Adrienne Dorison

I’m always ready to launch! Thanks for having me.

Adrienne Dorison

Utilizing strategy and business development processes is my entire background from the corporate world, so I brought that into my work, obviously, when I started a business and that’s what I do with other people. I think it’s easier for me to do it with other people than do it for myself, so thank you for the compliments, that you noticed that in me. It’s because I often find that I’m like the cobbler’s kid’s shoes or whatever that quote is about the cobbler’s kids not having shoes.

Adrienne Dorison

I’m always trying to think what is a value-add to my customer. If it’s not a value add, then, should I be doing it?

That’s usually my filter for everything. Is this the most important thing that I need to be doing right now? Usually, the answer is “no” and then I can go back to the things that are most relevant and important.

It is easy to stay caught up in the busy because it’s comfortable. It’s like a self-soothing mechanism that we all usually fall into but I know I don’t want to just sit in front of a computer for 8-16 hours a day just because I can.

Adrienne Dorison

The strategy and business development process I’m using is I’m trying to consciously think of those things all the time and keeping data so I know what things worked and didn’t. Xo even though they might be things that other people do or that everyone says we should be doing, they don’t work us.

I think a lot of people don’t know what’s working for them and so they can get caught up in just doing more doing. They don’t have a strategy and business development process in place.

That’s the biggest piece. It is understanding what are you going to focus on, how are you going to mentally make sure that you’re sticking to that, and then, how are you going to keep track of these things that you understand on a micro level what’s working and what’s not.

Adrienne Dorison

This is a super simplistic version of it in terms of your entire operation but this is for me personally, how I stay top of mind in terms of removing the busyness from the doing because we still have to be doing things.

Doing things is what adds value to a marketplace. We don’t have a business if we are not doing something or your company is not doing something.

Adrienne Dorison

Yes. I think you can’t sweep 100% certainty that you’re diving into something that’s going to create success if it’s the first time that you’ve done it. There’s part of life as an entrepreneur and as a person who takes risks or brings on new creative projects. There’s going to be some uncertainty but we can reduce that uncertainty by knowing through past performance or goal-setting, and have a solid strategy and business development process.

If you’re thinking about a specific project, ask yourself “Is this the thing I should be focused on? How can we make sure that I’m not just like unconsciously diving into something that isn’t going to add value?” I would be getting crystal clear on what is my goal and most people don’t know where they are going. They might know on a pretty broad stroke but get specific with yourself like what is the goal for the next 90 days.

Adrienne Dorison

I like to break my life and business up into 90 days cycles because I can’t think super specifically much beyond that. Our human brain is not built for it so I like to think what my goal is for the next 90 days. Then, what are all of the possible ways that I might be able to get there? So I bring about all the projects that could be possible for me to hit that goal.

I’m an efficiency expert like this is my background from corporate. It is operational efficiency so my goal is to make sure that I’m using the least amount of resources to get the most amounts of results.

Adrienne Dorison

When I look at all those projects, I’m looking for what is going to require the least amount of resources which is closest to me achieving that thing. Even though there are probably 10 different ways for me to achieve it, I want to look for what’s going to require the least amount of resources to potentially hit that same goal.

So you’re definitely not going to have 100% certainty but you want to be tracking.

Adrienne Dorison

Let’s assume it’s the first time you’re ever doing something. What’s the goal? How would this project, action, or task move you towards that? What are the current baselines? So if there’s a specific launch or projects underneath that launch that you’re doing, you want to know where are you know. Then, every single week, I would be tracking specific metrics that are going to help you understand are you moving closer to that goal or are you moving farther away?

This is going to be so nuance based on what is the project, what is the goal.

That’s why I don’t want to even give people specifics or I don’t give my clients specifics. I’m like here are the two things or the 10 things you need to track. It’s because for every single business I work with and every single quarter that we work with our clients, it’s going to be different.

Adrienne Dorison

Just know what your goals are and what the things are you need to be focused on. You need to have the critical thinking skills to understand the things we need to know to know whether or not this is working. It’s not a hard question if you just reverse engineer what the goal is and figure out what project is and how that project is moving you towards that.

I would say to track that on an ongoing basis.

With a small business, you are so much agiler and you can turn the ship much more easily. If things aren’t working after two or three weeks and you noticed that the metrics aren’t moving at all, try something new. Don’t keep beating that dead horse or moving in the wrong direction when it doesn’t seem to be working if you’ve been doing the things that you need to do. That’s always a question of awareness and personal responsibility and honesty, which is challenging for some people. They want to believe that they’ve done the work but sometimes, they haven’t.

Adrienne Dorison

Yeah, this is like a Pomodoro timer, right?

Adrienne Dorison

Yeah.

Adrienne Dorison

This is the most annoying answer, but self-discipline. With some of my clients, we do Pomodoro together. There’s an app that I use that you’re talking about something similar. It’s called Focus Booster app, and you can set timers on there.

Whenever we do these types of activities or whenever they have things blocked off on their calendar, I always tell them to kind of pretend you’re going to the library.

Adrienne Dorison

Pretend you’re going the library even though you’re not like you’re just sitting at your computer. But I want them to prepare like pack your backpack. What do you need? What do you need to prep to do this task that you’re going to do over the next 45 minutes or two hours? What are all the things that you could possibly need?

If you’re writing an article, what are all the references that you might need or all the prep work that you’re going to need to have or the emails that you’re going to refer back to? Whatever it is, can you get that prepared in advance as much as possible?

Then, can you just turn the internet off if that’s a possibility for you? Or can you just notice where you’re getting pulled away or when you do need to go into your inbox?

Then all of a sudden, you feel this immense desire and need. It’s almost like a compulsion to start answering emails that are in there, but why can’t we just leave them? Why can’t we just leave them until it’s time to answer emails for the day?

Adrienne Dorison

It’s because we know that this is a non-efficient way to do things. It’s a super inefficient way to be going from one task to another. Our brain has to readjust to the task. It takes us about 20 minutes to even get back acquainted with the task we were previously doing. It’s just a huge waste of our time.

If you can set up boundaries for the things you know are a distraction to you, that’s great. If you, for some reason need to go into Facebook or email, how could you just be more aware and tell yourself before you go in there, “I am going to go in there but I’m only going to go grab this one thing that I need. Then, I’m going to pop right back out, and I can go check my other things at X scheduled time.”

Adrienne Dorison

We try to reduce the number of times for example that people are going to their inbox or Facebook every single day. Have designated times for that so you can be purposeful because like you said, a lot of the people that are listening, your clients, customers, and audience, they need to go to social media to grow their business, and that’s a tool that they’re using. But how could they have maybe better boundaries around that tool?

I was telling one of my clients yesterday who needed to go on social media, but it was becoming not so enjoyable. This thing we use in our personal lives that is for fun and social connection, which what it should be for, became sort of a chore, triggering, and not so fun anymore. I was like, “Why don’t you separate these two ideas.”

Adrienne Dorison

Separate the idea that you go on social media to post your own stuff and get distracted and go down this tunnel. It makes you feel bad, and you feel like you’re constantly being pulled down by your notifications. We’re going to have to reframe how you’re using this if you’re going to continue to use it as a tool for your business.” I was like “Use a timer. Set a timer.”

If you know engaging on your social media is something that brings you more clients, customers, connections, set a timer for 30 minutes. I make a game out of it.

Go and see how many thoughtful comments you can leave during those 30 minutes, and then when the timer goes off, you’re out. You don’t get to go back until the next time you’re supposed to do those things.

Adrienne Dorison

It’s just because like way more fun. It’s just like play games with yourself like this.

Adrienne Dorison

Yes. We talked about these four D’s on strategy and business development  that every business is going to traverse.

The first is Doing. Every business owner starts in the Doing phase.

When you first start your business, you’re probably doing pretty much everything if you’re the only person in it. Maybe you have a couple of people, but you’re doing a lot of the work essentially.

As you grow, maybe you hire someone, and you’ve outsourced a couple of tasks, but they still need to come back to you to maybe get approvals on those tasks or you’re just ‘task grabbiting.’ Giving out a task, they come back to you. That’s what we called the Deciding phase. That’s the second D.

I’m just going to go through these four D’s because I think it’ll be helpful for people to understand where they’re falling, and how to move yourself into a business that runs a little bit more efficiently.

Adrienne Dorison

The next one is when you can fully delegate tasks or even projects, or even full roles to people. That’s when you’re giving a little bit more of that ownership away. They’re acting and responding a little bit more autonomously. They don’t need to come back to you for every single decision, and these are the three phases of strategy and business development that I would say the majority of entrepreneurs are falling into.

This is where the majority of your time is going, and the majority of you are moving from doing to deciding a little bit. You’re maybe outsourcing some things. Maybe you’d even move a little bit into delegation.

Adrienne Dorison

What happens is when you’re in the deciding phase, this is a sticky phase to be in, because you end up making 407 decisions all day long, and you’ve not done a lot of the things that you need to do at that higher level, but you feel exhausted by making 4,700 decisions.

And so what happens, I hear this phrase all the time, is “It’s just easier if I do it myself.” So then, you move back into this doing phase versus moving up towards full delegation. The deciding phase is much more exhausting than the delegation phase.

Adrienne Dorison

The final phase is designing.

This is where we want our CEOs to be spending a good chunk of their time. It is designing the business, the next project, the team, the workflows, the efficiency of the entire operation, but it’s hard to get there if you can’t traverse these other steps.

Adrienne Dorison

The first thing we want people to do is to do an assessment of where is the majority of your time falling, and how do you want to be moving it towards the ideal mix for yourself. That’s going to be different for everyone just based on what your business is, and based on what you want for your life and your lifestyle, and the vision you have for the growth of your business.

Some people don’t ever want to scale a business. They just want to keep things going the way they are and that’s totally fine. But I think we have to be conscious of how much of us are involved in that business, and what happens if we need to step away, and that’s something I’m passionate about.

Adrienne Dorison

Do a little assessment for yourself based on these four Ds of Doing, Deciding, Delegating, and Designing. What is the mix that you currently have for yourself, and for your entire company?

Because the company has to be doing, but you as the owner shouldn’t be doing or you shouldn’t be interwoven.

Adrienne Dorison

The first thing we want people to do is to do an assessment of where is the majority of your time falling, and how do you want to be moving it towards the ideal mix for yourself. That’s going to be different for everyone just based on what your business is, and based on what you want for your life and your lifestyle, and the vision you have for the growth of your business.

Some people don’t ever want to scale a business. They just want to keep things going the way they are and that’s totally fine. But I think we have to be conscious of how much of us are involved in that business, and what happens if we need to step away, and that’s something I’m passionate about.