Tag: bekindbymagic

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Be Kind by MAGIC – Inspire your Clients

Inspire your clients

Being Kind is your business super-power.

How do you Be Kind in Business? By applying the MAGIC formula:

Moving
Attuning
Giving
Inspiring
Connecting

It applies to:

Yourself
Your clients
Your team
Your prospects

—

Emotions are a much more powerful driver than logic. Inspire your clients and you could be the catalyst of life-changing action.

You can inspire your clients in several ways:

  • Help them to see their achievements in a different light,
  • Help them to describe themselves differently,
  • Help them to imagine possible future scenarios, and
  • Help them to set goals to achieve greater things.

But What You Actually Did Was…

Sometimes what we do feels very ordinary, but looks extraordinary to people who are looking on. You can help your clients to see their achievements as something special.

Help your clients to identify defining achievements. This may well involve working with them to reframe what they have already done, to look back at their work and personal lives and realise what they have accomplished. And then re-label it. This can be very affirming and inspiring.

They suddenly realise that they are something that they didn’t realise they were – for example, a facilitator, manager or mentor.

Maybe they have successfully raised four children as a mother? The time, resource and people management lessons and experience from this are significant and all-too-often go unacknowledged.

Did You Realise That You Are Actually A…?

When you enable your client to reframe their past experience, it could inspire them to explore previously unconsidered future roles. Maybe your client has not yet realised that they could legitimately describe themselves as a coach, a mentor, a manager, or some other role?

Look together at what they have done and explore together whether they could describe themselves differently. And once they have started describing themselves differently to themselves, they can be inspired to describe themselves in that way to others as well.

Encourage them to take up a daily mantra or affirmation which they say to themselves first thing in the morning, e.g. “I am a successful manager of people and resources. My work enables others to work together well and ensures that time and materials are used most effectively.”

Repeating this to themselves will shift their self-image and inspire them to see what could happen next.

What Could Be?

Help your clients to imagine possible future scenarios.

You can be brave for them, and imagine a possible future reality which they may be too nervous to imagine for themselves. Whereas they might think it is impossible at the moment, you can ask them the questions, “Why not?”, “Could you possibly do it?”, “What would have to be necessary for you to achieve that?” You may also have ideas that they have never thought of. Help them to create an image of them achieving it, so they can picture it in their mind.

Then encourage your client to identify obstacles. Some may be real, but most are probably perceived and imaginary. Some may be real but possible to overcome, maybe with a little training or some outside help. Again, ask “Why not?” and enable them to picture the obstacles disappearing or being overcome.

Goal!

Inspire your clients by aiding them to set challenging goals.

Michael Hyatt is excellent on this. He identifies three areas in which we can set goals:

  • our comfort zone, goals which are too easy to achieve and therefore don’t stretch us;
  • the delusional zone, goals which are too difficult, and we will never attain them, and thus get discouraged; 
  • and then there is our discomfort zone, the sweet spot for our goals. Projects that will stretch us slightly, but we can get there. We will be challenged and learn things along the way, and grow as a result.

Inspire your clients to set goals in the discomfort zone.

What About Accountants and Lawyers?

You might think that professionals like accountancy and the legal profession have little room for inspiration. But why not?

Identify pain points for your clients, and then show them how you could help them overcome them. Suggest what life could be like for them after they have worked with you. This will inspire them to go ahead and to keep going when things get tough.


Inspiration is potent. It is a real driver. Be kind to your clients, inspire them.

—

Download my free eBook “Be Kind to Yourself” and learn how to:

  • Adapt to new ways of working
  • Harness the power of habits
  • Optimise the use of space in your home
  • Use clothes to boost productivity
  • Focus on what matters
  • Plan for the future amidst uncertainty
Be Kind to Yourself – Free eBook
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Be Kind by MAGIC – Giving to Your Clients

Being Kind is your business super-power.

How do you Be Kind in Business? By applying the MAGIC formula:

Moving
Attuning
Giving
Inspiring
Connecting

It applies to:

Yourself
Your clients
Your team
Your prospects 
—

Giving to your clients is a surefire way to better business.

We are all customers or clients at some point.

Bring to mind a time where your service provider or vendor exceeded your expectations or did something special for you. They gave something extra. It sticks in your mind, doesn’t it?How can you do the same?

Obviously, we can’t give everything away for nothing to our clients. We have to make a living. It has to be sustainable, we have to give within our means. But, if we can find the balance, there are big benefits to being generous to our clients, and we can probably afford to give slightly more than we think.

Sometimes it will repay in the long run, sometimes it won’t. And even if it doesn’t, it’s a good thing to do because it makes us better, both as people and as businesses.So how can we give to our clients?

More Than They Were Expecting

Firstly we can exceed expectations: under-promise and over-deliver. Surprise them by how good we are, by giving them more time than they were expecting, or more attention.

My accountant’s bill, especially in the early days, often had the phrase “exceeded but not billed” next to his tally of hours. He obviously thought I’d be rich one day and was happy to encourage my loyalty!

Maybe you can offer something other than time? Can you provide extra add-on resources that your clients will value? Downloads, videos, links to useful services?

We All Love a Present

I buy magic tricks from a magic dealer who often encloses a little packet of sweets inside the package. It makes me feel good. Another one sometimes includes a small extra trick as a pleasant surprise.

Could you send a special gift to your clients?I signed up for a course last week, and was sent the course materials. They came in a blue sparkly padded bag. It could have been a regular padded bag, but the sparkly blue effect made me feel valued.

Can you package your delivery in a way that will make your client feel like a VIP? How can you roll out the metaphorical red carpet?

Say Something Special

An easy way to give something is to say something positive and unexpected.

You can simply offer encouragement to your clients, say thank you for their business, say well done when they achieve something. Tell them that they are special and that you value their business.

Why not go a step further and send a card, or buy them lunch or coffee?

Have you Met…?

You can share your network with your clients, help them to plug into it to increase their range of contacts. You can provide them with recommendations, and you can recommend them to other people.

Not giving something physical, but giving them a leg-up and new opportunities.

Work For Free??!!

Can you offer pro bono work?

“Pro bono” literally means “for the good of the people.”

This is a common practice in legal and accountancy practices. I wondered why they did it. Then I read this enlightening blog post on the business case for pro bono work: http://www.a4id.org/policy/business-case-for-pro-bono/

In a nutshell, graduate lawyers are increasingly keen on including pro bono as part of their professional offering. If a firm offers pro bono work, they will attract better graduates. Better graduates will earn more money in the long run. It makes business sense.

Could you do some pro bono work? If it works for lawyers and accountants, why not for coaches and other kinds of client services? I know magicians and other entertainers who have decided to do a percentage of charity gigs each year.

Think about how you can be generous in your client work. How are you giving to your clients?

Make them feel special. You will stick in their minds.

—

Download my free eBook “Be Kind to Yourself” and learn how to:

  • Adapt to new ways of working
  • Harness the power of habits
  • Optimise the use of space in your home
  • Use clothes to boost productivity
  • Focus on what matters
  • Plan for the future amidst uncertainty
Be Kind to Yourself – Free eBook
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Be Kind by MAGIC -Attuning to Your Clients

Being Kind is your business super-power.

How do you Be Kind in Business? By applying the MAGIC formula:

Moving
Attuning
Giving
Inspiring
Connecting

It applies to:

Yourself
Your clients
Your team
Your prospects 
—

Attuning to your clients is all about understanding them, and then modifying how you serve them as a result.

There are three steps to attuning:

Look and Listen

First, you have to look and listen. Observe your client, ask them questions, find out about them and their situation. Spend some time on this; ask the follow-up questions. Note both what they answer and how they answer. Do any questions make them excited, any make them uncomfortable?

Understand

Next, you need to understand what you have found out.

  • Who are they? Get a take on your client’s personality. Maybe a tool such as DiSC , MBTI  or the Enneagram would be helpful here? You won’t be able to do a full analysis, but you should get some interesting pointers and insights. This will help you to work out how much to affirm and encourage, balanced against how much you can challenge them without frightening them.
  • Where are they? You have to understand their situation. What are their problems? Could you help them solve them? Can you see the issue from another angle and reframe it? Or maybe you can see that their perceived problem is not the real problem in the first place? Perhaps the answer they think they want is not actually the answer that they need?
  • What makes them tick? This is probably the most essential aspect in understanding your client. What are their core values, what is important to them? They may well be different to yours, but you need to understand them so that you do not slip up and offend them, or appear to be driving them in a direction which seems wrong to them.

Modify

Finally, once you have understood your client, you can work out how best to serve them. You can decide how you will modify both the style of your presentation and the content of what you provide. In other words, what you say and how you say it.

  • What?
    Think about the most appropriate content for the person or audience in question.
  • How?
    What is the best way to present it? Will they respond best to didactic teaching or participation, to words or pictures, to visual or audio? Or maybe a mixture? And what tone and language will work best? Formal or informal? Lively and bouncy or more restrained? 

Tricks and Schtick

When I’m performing magic, the way I perform the tricks will vary depending on my audience. Often I may use the same tricks but presented very differently. For example, I have a rope trick that I perform at both children’s parties and corporate drinks receptions: same mechanics, very different presentations. And, of course, there are also some tricks which only work in kids’ parties and some that only work in corporate settings.

It is the same when applying my MAGIC formula to help teams and individuals to improve their working relationships. I present it in a slightly different way to a nonprofit manager’s audience than I will, to the leadership of a bank. It’s the same fundamental material, but with a slightly different approach.

How can you modify your offering to those you serve to make it a better fit for each one?

Think about how you can attune to your clients.

Remember:

Observe, Understand, and then Modify.

—

—Download my free eBook “Be Kind to Yourself” and learn how to:

  • Adapt to new ways of working
  • Harness the power of habits
  • Optimise the use of space in your home
  • Use clothes to boost productivity
  • Focus on what matters
  • Plan for the future amidst uncertainty
Be Kind to Yourself – Free eBook
Posted on

Be Kind by MAGIC – Moving Your Clients

Being Kind is your business super-power.

How do you Be Kind in Business? By applying the MAGIC formula:

Moving
Attuning
Giving
Inspiring
Connecting

It applies to:

Yourself
Your clients
Your team
Your prospects 
—

Moving Your Clients

If you work with clients, you can significantly enhance your offering to them by thinking about how you move them.

How do you move them educationally, moving them from not knowing something to knowing?

How do you help them to see things from a new perspective, moving them from one viewpoint to another viewpoint?

And how do you engage their feelings, moving them emotionally, providing them with an impetus to take action?

Be a Favourite Teacher

You can serve your clients by moving them from one state of knowledge to another. In other words, you can tell them something they didn’t know that will be useful to them.

Maybe it is something about the law? Perhaps a new software tool, services they may be able to access, or some other resources that may be useful to them.

Nifty Shifty

Magicians always have to be careful about angles. If you watch a trick from the wrong place, sometimes you can see things that you weren’t meant to! Seeing things from the best angle is very important for the magic to work.

Working with clients, helping them to see something from another perspective can be very useful. Can you help them to shift to see things from another point of view? To re-frame things, see them from a distance, take an outsider’s view?

Maybe they have intellectual or emotional doubts that are stopping them progressing?  Sometimes those doubts are based on real barriers, but very often, the obstacles are just imagined or perceived. The doubts are like little gremlins sitting on the shoulders that need punching in the nose. Can you help them to shift their viewpoint, so they can sort out the real from the imagined?

Imagine How You Will Feel When…

What emotions can you engage in your clients?

Can you excite them about potential, about what they can imagine happening, but also about what they can’t yet imagine happening? The excitement can motivate them to begin exploring new territory.

Can you help them to flip nervousness about the future, into excitement about adventure?

Can you get them to reflect on the changes they have seen and the progress they have made so that they feel satisfaction and pride?

Maybe there’s even space for inducing a little fear about the consequences of inaction?

Even if you are a lawyer, accountant or in some other seemingly unemotional occupation, there is still scope to engage the emotions of your clients. Paint an imaginative picture of how someone’s life will be better as a result of your involvement. Let them see the potential for change and feel the related emotions.

Moving is a fundamental characteristic of living things. Make sure that you and your clients are moving.

How can you move your clients today?

—

Download my free eBook “Be Kind to Yourself” and learn how to:

  • Adapt to new ways of working
  • Harness the power of habits
  • Optimise the use of space in your home
  • Use clothes to boost productivity
  • Focus on what matters
  • Plan for the future amidst uncertainty
Be Kind to Yourself – Free eBook
Posted on

Be Kind by MAGIC – Connecting to Yourself

Being Kind is your business super-power.

How do you Be Kind in Business? By applying the MAGIC formula:

Moving
Attuning
Giving
Inspiring
Connecting

It applies to:

Yourself
Your clients
Your team
Your prospects 
—

I’m Back

Sorry that I haven’t blogged for a couple of weeks. Many thanks to those of you who noticed – it’s nice to be missed 🙂

I’ve been on holiday. This has given me a chance to connect to myself, to think about life a bit.

Connecting to yourself is the subject of today’s blog.

Why Connect?

Why should you connect to yourself?

Think about bank statements. Remember paper statements? Some of you might still get them! We all know that you have to open the envelope and look at the bank statement, even if you don’t want to. There is no benefit in denial. It will only make the situation worse.

In the same way, it is vital to connect to yourself so that you are aware of where you’re at, and why you are doing what you’re doing. If something is not right, there is no point living in denial and carrying on regardless. It would only make things worse.

It is so easy to go through life on autopilot, never stopping to ask ourselves why we are doing things. This is how we get stuck in a rut. This is how we lose energy and become listless.

Once you have given yourself the chance to be self-aware, you need to listen to your mind, you need to listen to your body. 

What questions should you ask yourself? What answers should you listen out for? How do you make time to make sure connecting to yourself happens?

The Question of Which Questions?

I have been reminded recently about the importance of connecting with our why. I was talking last week to Amy Rowlinson, who has the fantastic podcast “Focus on Why.” Simon Sinek is also famous for encouraging us to “Start with Why”.

Ask yourself, why you are doing what you are doing? Or, maybe, why you are not doing what you want to be doing?

Once you have worked out your motivation, ask yourself, “Is this working?”

Am I enjoying what I’m doing? Could I do it in a different way to make it more enjoyable? Most of the time, most of the agency for making changes to our working habits lies with ourselves. Work out what needs to change and then make a concrete plan to change it.

Am I working towards my goals or just marking time? It is so easy to fill your day with “busy work” that achieves little and does not move you forward. Could you make any changes to keep you on track?

Body Conscious

Listen to your body.

Am I tired? Am I aching? Feeling sharp? Energetic? Could I make any changes? Revised sleep patterns, change of diet, new office chair….?

Maybe you need to go and see the doctor? Again, there is nothing to be gained by denial.

Life-Saving Routine

Last week, I watched the fantastic David Blaine’s “Ascension.”

I’m a fan of David Blaine as a magician, but he also does these amazing stunts. In this one, he had a bunch of 52 helium balloons. He held on to it as they took him to 23,000 feet, and then he skydived off. The whole thing was live on YouTube. Incredible.

What was very apparent is that he had a strict routine for checking, every step of the way.

At 23,000 feet, held on by a cable to the balloons, he had to put on his parachute. He put it on, and he checked the straps and buckles in strict sequence, at least twice.

It was drilled into him. He had a checking routine. If he hadn’t done it, He would have been risking his life.

Do you have a checking routine for your life?

I would recommend it. If you don’t do it, you are risking a fulfilled life.

What do I mean by this?

Love Your Reflection

I am a huge advocate of building and reflective practices into your life, daily, weekly, and periodically.

Each day, I recommend journaling. A journal can be in various forms. Years ago, I used to do the “artists pages”, recommended by Julia Cameron in the Artists Way (#ad). Two sides of A4 of a stream of consciousness freeform prose, whatever comes into your head. It’s amazing what you write down! You get a real insight into your inner workings.

These days it is more structured and quicker. I do a bullet point journal inspired by Michael Hyatt. It’s a systematic way of reflecting on yesterday and planning for today.

I also walk the dog each day and make a point of not listening to music or podcasts while I’m doing this. My mind is then free to process stuff, to think about life.

Weekly, I do a more involved journal entry every Sunday morning. And I also have a kayaking trip where I take myself off for three hours by myself in nature. Again a chance to process stuff, to think, or even just to zone out for a change. I stop for lunch on the river bank, cook it up on a little stove. It’s a great chance to lie on my back in a field, watch the clouds scud by and ask myself how I’m doing.

And periodically. It’s good to take yourself away on holiday, or maybe even a retreat where you take a deep dive into what you’re doing, why you’re doing it, and what you plan to do next.

On reflection, are you reflecting enough?

Be kind to yourself, connect to yourself.


—

Download my free eBook “Be Kind to Yourself” and learn how to:

  • Adapt to new ways of working
  • Harness the power of habits
  • Optimise the use of space in your home
  • Use clothes to boost productivity
  • Focus on what matters
  • Plan for the future amidst uncertainty
Be Kind to Yourself – Free eBook
Posted on

Be Kind by MAGIC – Inspiring Yourself

Being Kind is your business super-power.

How do you Be Kind in Business? By applying the MAGIC formula:

Moving
Attuning
Giving
Inspiring
Connecting

It applies to:

Yourself
Your clients
Your team
Your prospects 

Self-Inspiration

How do you inspire yourself?

It’s all about asking questions.

Questions about:

– your dreams,
– people you admire, and
– the situation or the task at hand.

Dream on, Dreamer

Give yourself space and time to ask yourself, “What if?” 

Do you have a dream? What do you want to do? What do you love doing?

What would you love to do if you could?

Why can’t you do it? Is there a reason why not?

Think about what you love doing. Could you do that as a business? Would you want to? If you can, talk to people who do it as a business already. Find out if it is as much fun doing it for a job as it is in your spare time. Maybe you just want to keep it as a hobby?

But if you wanted to take it further, what would have to be true to make that happen? Could it work? What would have to change to make it possible?

Interrogate the Pedestal

I’m sure that you have people that you look up to, role models. People you look at and think, “I wish I could be like them.”

Maybe you know them personally? Perhaps they are famous? Ask yourself, “How are they different to me?” And, “How are they the same as me?”

“Could I do what they’re doing?”

“What would I have to do so that I could do what they are doing?” Maybe the answer is just some training, a bit more experience and/ or a bit more self-confidence.

If you know them, talk to them. Ask how they got there. How did they get to do what they’re doing now? If they’ve written one, read their autobiography. Ask yourself, “Could that be me?”

Everybody’s story will be different, but you may find inspiration for your own journey. Would you really like to have the life that they are having, or your own version of it?

What Is and What Could be

Asking ourselves about possibilities for our work situations can inspire and motivate us.

In leadership, ask, “What could the future look like, what might be possible? What would have to change to make that possible?”

In sales, ask, “What would be made possible by closing this sale? What improvements will be made for my company, or my life?” “What difference will this make to my prospect, how will their life be better as a result?”

If you work with clients, ask, “What difference will my action make?” Picture your clients’ lives being better as a result of your involvement.

Allow yourself to imagine these things, and it will inspire you.

Goal setting

Once you are inspired, you have the emotional fuel to allow you to achieve your goals, but first, you have to set your goals.

Michael Hyatt  is insightful on this. He observes that we could set goals in

– our comfort zone,
– our discomfort zone, or
– our delusional zone

Goals in our comfort zone are too easy. They don’t stretch us, we won’t make progress. Goals in our delusional zone are unachievable. We will never achieve them, and we will get frustrated and discouraged if we try.

He advises setting goals in our discomfort zone.

Stretching ourselves slightly, going slightly beyond what we’ve done before. Achievable, but not easy. Set goals in the discomfort zone, and you will grow.

Once we achieve them, we will feel great.

How will you inspire yourself today?

—

Download my free eBook “Be Kind to Yourself” and learn how to:

  • Adapt to new ways of working
  • Harness the power of habits
  • Optimise the use of space in your home
  • Use clothes to boost productivity
  • Focus on what matters
  • Plan for the future amidst uncertainty
Be Kind to Yourself – Free eBook
Posted on

Be Kind By MAGIC – Moving Yourself

Being Kind is your business super-power.

How do you Be Kind in Business? By applying the MAGIC formula:

Moving
Attuning
Giving
Inspiring
Connecting

It applies to:

Yourself
Your clients
Your team
Your prospects 

Today we look at the power  of MOVING yourself.

Live and Kicking

When I watch a live performance, it moves me. I get set free from day-to-day preoccupations and taken somewhere else. Maybe you are the same?

When I am performing, and I see my performance producing a similar experience in others, it feels great. I feel like I’m in my groove.

Live performance makes me emotional because I know its power.

Our feelings are enormous motivators. Most of what we do is motivated by emotion. Sometimes we like to think we’re mainly rational, but actually, our feelings are way more powerful.

It is important to remember this.

Jaded and Faded

You come across some close-up magicians who are jaded. They’ve been doing the same thing for too long, they’ve lost the joy and the spark. You can spot it a mile off. It contrasts so hugely with those who are loving every minute of it and bringing joy to those they entertain.

They’re just not feeling it anymore.

If you feel like you are lacking energy or motivation, find a way to reconnect with the feelings that got you going in the first place.

What started you off?

What is the bigger picture?

Paper Tigers

On the flip side, it may be that you had a feeling that stopped you doing something: nervousness, apprehension, fear of failure. Can you examine it, work out where it came from, test its validity? Once these negative feelings are recognised, many of them go away. Others can be worked through and conquered.

Connecting with our feelings is essential if we want to make progress, grow and continue.

Environmental Friendliness

How do you do this? How can you reconnect with your feelings, so that you’re always motivated and energised?

Think about your working and living environment. Surrounding yourself with stimulating or comforting pictures on your walls and objects on your desk can help. Watching films and theatre, going to particular places may well excite emotions that will motivate and inspire you.

Day-to-day and in the moment, music can also be a great energiser. I like to listen to AC/DC, Guns N’Roses or Led Zeppelin just before a big meeting, just to get my energy up and my mind into a faster rhythm. I’m then more energised and alert.

Similarly, exercise, nature and pets can help to lift my mood. Sometimes a change is as good as a rest: do something creative, go for a walk, phone a friend. Change your mood state, be moved, connect with the emotion that is driving you.

Feel the magic, because feeling is magic.

—

You may find my free eBook helpful.
18 pages and easy to read: “Be Kind to Yourself: Six Magic Insights to Transform Home-Based Working”
Get your copy here: https://www.work-life-magic.com/be-kind-to-yourself-free-ebook/
Please pass this on to anyone you know that might find it helpful.