Why is consistency important in small business growth? Especially a small home business? It’s not only the important but the cornerstone! It also translates into all areas of your life! Being in the health and wellness industry, I am guilty of the exact same feelings of discouragement and wanting to throw the towel in when I don’t see immediate results! All that focused planning of my food, intake, and exercise, why can’t I be at a lean ripped up machine in just a matter of a couple days? Honestly, I always notice that my body doesn’t change much, weigh different, or really "see" the efforts of my labor until the 14th day! Weird, I wake up on the 14th day, and boom, I can see it! Or how about the time where I started washing dishes in my hometown restaurant when I REALLY wanted to be a "bus girl." Even though I didn’t get tips being a bus girl, it just allowed me to have that feeling of success and not being the one trapped in a hot kitchen scraping uneaten food off of plates and throwing them in the wash. My time did finally come to graduate into the main dining where I could finally dress in a black skirt and white shirt, and the white shirt would actually stay white! But I had to put a ton of effort, prove my skills, prove my work ethic, prove my determination for growth, prove I am the girl to move! Why is your home business any different than any other venture of growth in your life? There is no difference! Why would you decide to make a big change in your life, one that will improve the quality of your life, invest time, money, and stress in the efforts of getting started then do nothing or drop off because the growth of your business isn’t happening when you want it to? Only you can answer that question for yourself, yet so many people do just this. No business should be treated like a hobby and especially your own business you must take it seriously and be consistent on a daily basis. Don’t think that things will happen overnight it takes time and committing yourself. I hear many times from people working on developing their business say, “I tried that it didn’t work” or "I don’t have upline support." Most often time it’s easier to put the blame on someone else or even put the blame on the business model itself. But what it really boils down to is consistency. Doing the right activity over and over. Now we have to be realistic! You can’t expect to see life changing results in a matter of a couple months. There is no possible way but you must be persistent and consistent. Because just like riding a bike, it’s tough to get the bike rolling as you start to pedal, but once you are rolling it’s rolling with less effort! But as soon as you hit the breaks and stop, to get rolling again is tough! Sometimes you may even be caught in the middle of a steep hill! I run with the motto, "Things always work out in the end". I’d be honest in saying I don’t stress out about meeting deadlines, meeting challenges, and even meeting the personal quota and goals I set each month. Even when the month starts to near it’s end, my stress level starts to rise and I start working even more on activity to produce the results I’d like. But what I find happens, is that because I was consistent, never putting the breaks on for the months leading up to the end of this month, the breadcrumbs and efforts I was laying down the whole time turns around and pays off. Here are some suggestions to ensuring your activity is productive and not just a matter of busy work that you keep fooling yourself with.
1) Set a 90 day activity journal. Record your activity for 3 months, as well as the productivity. If you are failing to see the fruition of the efforts you laid down in the beginning of the 90 days come around at the end of the 90 days, time to re-evaluate your activity.
2) Re-Evaluate your Daily/Weekly/Monthly Schedule – It’s easy to be busy. But being busy with activity that fills your time producing no results will only frustrate you. Use a calendar to schedule out your appointments of work and activity on each day and follow it! Be sure to move on to the next scheduled task that is on your schedule.
3) Don’t be Scared to Ask for an Honest Opinion! – After being diligent in your efforts of work and activity, find your mentor, sponsor, or direct manager and ask for some constructive feedback. As hard as that pill is to take, someone that you have in this position above you should be able to deliver just the news you need to hear while giving you that drive and determination to make those changes for a better result. As more is learned about your efforts, schedule, and areas needed for improvement, more of the inefficiency is removed, exposing that still more can be learned — and so on — creating an ever increasing spiral of productivity and results. But that can’t happen without consistency.