ask for the help of others in a very, very public way. So those are your five steps or five different ways that you can leverage accountability. Self-accountability. Hiring a coach. Finding a partner finding a small group or sharing publicly. So I'm going to wrap up today's episode with some homework. Y'all know I'm always all about giving you some specific action steps that you can take today.
To work towards those big goals that you have, and today's homework is going to be around time blocking, because that seems to be the theme of the week from my podcast [00:18:00] episode, with Kate over on three-day work weeks. Two. It's actually was the topic on my leader wham this week. And that was all about time blocking. So your homework is going to be number one.
I want you to go into either if you're a digital calendar girl or if you're I left a paper planner and a digital calendar, I do my time blocking on my digital calendar, but you certainly could do this on. A paper planner. If you're the type that loves, you know, the highlighters and fancy pins and you're maybe very artistic.
And like to take the time to. You know, block off a physical daily calendar. If you're going to do it on a, on a daily calendar though, on a written one, you're going to want it to have hourly spots on there because you're going to even block in, like, I go, I'll even block in. Like a shower. I want to maximize every bit of the time that I have working my business.
And so if I know that I've got a block in 30 minutes to get ready for something, I'm going to put it on my calendar. Right. And so actually I'm going to share in a future [00:19:00] episode of the power of an app, I use called Calendly and smooth. You guys might've heard of it, but it's an amazing way. If you are time-blocking you can leverage an app like Calendly to book in with clients to book in with your team. There are so many different ways that you can use an app like that.
But if you're not already, time-blocking in a digital way, it's not going to happen. So I'm going to encourage you, even if you are a physical paper planner, girl, I want you to best out your either your, I Cal. Well, you're good there. Google calendar. Whichever one you feel like might be the most likely for you to use, but I use, I Cal.
So best it out. And I want you to go ahead and put in your existing obligations into your digital calendar. So if you already work, maybe you own a brick and mortar store and you are adding on an additional revenue stream through a side hustle. But you still need to work your business, say four hours a day. You're going to want to go in and physically block off that time.
If you are, if your child has [00:20:00] like. Again, soccer practice on Tuesday afternoons from four to five. I want you to go in and I want you to block that off. And next, like, you know, if you want to take it to the next level, I, while you're in there, go ahead and make it color coded. You can totally steal my, my color codes. I use again, green for family blue for personal. It's like a pinky purple on. I Cal for my work related stuff.
And choose, you know, two to three categories. So maybe your work, your personal and your family, if that's relevant to you and your business. But you're going to go in and block, start with your existing obligations. Okay. Guys, the things that you do every day, every, every week, and you can add in.
If you want bonus points, if you want to add in those. Those time blocked non-negotiable steps in your business. Go ahead and do that as well, but you're going to start with just resisting. Our obligations because that's going to help you. Really see where you're spending your time already, because guess what guys? Homework number two is going to be to actually go back.
[00:21:00] Through last week, whenever it is that you're listening to this and put in the time you spent for the three different categories. So that might be a little tricky if you can't exactly. Remember how you spent your day, where if you're like me, there are some days that you're like, gosh, I feel like I stayed busy all day long and I don't even know what I accomplished, but I bet if you think about it, you can go back and be like, oh yes, I did spend a two hour lunch with a friend or I did again, go to yoga or I played golf, whatever it is that your.
Uh, passionate about, and if you time block that in, you'll be able to get a quick glimpse at how and where you're spending your time and the priorities, because the way we spend our time and our money, that will tell you your true priorities. So homework number one, go ahead and. Dive into your calendar, add in your existing obligations.
Color code it. Go ahead and put in some extra things that you want to do. Time block the action steps that you want to take this week, and then go backwards just for a week and put in the time that you spent for three different categories and commit to doing this you guys for a month and you will see a pattern [00:22:00] emerge, and you're going to feel like you're more in control of your time.
Just like having a budget kind of tells your money, where to go time blocking is telling your time where to go. Right. So I hope this is helpful, guys. This is something that, I can tell you has been a life saver and a game changer for me, especially in trying to scale my business and really get intentional about spending my time wisely.
So I hope it's been beneficial. Let me know what you think. Go follow me on Instagram and shoot me a little message. I would love to hear from you, especially if you found value in this and. Yay. I hope that you'll have a fabulous week and I can't wait to hear the results of your time blocking. Can't wait to see you next week
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