5 uncomfortable moments that changed the trajectory of my business

Now in my fifth year of business, I can see looking back on the journey there were a few times when I was REALLY uncomfortable. But because hindsight is 20/20 I know those moments actually brought about a huge amount of growth.

WHEN I NICHED HARD.

About a year into business I was quite happy doing anything for anyone. I started realising I was being entirely ineffective in running my business that way. I started niching to rural and then into female-run rural businesses.  Every time I decided to niche it was uncomfortable. 

I made the decision to stop services and focus on coaching. That niche was uncomfortable as well. 

Literally, I can look back over the course of my business and attribute these moments to future growth. I remember specific scenarios of turning down work or saying it wasn’t a good fit because it didn’t align with where I wanted my business to go in the future. Saying no to money is always hard- but it meant I was saying yes to something else.

WHEN I TURNED DOWN GOVERNMENT FUNDING.

Look I’m not silly, funding is the golden goose egg that is unattainable in the small business world. I was happily coasting along delivering heavily subsidised training to clients across WA, QLD, and NT. 

It was an amazing opportunity, but I realised it was diminishing the value of my work. It also was rather unsustainable given the volume of clients I was working with. 

Saying no to this opportunity was incredibly scary. But as before when I said no to this, I was able to yes to other things.

WHEN I INVESTED $6.5K.

Look, investment is scary, I totally understand. I had invested in my business in a few ways, but this was the first time I said yes to a high-level coaching program. 

It scared me. A lot. But what it did was make me WORK. I had to make my business work. It was a serious commitment to my future. And that investment came back tenfold. Like actually. 

So when I think about investing now, I am much less scared of the price tag and much more excited about the opportunities that could come back.

WHEN I RAISED MY PRICES.

Raising prices is hard if you can’t explain the value behind the price tag. It was actually a mindset stretch for my first price rise. My coach and I worked through this together and I could tell it was clearly in my best interest to repackage, up the value and the price. 

And to be honest, I believe this uncomfortable moment has gone on to serve my clients much better. We are working together longer and I’m able to support them through tremendous change.

WHEN I PLANNED MY SECOND BABY.

Obviously, we were elated to know that number two was on its way. We didn’t have an easy journey and so we were over the moon with our little June baby. 

But from a business perspective, and as a person that works in four-month blocks. I was a bit uncomfortable with the future of my business. 

I made some major decisions for my business future and the time off I had planned. A lot of outsourcing, a lot of planning, and a lot of trusting the process. Definitely a different kind of uncomfortable but now I see that it ultimately has allowed for greater scalability in my business. Which is a huge win.