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As business owners, many of us like to create a clear boundary between our personal and professional affairs. And with good reason! It’s not healthy to intertwine the two in a lot of ways. However, it’s also unhealthy to consider them to be oil and water.
Whether you like it or not, your business is an extension of you. Your personal beliefs about money could hold your business back without you even knowing it.
“Waste not, want not”
“Look after the pennies and the pounds will look after themselves”
We’re drip-fed these lines over our formative years, usually with good intent. It’s hard to see at the moment how these words of ‘wisdom’ could do any harm…but their cumulative effect can have a tremendous stunting effect on your growth as an entrepreneur.
Remember that these beliefs take root in your subconscious long before you set foot on the professional stage. When you start with nothing to lose and everything to gain, these messages of prudence and conservation don’t have much of a foothold.
After all: what is there to conserve?
But as you grow and succeed, you’ll find yourself placing more and more restrictions on what you do with your capital — setting the thresholds for investing ever further ahead, convinced that you’ll finally be ready to take that leap by the next one.
But you never do.
So here are four beliefs about money that you might hold and could be holding your business back.
Related: 3 Money Mindset Blocks That Are Holding You Back From Expanding Your Business
1. It could all end tomorrow
It’s very easy to be convinced of the need to conserve your capital reserves because it could all be gone tomorrow, and you’ll need the liquidity.
That’s fair and by no means unreasonable, especially given the current geopolitical situation. As a responsible business owner, you want to ensure you’ve covered your bases should the worst come to the worst. You have employees with mouths to feed, after all.
However, you can convince yourself of this being the case at any time, and it’s a false economy. Think about it for a moment. You’re a smart person; you know how money works. If you leave your cash in an account, it will be eroded by inflation and taxes. It needs to be put to work to grow.
The responsible thing to do is to find diverse avenues of investment to grow that money.
All it takes is a shift in your mindset.
Related: Want to Make More Money? Start Rewriting Your Story.
2. I can’t increase my prices, or I’ll lose my clients
This is one that an awful lot of business advisors speak on, but yet somehow, it just doesn’t get through. All of the logic and intellectualizing in the world can’t convince us that it’s the right course of action. But it is!
I’m not saying to hike your prices every week. But you change your mindset about regular price rises, even just to keep pace with inflation!
You also need to do it to optimize your client base. You’ve doubtlessly heard of the Pareto or “80/20” principle. This applies to your clients in a big way. I guarantee you that, within a small margin of error, 80% of your turnover comes from 20% of your clients, which means that you are spending 80% of your resources on 20% of them!
Here’s the thing, though: it’s not a clear dividing line.
When you put your prices up, it’s not like you’ll lose 80% of your client base, just like that! Many of them will be brought into the top 20%. Those that will, will be more than you think and certainly will negate any revenue lost, or resources expended on, those that represent the bottom half. Double the number of clients in that 20% bracket; you’ll have 160% of the revenue for less than half the work!
Related: How to Let Customers Know About Increased Prices Without Making Them Mad
3. Risk mitigation
Risk is a four-letter word. The thing is… without risk; you will not achieve your business goals. You have to embrace it as a factor in what you’re doing. But risk in and of itself isn’t necessarily a good thing.
We’re not talking about throwing yourself to the wolves needlessly. But you need to find that mindset where you’re comfortable “taking a punt” (as we Brits say).
Calculated risk is good, but don’t get too wound up in the minutia. With any new venture or endeavor; there comes a jumping-off point. It’s a time to let go of the theorizing, stop trying to convince yourself of the certainty of the outcome and take the leap of faith.
If you’re getting yourself bound up with risk assessments and market fluctuations, just remember that not taking action is a risk in itself.
4. Debt is the last resort
This is probably the best example of a personal belief that, when carried from your personal life to your professional one, can really impede growth.
Consumer debt (i.e., buying consumables using debt) is to be avoided because this is servicing debt on an asset that is losing value — a car, for example, or a washing machine.
But, when leveraged strategically, debt is one of the greatest tools in your arsenal and can increase your value. That’s how rich people get richer! What…did you think that they invested their own money?
Of course not!
They use their wealth and capital to leverage debt and invest that. As long as the return is greater than the interest on the debt: you’re winning and experiencing abundance!
Don’t be afraid of debt in your business. Don’t let it suffocate the happiness and pride in your business. It is most definitely your friend. Awareness is the first step in any problem-solving.
I hope that by bringing these four beliefs about money that could hold your business back to your awareness, you can start to see your role in all this. That alone could be all the change you need to start opening doors to new opportunities for growth.
I hope so!
Related: How Debt and Taxes Can Make Smart Entrepreneurs Rich
