This episode of the Maximize Business Value podcast is the second of a three-part series, where host Tom Bronson gives listeners short, specific actions to prepare for 2021. In part 2, Tom walks you through the Future Clarity Mapping Tool, which can be drawn by hand or found at www.masterypartners.com/ebooks. This guide will help business owners transcribe their company goals to determine what needs to be done to achieve them. Tune in to actively clarify your future!
Tom Bronson is the founder and President of Mastery Partners, a company that helps business owners maximize business value, design exit strategy, and transition their business on their terms. Mastery utilizes proven techniques and strategies that dramatically improve business value that was developed during Tom’s career 100 business transactions as either a business buyer or seller. As a business owner himself, he has been in your situation a hundred times, and he knows what it takes to craft the right strategy. Bronson is passionate about helping business owners and has the experience to do it. Want to chat more or think Tom can help you? Reach out at tom@masterypartners.com or check out his book, Maximize Business Value, Begin with The Exit in Mind (2020).
Mastery Partners, where our mission is to equip business owners to Maximize Business Value so they can transition their business on their terms. Our mission was born from the lessons we’ve learned from over 100 business transactions, which fuels our desire to share our experiences and wisdom so you can succeed.
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Tom Bronson is a serial entrepreneur and business owner. He is currently the founder and President of Mastery Partners, Mastery Mergers & Acquisitions, and the Business Transition Summit. All three companies empower business owners to maximize business value and serve business owners in different capacities to help them achieve their dream exit. As a business owner, Tom has been in your situation a hundred times and knows what it takes to craft the right strategy. Bronson is passionate about helping business owners and has the experience to do it. Tom has two books to help business owners on their journey to a dream exit: "Maximize Business Value Playbook," (2023), and "Maximize Business Value, Begin with the EXIT in Mind," (2020). Both are available on Amazon.
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Announcer (5s):
Welcome to the maximize business value podcast. This podcast is brought to you by mastery partners, where our mission is to equip business owners, to maximize business value so they can transition their business on their terms. Our mission was born from the lessons we've learned from over 100 business transactions, which fuels our desire to share our experiences and wisdom so you can succeed. Now, here's your host CEO of mastery partners, Tom Bronson.
Tom Bronson (36s):
Hi, this is Tom Bronson and welcome to maximize business value. A podcast for business owners who are passionate about building long-term sustainable value in their businesses. So this episode is the second of a three part series, which is my gift to you this holiday season, as we finish out 2020 and get ready for what lies ahead in 2021, this three part series includes short, actionable things that you can do to really move the needle in 2021. In the first part of the series last week, you learned what it means to be a go giver this week.
Tom Bronson (1m 17s):
We're going to focus on bringing your future into clarity and next week we'll learn how to take massive action to accomplish the goals that we'll define. So let's get started. Do you have goals? I mean, do you really have goals that you want to achieve? And I mean, not just goals in your mind, do you write down your goals? Because in my opinion, if they're not in writing, then I say that they're just dreams, right? In meaning to write and articulate your goals. So each year I go through an exercise that the really clearly define my goals.
Tom Bronson (1m 58s):
And today I'm going to share that process with you. I didn't invent the process by the way. It's one that I learned from Dean Graziosi. He's a fellow follower of Tony Robbins and he helps people really define and achieve their goals. You can learn more about him on the internet, just type his name in order to help you with this exercise though, we've developed a one page tool that you can use to follow along in starting to define your goals. You can download it, the it's free tool, and you can download it on our website and the free stuff section, just go to www.masterypartners.com and click on the free stuff.
Tom Bronson (2m 44s):
And you'll find it there it's it's are clarifying the future goal. So, but if you'd rather just use a piece of paper, you can do that. You know, I've got to get a piece of paper right in front of me that I can do that with follow along with you. So right across top of the paper, or you can download the, the tool and right, clarifying the future across the top and be sure to date it because I actually saved mine from year to year. And I refer back to them at the end of the year to see how I did in attempting to reach my goals. So, so once you have that on the paper, then you can draw one vertical and one horizontal line on the paper.
Tom Bronson (3m 24s):
So you can divide it into four boxes, inbox, one at the top left label it box one, write the current truth. In the top right, write box to two is your one year goals. Bottom left is box three. Why the goals are important and box score bottom. Right? Last one is capabilities needed. Okay. So let's start filling out the boxes, starting with box one. So this is your current truth. This is the state that the business is in, or that you're in personally, if these are personal goals, you can do this exercise for both personal and business now, but it's so important.
Tom Bronson (4m 12s):
I want you to be honest, no, one's gonna see this, but you, unless you share it with them. And so you need to be honest with yourself, because if you can't be honest with yourself about where you are, you're never be able to build a path to where you want to be. So in the box, in the first box, I want you to be honest and think about the current state of things. What's your write down. Anything that comes to mind about your current status? What is the reality? Is your business not performing the way you want it to? Is your income less than what you desire? Are, are you where you really thought you would be already?
Tom Bronson (4m 52s):
Don't be afraid to express your feelings here, because remember that you don't have to share this with anyone but yourself. And so, so here are a few examples from my clarity tool exercise from a year ago, I'll be doing this clarity tool with you this week, but, but this is from mine a year ago. And I wanted to share with you some of the things that I put on there, just to show you how honest I am with myself. So it's important to be able to do that and to show you that I'm exposing my vulnerability. And by exposing my vulnerability, it actually spurs me to action.
Tom Bronson (5m 35s):
So I'm opening myself up to be ver, you know, with myself, here's, here's the tool that I'm going to be using and reading from today. So, so from last year, my current truth was my business was past of where I thought it would be when I founded it two years prior, the business was breaking even, which is not where I expected to be at that point. And the business was struggling to identify and connect with the right people who need this year. The message. Those were three of the things that I put in that again, this is for my business, not for personal.
Tom Bronson (6m 15s):
Okay. So I encourage you now to either hit pause or, or, or stop the video if you're watching this or pause the audio, if you're listening to it as a podcast and just take the time to fill out your own truth and remember to quote one of my favorite movies of all time, the princess bride be honest. This is for posterity. Okay, go ahead and hit pause. Now, if you want to and go fill in your current truth, okay. Now that we're back, let's move on to box two, one year goals. Now in this box, I want you to try time travel for a little bit with me.
Tom Bronson (6m 56s):
I want you to go to a year from now and state your goals as if we were looking back at things that you've already accomplished, state them. If as if you have already achieved them. Now, this is really, really important. It helps get us, get our mind in the proper framework so that we can finish the rest of the tool. So state them as achievements, not as future dreams. So again, from, from my clarity tool from last year, here's what I said, my business doubled over the last year. Number two, my business is profitable.
Tom Bronson (7m 38s):
Number three, my business is debt-free. And so, so I stated them a year ago as if they had already happened. And it's really important for you to go do that. So, so also in addition to the, Oh, I've got more, I have launched three new programs to provide business owners with the tools they need to build long-term value. And then finally, I am constantly attracting the right type of clients who want and need our services. So pause here and fill out box two with your one-year goals, stating them as if you had already achieved them.
Tom Bronson (8m 20s):
Go ahead. I'll wait. Okay. Next let's move on to the why, why are these goals so important to you? Why do you need to achieve These goals and what will doing so mean for you? Okay. So again, from my, my examples that I have in my box three from last year is I love helping people. And this is the best way I know to help business owners achieve their ideal outcome. Number two, I love my family. And by having a thriving business, I'm able to provide for them better than I can today.
Tom Bronson (9m 1s):
Number three, because my business is profitable. I have the freedom and the additional resources I need to grow the business to, to help more people. And then number four, I love meeting new people and learning about businesses. So these are why my goals, the things that I wanted to achieve earlier on are important to me. I really do love helping people. I get satisfaction from that. I love, I love helping businesses. I love learning. I'm a lifelong learner, as you already know. So, so pause now and go fill out why these goals are so important to you.
Tom Bronson (9m 43s):
Okay? Now that you're back, finally, let's move on to box four. The capabilities needed to achieve my goals. Now it's important that this is not making a list of the, of the tactics. It's not making a list of things that you need to do. It is the capabilities that you will need to develop in yourself or in your business in order to reach your goals. So we'll get to the tactics in a minute because that's an important next step, but stay focused on the capabilities that you need to develop again, from, from my tool last year, here's what I said.
Tom Bronson (10m 26s):
I need to create mass, a massive funnel and pipeline of prospective clients through marketing. I need to have an automated way to nurture my prospective clients. I need a way to systematically measure my results to ensure that I'm practicing for my goals. I need a way to create, and curate, a massive amount of content to feed the programs I want to offer. And finally, I need to develop a system to feed my mind daily, to ensure that I stay at peak performance and reach my goals.
Tom Bronson (11m 7s):
So, so there you are stop right now and write down the capabilities that you need to develop in order to achieve your goals. Okay, now that you have filled out the form and you've been able to articulate your current truth, your one-year goals stated as if they've already happened, why these goals are important to you and the capabilities you need to develop in order to achieve those goals. Now, you can finally think about the tactics that you will need to get those in order to get those capabilities so that you can achieve your goals.
Tom Bronson (11m 48s):
I write the tactics on the back of the page, right? It just gives me a place to sort of make a list. If you will. For me, some of the tactics that I included last year were research how to write a podcast or how does a start a podcast and then get it started, which literally we achieved that right? Consistently write a blog post every week, but them to achieve that since April develop a newsletter that will get valuable information into the hands of the right people every week check box, there develop a curriculum or a masterclass we've just finished that one.
Tom Bronson (12m 29s):
I'm very excited about the announcements that are about to come up in the next couple of weeks about our new masterclass that starts in January. So more to come on that that would've taken us a long time to get there. Here's a good one calendar meeting my mind every day. So I've put a link on my calendar to kind of a daily mind feed for me. Sometimes it's, it's about being thankful. Sometimes it's about being generous. Sometimes it's, you know, quotes from a book. Sometimes it's biblical quotes and references, but, but I calendar that every day. So that I go and do that, you know, as one of the first activities that I do every day, feed my mind, get it woken up.
Tom Bronson (13m 16s):
So, so et cetera, et cetera, you've got tactics that you can add to your list. So there you have it. Once. Once you've got that, now you have a tool to clearly map your future success. I hope that you will use this tool to help you get clarity around your goals and what you need to do to achieve them. Be sure to do this exercise because next week, we're going to wrap up this series on how to take massive action in 2021 to achieve your goals. I hope you tune in because I'm going to reveal my secret weapon, that getting things done.
Tom Bronson (13m 57s):
This is the maximize business value podcast, where we give practical advice to business Owners on how to build long-term sustainable value in your business. Be sure to tune in each week. And if you found this on YouTube, click subscribe, please. Once we get to a certain number, then we can do some cool branding things, but otherwise be sure that you subscribe or follow us wherever you found this podcast and be sure to comment. We love comments and we'll respond to all them. So until next time, this is Tom Bronson, and I am reminding you to get clarity around your future so that you can maximize the value
Announcer (14m 44s):
Thank you for tuning in to the maximize business value podcast. With Tom Bronson. This podcast is brought to you by mastery partners, where mission is to equip business owners to maximize business value so they can transition on their terms on how to build long-term sustainable business value and get free value building tools by visiting our website, www.masterypartners.com that's master with a Y mastery partners.com.
Announcer (15m 29s):
Check it out.
Tom Bronson (15m 30s):
<inaudible> that was perfect. I wouldn't make any changes on that.