CAM Coach

DON’T LOOK BACK IN ANGER

Mark Shields, explains why the best way to put 2020 and 2021 behind us is to plan ahead for a brighter, more profitable future…

2020 and 2021 have been incredible challenging years for everyone including holistic practitioners although it’s bitter sweet for us as we are massively in demand at the moment and will be for some time. You may feel that you just don’t have time to plan ahead, or that so many factors affecting your practice are completely beyond your control, that planning seems pointless. Even working on your business plans in short bursts can mean a more successful future.

Start by looking back at what you can learn from the past year? Find the positives. What worked well for you? What aspects of your practice were you happy with? What didn’t work so well? What is working now that didn’t work before the pandemic? Income streams are different now are you capitalising on the online world? Are you embracing the learnings and move forwards?

It may well be that your attitude to your work has changed, so you need to ask yourself some questions about what you really want from your life. The pandemic meant that many people rethought their personal priorities and goals. It’s important to take some time for this, otherwise we can find that we’ve meandered on and have somehow ended up in a life that doesn’t make us feel happy and fulfilled.

Have you changed your perspective on things? What is important to you now that wasn’t before? Have you found a balance between time at work and time for other aspects of your life like seeing family and friends, hobbies or socialising?

Sometimes to move forward we need to take a few steps back. The most important action for any business owner right now is they have revisited their business planning and created a new plan going forward from 2022 taking into consideration all the learnings from the last 2 years.

Business planning top tips

Planning is often regarded as painful and a waste of time. When the world is changing rapidly, it’s easy to decide to go with the flow. I’ve worked with hundreds, if not thousands, of holistic therapists over the years. Let me tell you that every single successful holistic therapist I’ve met has prioritised business planning. Great skills will get you nowhere without a plan and spending time and resources on building your business.

It’s important to understand that when it comes to business planning we look at the short, medium and long term plan of any business. This often goes overlooked and business owners focus on just one of those periods – if any at all. Ensuring your business plan caters for the short, medium, and long term future of your business means, typically, looking at plans for 1, 3 and 5 years. You will need to be flexible and able to adapt, as the business world and market changes as we progress into the next few years.

n Short term plan = 6-12 months n Medium term plan = 12-36 months n Long term plan = 36-60 months

You should commit to forecasting your business results in line with your short, medium and long term plan. These are some of the things you will need to predict. You may have others to add to the list depending on your location, modalities or expected returns. As a minimum, you need to consider the anticipated numbers of appointments, income levels, activity, your different income streams and costs.

Short term plan (6-12 months)

This plan would include your activities in the next year:

Medium term plan (12-36 months)

This plan should include the things you’ll be doing in one to three years’ time:

n Ongoing review of Action Plan n More advanced marketing campaigns n Joint ventures n Adding new income streams n Media marketing n Personal development n Adding new therapeutic disciplines n Formulation and addition to product range n Review/change of premises n Effective change management programme n Ongoing CPD n Data marketing

Long term plan (36-60 months)

Longer term planning considerations should include:

n Business development n Effective change management programme n A review of short and medium term business plan n A more strategic view of your overall business proposition n Merging with or acquiring new businesses n Product development n Keeping up with economic and legislative change n Attainment of further qualifications n Ongoing CPD n Strategic business development

Achieving success is one thing; consistently sustaining a successful practice is something entirely different. If we look at the success ratios of any CAM practice, more than 30% fail in the first 12 months and only 8% remain profitable five years on. This is why it’s imperative you ensure you have a five-year business plan, split into the three segments of short, medium and long term.

Although it may appear that the three categories above are divided into three action plans, they are not. It’s one plan and one plan only. A good practitioner should have one business plan including short, medium and long term actions. This is how you keep up and manage change and stay ahead of the competition. You simply include short medium and long term actions in the same plan and review the plan every month. The key is to apportion your time in a sensible way as often, short term actions seem more pressing than an action you have five years to complete. The key is to dedicate your time to your business plan using the following time weightings:

n Short term plan 70% n Medium term plan 20% n Long term plan 10%

Think of these as three juggling balls you have to keep in the air – all three all the time. Writing a business plan is important, writing a meaningful business plan that captures the short, medium and long term future of your business is paramount to the long-term sustainable future of your practice. n

MARK SHIELDS is often given the accolade of being amongst the

n Start up actions n Renting of room n Ordering of stationary n Creating first website n First attempt at advertising and marketing

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UK’s leading NLP and Coaching experts, known as the CAM COACH named after

his book of the same name Mark Shields

today works with delegates from all corners of the world who choose the Life Practice

Academy as their to learn the powerful Life Practice Transformational Coaching Methodology and proven CAM COACH

success in business strategies. Find out more at https://courses.thecamcoach. com/p/home