224. Behind the Scenes: Coaching Conversation

Summary

Podcast Summary: The Kristen Boss Podcast - Episode 224: Behind the Scenes: Coaching Conversation

Introduction

In Episode 224 of The Kristen Boss Podcast, released on August 19, 2024, host Kristen Boss delves into a candid coaching conversation with her elite six and seven-figure earning students. This episode provides an in-depth exploration of the underlying challenges entrepreneurs face in maintaining consistency within their businesses, especially outside of crisis moments. Kristen leverages her expertise as a top business coach to unpack crucial topics related to business sustainability, mindset, and the compounding effects of daily habits.

Key Discussion Points

1. The Crisis-Driven Work Ethic

   Kristen opens the conversation by addressing a prevalent issue among entrepreneurs: the tendency to operate primarily during times of crisis. She observes that many business owners only ramp up their efforts when financial pressures mount, likening them to "crisis social sellers" who respond primarily to emergencies rather than maintaining consistent activity.

   “[...] people in this business don't know how to work when they are not in a crisis, a financial crisis. They only know how to work in a crisis,” — Kristen Boss [02:12]

2. Inaction During Stability Leads to Decline

   The discussion highlights how entrepreneurs often become complacent during stable periods, leading to a gradual decline in their business performance. Kristen emphasizes the importance of recognizing that inactivity leads to compounded negative effects over time, much like skipping workouts can undermine fitness goals.

   “Every day you don't make a post, you don't show up in your business compounds into a declining paycheck.” — Kristen Boss [04:15]

3. Understanding Success and Stress Habits

   A significant portion of the conversation revolves around distinguishing between "success habits" and "stress habits." Kristen explains that maintaining success habits even during non-crisis times is essential for sustainable growth, while stress habits often emerge as counterproductive behaviors during challenging times.

   “Your top line behaviors are what you do in your success moments, and your bottom line behaviors are your stress habits.” — Kristen Boss [19:50]

4. The Law of Compounding Effect in Business

   Kristen draws parallels between business activities and personal habits, illustrating how consistent positive actions lead to growth, while neglect leads to decline. She underscores that the delayed nature of business results requires patience and sustained effort beyond immediate gratification.

   “The law of compounding effect goes both ways. Every day you show up, it compounds. Every day you don't, it compounds.” — Kristen Boss [05:30]

Personal Anecdotes and Insights

Kristen shares personal experiences to illustrate her points, including her journey with weight loss and how it mirrors business sustainability. She recounts her initial success during an ideal period of focus and the subsequent challenges when returning to a less controlled environment.

“When I was in my idealistic environment, I was averaging a pound and a half to two pounds a week weight loss. When I went into reality, it went down to half a pound to one pound a week.” — Kristen Boss [12:45]

This analogy serves to highlight the necessity of adapting strategies to varying circumstances and maintaining consistency regardless of external conditions.

Actionable Strategies for Consistency

Kristen offers practical advice on how entrepreneurs can maintain consistency in their business activities:

1. Adjusting Goals to Fit Current Seasons

   She advises redefining success based on the current business environment, much like adjusting fitness goals based on personal circumstances.

   “Maybe we need to evaluate what are your success habits that you can sustain even when life is in upheaval.” — Kristen Boss [15:30]

2. Identifying and Managing Stress Habits

   Kristen introduces the concept of "check engine lights" to recognize when stress habits are taking over. She encourages creating a personal checklist to reset the nervous system and shift back to success habits.

   “When you're in stress, think about what you can do to reset your nervous system and move back into your success habits.” — Kristen Boss [24:10]

3. Setting Clear, Actionable Tasks

   For individuals with ADHD or similar challenges, Kristen emphasizes the importance of specificity in task setting to reduce overwhelm and increase focus.

   “Sit down and write two emails. My brain can focus, but if it's too vague, there's ambiguity, it feeds chaos.” — A Guest Speaker [23:27]

Conclusion

Episode 224 of The Kristen Boss Podcast offers invaluable insights into the psychology of consistency in business. Kristen Boss skillfully navigates the complexities of maintaining steady growth by addressing the tendency to react only during crises and providing actionable strategies to foster sustainable habits. By sharing personal anecdotes and engaging in meaningful dialogue with her students, Kristen empowers entrepreneurs to shift from a crisis-driven mindset to one of consistent, volume-based activity that ensures long-term success.

Notable Quotes

• “People only wake up when their paycheck starts to inevitably decline.” — Kristen Boss [04:50]
• “What you’re doing is your nervous system is just in a flight state. It resets your nervous system.” — Kristen Boss [25:20]
• “We have to educate your teams to understand when it’s time to crank up the volume.” — Kristen Boss [14:54]

Final Thoughts

This episode is a must-listen for entrepreneurs striving to build resilient businesses. Kristen Boss not only identifies the pitfalls of inconsistency but also provides a roadmap for overcoming them through self-awareness, strategic planning, and the cultivation of sustainable habits. Whether you're navigating through personal challenges or seeking to elevate your business practices, the insights shared in this coaching conversation are both practical and transformative.

Transcript

[Unknown Speaker]

I see you with brand new eyes no, I've never been so sure Take my head let's run into the unknown this is the beginning.

[Kristen Boss]

You're listening to the Kristen Boss podcast. I'm your host, Kristen Boss. As a best selling author and performance coach, I'm on a mission to share about sustainable and purposeful approaches to both business and life. Each week I bring relevant topics that I believe are necessary to create a life of purpose, significance and meaning. Entrepreneurship is about so much more than growing your bottom line. It's about who you are becoming in the process and building a life that is truly extraordinary. Entrepreneurship is really just the beginning.

[Unknown Speaker]

Hey bosses. Welcome to another episode of the podcast. This week is a little bit different. I was meeting with my six and seven figure ear students that I mentor that went through leadership school. And this is a snippet from a coaching I did with them this week where we talked about trends I was seeing with how people work this business and how we tend to show up when we feel a crisis and what gets in the way of consistency. And as I was talking to them, I felt like, you know what, this is a really valuable conversation that I think more people need to hear. So what you're going to hear in this episode is you're going to hear how I talk about, uh, why people aren't working consistently and why I believe social sellers only know how to work in a crisis and how to fix that and then how to actually understand your success, your success habits. And you also have something called stress habits. And when you move out of your success habits, we often find ourselves in our stress habits. So I know this conversation is gonna be enlightening for many of you. Maybe it's gonna give you a couple aha moments. So I hope you enjoy listening to this candid conversation I have. As I' my six and seven figure earners, I hope you enjoy if your business.

If this was a matter of keeping your lights on, what would you do? And the responses were fascinating to me. Overwhelmingly in the first five minutes, everyone was like, or first like. However many seconds of people responding were like, I'd hustle my tail feathers off, I'd work harder, I'd stop making excuses, I'd go big. And all I heard was BS rhetoric. All I heard. Not one person gave me an action item. Not one person said, I'd be out there talking to as many people as possible. I would be doing three reels a day. I would be reaching out to 50 people a day. I was shocked. I was like, I'm like, if your lights had to stay on, what would you do? And they were like, work harder. Hustle. And I'm like, what? No. And I like, I had to tell him. I was like, no, no, no, no. Behavior wise, activity wise. What would you do if you had to keep the lights on and you had rent to pay? With this business, that's when all of the behaviors and the actions popped up. And then I said, okay, so why aren't you doing them? Why aren't you doing those things when you know that it would explode your paycheck, completely change your circumstances? Why? You know, you see, you just wrote down all your answers. So why aren't you? And it's because. I think it's because in their mind, I think people in this business don't know how to work when they are not in a crisis, a financial crisis. It's like, people only know. And I think it's because we market to financial crisis. Does that make sense? Like, are you hurting? Are you struggling? Are you broke? And then people get out of hurt. Broke and struggling, and then they get complacent, and then they stop working. And then they get comfortable until the paycheck starts to decline, and then it starts to hurt. And then they're in financial pain. They're like, oh, no, no, I need to work again. Instead of like, hold on. But if you were a 9 to 5, you would just keep working. But in this business model, it's like the, the activity matches. I find the feelings of crisis. It's like if I feel I'm in crisis, my activity goes up. If I'm not in crisis, I don't act. I don't work at all. And I cool. So you're a crisis social seller. You're an emergency only business owner. You only open when things are tight for you. It's like, oh, my favorite donut shop. It's closed. Yeah, they're, they're, they don't need, they're good. They're sitting in, you know, all kinds of cash right now. They don't need us. And then like, oh, no, the donut shop. They need to make rent. They opened up again. It's like, it's, it's, it's irresponsible business ownership. We have to have this conversation. It's like people only wake up when their paycheck starts to inevitably decline. For that, that, that gal that is like, oh, I need the money. And she had, like, had a very lively plush business. She doesn't understand the compounding effects of inactivity everything compounds. What people don't understand is that the law of. The law of compounding effect goes both ways. Every day you don't make a post, you don't show up in your business compounds into a declining paycheck. Every day you show up, it compounds. The problem is that we have delayed results on both sides in this business so that, like, I don't make a post today, I don't show up for my business today, there's not an immediate negative impact on my paycheck. Right. So there's not. Because there's not immediate pain. They don't associate the inactivity with pain. They're not like, oh, this is bad. They're just like, it's okay. Same way that they don't associate activity with results because they're like, well, my activity today, it's no different. It's no different than fitness. I'm like, are you gonna go run on the treadmill for an hour and then get on the scale and expect to drop 5 pounds? No. And if you're like me, you'll probably gain 2 pounds of water weight from doing it. Right. And so it's like, why do we have that? We have, like, we're aware of that in. In the gym. Being like, that's silly for me to.

Go to the gym one day and.

Expect to lose five pounds. It's also like, we have to understand, okay, it's me going to the gym every day for long periods of time. Like, oh, it's not going to. Is going to the gym today going to give me any result? No. Is going to the gym tomorrow going to give me any result? Probably not. When will it start to give me results? 14 days, 21 days, 30 days, 45 days. Right. It's no different with, like, negative habits of, like, okay, every day I choose to sit down and don't. Like, one day of binging on Haagen Dazs isn't going to do anything every day. It eventually is going to compound. So it's like, we are just, like, from atomic habits. Like, who we are is always a reflection of whatever habit we are compounding, no matter what. So it's like, that's why we have to educate your teams to be like, all right, here's. Here's the. Here's the catch. 2020. In this business, there's no instant results, positive or negative, which means when you don't show up, you don't see an immediate negative consequence for that, which is kind of sneaky because then we think maybe we can get away. It's almost, it's almost always both on the front, like on the positive and the negative. It's almost always a 90 day reflection, both sides. If someone's like, my paychecks way down. Be like, cool, let's look at the last 90 days. What were you doing 90 days ago? Almost always paychecks up. Cool. What have you been doing the last 90 days? And I've been doing this long enough to know, like, I start to see, like the 45 day mark is where it typically starts to. To compound a little bit, where we start to really see some evidence. Day 60, hello. 90 is when I really believe the evidence is there. Like, boom, we got it. We're compounding, we're going. But everybody else is just too impatient. They're like, what's going on? What's going on? Because we've been conditioned as a society to trade our time for money. It's an employee mindset. It's just like, oh, I put in 20 hours a week this week. Where's my money? I'm like, well, you're not in a nine to five. You're in. This is like a startup. You got to put in a lot of time before you actually start to see a return. And most people don't have the mental grit to do that. So, yeah, that's my lecture on that.

I have been in this, like, push, like pushing to get back to where I was and then like some kind of crisis will happen. I get Covid. I caught Covid for the first time back in January. I developed Long Covid. I, you know, started to kind of come out of it. And then, you know, I went to. I'm having a total mind, A Covid mind blank right now. The in. In Denver.

Yes. Rising.

Yes. And I was like really, like primed and ready to go. And then when I got back, I got sick again with like a stomach bug. And then it was end of school. And I'm finding myself kind of riding these waves of like, almost back to breakthrough. And then I'm like crashing and burning really hard. And it's clearly a pattern for me. And so I'm trying to kind of figure out what the root of that is. Like, I don't know if it's all that I'm too optimistic or if, oh, maybe I'm having a hard time, like, planning for when things aren't going to go the way I need them to go.

Okay, so let's do this.

Yeah.

This is such a good. I love coaching on this. Because it's so good. There are seasons and they are very rare and far and few between when we can work in idealistic conditions, when it's perfect, when it's prime. And I would say in those conditions, that's when we can put on the rocket boosters. So to give you an example, and I hope I'm going to tie this back, well over a year ago is when I decided to get really serious about my health journey. And I had like £30 to lose. And I also went on sabbatical. And during that sabbatical, I was away from my business. I was in the mountains. I wasn't eating out. I wasn't like, I was away from like vacations and all those things. So I had this like 12 week window of time that was the most idealistic conditions for me to focus on my fitness. Like, I could walk two hours a day, I could go to the gym whenever I wanted. I wasn't eating out. So I was in this like vacuum where it was very easy to achieve my results. I mean, it still is a lot of work, but I was able to like lose a lot in the, in those 12 weeks. And then I had to learn. Okay. Then I got home and then went back into business and suddenly I couldn't walk whenever, I couldn't go to the gym whenever. So then I realized what was, what happened was I had to figure out how to engage in the habits in less than optimal conditions. And that was where sustainability came in. And so what happened then is when I was in my idealistic environment, I was, I was averaging a pound and a half to two pounds a week weight loss. It was great. It was very consistent. When I went into reality and had to actually build sustainable habits along less than ideal conditions, it went down to like half a pound to one pound a week. And I was like, okay, I just need to adjust my expectations that this is what results looks like in these seasons. And then I, starting in January, so I was like, cool. And I thought I was, by now I thought it was going to be totally at my goal week goal weight. I've still got like 12, 13 pounds I want to lose. And I kept having this like, all right, we're going to ramp up. I'm going to like do it again. I'm going to get into a cut. I'm going to like count my macros and get up to 15k steps a day. And then like there was constant like, either business emergencies, family crisis, all these things. My travel schedule is absolutely insane this year. And where I was like, in my. Living on my suitcase. Like, there's one point where I was gone, like, like, one week out of every month. It was just bonkers. And so that's when I realized I had to adjust my goals to the season I was in while also maintaining my minimum viable success success habits. Like, all right, then what does success look like in this season? And that is where I shifted my goal from weight loss to the skill of maintenance.

Okay?

And my coach said this. He's like, kristen, people don't have a weight loss problem. People have a weight maintenance problem. And I feel the same in business. Like, people don't have a, you know, like a result problem. They have a consistency problem. They have a maintenance problem. Like, they don't know how to consistently generate results in their business and understand that it's a volume dial instead of an on off switch. I see so many people work this business with on off switch instead of a volume dial being like, hey, in seasons like this, I'm at a 2. And seasons like this, I can crank up the volume a little bit and understanding, like, how. How is it time for me to crank up the volume now? Are we always supposed to be at an 11? I was just thinking of a spinal tap. This one goes.

Blow out your eardrums if you were.

Is this. Is it always supposed to be an 11? No, we're not wired that way. But, like, there's times where we have to be in sprint and there's times we have to be in recovery, but we're always moving. That's the thing. And so for me, I changed my goal. I'm like, is weight loss my goal? No. And what was interesting was I kept judging myself for not being able to lose weight. I was like, God, it's so frustrating. Why can't I? Why can't I? Why can't I? And I was just like, wait, hold on. Maybe I actually need to see that the win here is maintaining my weight loss. One year ago, I would have been eating my body weight in donuts. Like, I would have just been. All my stress habits would have shown up instead of my success habits. Does that make sense? And so for me, I was like, all right, we're real. We're repositioning. We're redefining what success is in the season. I'm figuring out what a sustainable habits look like. So instead of 15k steps a day, it became 8 to 10k steps a day. Instead of lifting 4 times a week, it became 2 times a week. Instead of, like, being in Cut macros. I was in maintenance macros. So I, like, adjusted, but all the habits stayed. And then I had maintenance. I was like, this is. This is actually a pretty big deal in the. One of the highest stress seasons of my life. It's actually a pretty big deal that all these habits have stayed. And just now, just now I'm in August. I thought I'd be at my goal weight in August. I'm just adjusting my expectations and being like. Just now I'm like, all right, I have the capacity, the bandwidth, the time, the schedule to turn up the volume, and now I'm going to do it. So I would just say for you, maybe we need to evaluate what is your success habits that you can sustain even when life is in upheaval and you get sick and the uncontrollable happens, because that's life.

I love that idea, though, about, like, the stress habits taking over, because that is certainly something I do in one of my stress habits is I have to kind of like go into my hidey hole a little bit and just kind of focus on what's in front of me. And so I think there's something to kind of unpack there for me. That's good.

Yeah. Our stress habits and our success habits.

[Kristen Boss]

Hey there. I just want to interrupt this show.

[Unknown Speaker]

Real quick to give you an important announcement. I know if you're like a lot of my listeners, you're listening here week after week, maybe binging my podcast and trying to take all the notes and really implement it into your business. But here's the thing. There's something between knowing what to do and actually doing and following through and trying to piece everything together on your own. Well, you don't have to do that. I don't want you struggling any more than you have to be, which is why I want you to check out the Hub. The Hub is the ultimate place for you to learn the foundational habits and skills such as connecting, building relationships, writing content, and how to sell without feeling icky in the online space. It is the ultimate place for you to learn the sustainable hab and business skills in the social selling space. The other offer you need to look at is if you are ready to expand into your cold market, grow your audience, learn the skills of lead generation, talking to a target market, and learn sustainable business strategies that really are evergreen. No matter what business model you're in. You're going to want to check out the Social Selling Academy. The links are in the show notes.

Of course.

We have all kinds of testimonials Because I've helped thousands of students just like you. So be sure to check that out. Now back to the show.

There's also going back to the stress habits and success habits. I also think I was talking to, I do political coaching and there's a prominent figure that I coach and I was talking to him about, he understands like, here, here's how I perform when I'm in optimal condition. So here's my success habits or my peak line habits. And then he's very aware of his bottom line habits. Like this is who I am when all of my stress comes out. And I said, what we have to actually build awareness around is your check engine lights. We actually have to figure out when you're about to. When you're about to move into stress habits and leave your, like, what are your stress line indicators? Where is your check engine light so we actually don't move into. I'm going to use some AA language. They call it like your bottom. Your bottom line behavior. It's like, there's your top lines. This is who you are in your health. And then your bottom lines is like, that's you drinking in a bar behind a dumpster or whatever it is. So it's like, it's like, all right, what's my drinking behind a dumpster? Bottom lines that show up in my business. What is my bottom line behaviors and then what's my top line behaviors? My top line behaviors is this. And then where is my check engine line about to move into? Bottom line behavior where all my stress habits are going to show up? This, this Self awareness is key to longevity in business. It's key to health, it's key to stress management. It's so important and understanding. Like, ooh, I've left, I've left my success habits and I'm about to go full swing into my stress. Yeah, I'd just be curious if you guys, if you guys wanna. I'd love to hear what your. We'll call them. I'm like, AA language. Like top line behavior. Like, what, what would you call your top lines? Like, this is like, I know I'm in health and I'm doing well in my business. When I'm doing these things. Throw some stuff out for me.

The big one is that I am actually sticking to the hours that I've sat to work.

That's so good. Holding to business hours.

Once I started deviating from that, that's when it starts to get a little messy.

Okay, so what would your check engine light be?

When I am either there's probably it can wobble either way. It can be that I'm avoiding working during the times that I say I'm going to and then I start to stress out and it snowballs and then I don't want to check all the millions of messages I have or I'm working.

Your work. What do you do? This is the technique. You might have it?

Oh yeah, my buffering. I have some really great buffering. A lot of it I love, I love reading Reddit for some reason. It's like the thing I started doing when I was up in the middle of the night seeing my kids because it kept me awake but it wasn't so stimulating that it like woke me up. So that's, that's sort of like one of my things.

But okay, yeah, perfect.

This is cleaning. Cleaning.

Okay, cleaning. What in particular, like is there one area you always go to where you're like, I start cleaning my countertops or I start decluttering my office or it's.

Usually my kids clothes because that's just, you know, a never ending season. I have a three and a six year old and it's like a full time job managing their clothing.

It's unbelievable.

It's unbelievable.

These are your check engine lights. When you kids clothes and Reddit, that's when you check in with yourself and be like, oh, hold up, hold up. This is, I'm leaving, I'm moving in distress. Why? What do I need? And then I would ask you in that moment, what might you need to give to yourself to move you out of stress? Because your brain's like, if I pulled laundry and read it, but that's like, that's, that's like, it doesn't actually move you out of stress, it delays your stress, it compounds it because guess what happens?

It makes it worse.

Your work is still waiting for you when you're done.

I mean I think for me probably having some kind of like rubric or like checklist of things that I can do to sort of break down whatever it is that I'm hiding from would be helpful. So whether it's like, you know, if I'm avoiding talking to my team because, you know, I have a million things, it's like how to prioritize which ones I respond to first because that's, I have ADHD and it's very hard for me to, I mean everything is, it is a bright, glaring siren. So it's hard at times to be like, okay, this one is actually more important or this, you know, conversation needs to happen before I You know, respond to a bunch of clients or something like that.

So is this like, before you sit down to your work, you create a list of priorities?

I think so, yeah.

Okay, cool.

Now, I think if I, if I, if I broke it down, it would be less overwhelming. And if I had, like, even if it's just writing down, like three things that I'm going to do in the next 20 minutes or something, it would probably be helpful.

I find I have ADHD as well. I find with vagueness creates a lot of room for overwhelm. Like, work. Like, what kind of work? All the work that, like, no. Sit down and write two emails. Okay. My brain immediately can focus, but if it's too vague, there's ambiguity. Feeds chaos.

Absolutely.

Yeah. So, but let's just talk about real quick, because when you're in stress, like, when stress is starting to come into play, that's where actually we need to think about care being like, what might I need to give myself? Like, I'm not sure. If you were in Reddit, I was like, let's go build a checklist that would move you out of stress. Like, I don't know if it's like, I'm gonna go wash my face. I'm gonna go. Actually, I would say this is huge if you could, because what you're doing is your nervous system is just in a flight state. Michelle takes so many showers. Yeah, but it does. What it does is it actually. It resets your nervous system. Even if you were to put your hands in cold water, really cold water, and you shook it out really fast, it resets your nervous system. So when you're in flight, when you're, when you're on Reddit, when your kids close, that's where you're like, oh, go stick my hands in cold water, shake it out. And it's going to, it's going to help reset your nervous system a little bit and recalibrate, and then you can be like, all right, now I can move into. That happened because I didn't give my brain an area of one area of focus. So even if you're just like, what is one task?

Yeah. I mean, even if, like, I, I was just thinking maybe like, go for a quick walk or hop on the treadmill, depending on the season.

Okay, I love this. I want you to write these down. These are like, this is what I do when I move into stress to reset my nervous system to get me back into my success habits. So I like that you're like, get on my treadmill for 15 minutes. Like whatever it is. Like cold, cold water on my hands, cold water on my face, whatever it is. Washing, like washing your face or just even rinsing your face could be a huge one if you're not wearing makeup that day. You know, whatever it is. Aerobic therapy can also be good, like smelling salt.

This is the beginning.

[Kristen Boss]

That's a wrap for today's episode.

[Unknown Speaker]

Listen, if you love what you heard.

[Kristen Boss]

Here today, I would love for you.

[Unknown Speaker]

To leave a real quick rating and a review.

[Kristen Boss]

This helps the show get discovered by new people. Be sure to take a screenshot of today's episode and shout us out on Instagram. We'll shout you right back out. If you'd like to find additional resources or discover how to work with me, head to www.kristenboss.com.

[Unknown Speaker]

It starts right.