BBC 013 : How to Easily Identify a Client's Business Challenges

Better Business Coach Video Podcast: Sales Training | Proven Education | Actionable & Downloadable Worksheets

This worksheet forms the first part of your first paid client session and is used to re-unfreeze the client to the fact that they must embrace change to fix their current business challenges.

You may be thinking, “Why do we need to go through the unfreezing process again? Surely the client will want to get straight into fixing their issues.” After all, we did a full unfreeze in the Business Needs Analysis and now they have paid for our help. In reality, this is not the case. First, if you followed my advice in session 10, you booked this session two weeks after the Business Needs Analysis, and in small business, two weeks is like a decade. Their business challenges have probably changed and to be honest, they have probably forgotten what that challenge was and may be thinking, “Why did I agree to this coaching anyway?” This session will turn all that around.

I find that by completion of this template, I know I have them. They are pushing me to move to the next template and go from watching the clock because they want to get back to work to watching the clock because they want to get as much done with you as possible.

Episode outline:

“Complexity is your enemy. Any fool can make something complicated. It is hard to make something simple.” – Sir Richard Branson

This is a very simple worksheet designed to be short and sweet, but sometimes simple is best. This is not meant to be an intervention, so don’t dwell on anything. Just ask the question, accept the information they tell, and move on. You are just looking for low lying fruit at this stage.

Question 1 – What are your major business challenges at the moment?

This answer can be vastly different from the Business Needs Analysis, so you need to ask the question again. This question is highly important as we will link everything from the following questions back to this challenge to obtain a successful unfreeze.

Most common answers will be:

• Cash flow
• Long ninety hour weeks
• Lack of staff performance

Remember the lessons from session 9: listen, don’t interrupt, and whatever they say is the right answer. This is what’s really keeping them up at night and the key to your long term engagement.

Question 2 – Rate each of the areas on the template using the scale 1-10 (put the number in the column which corresponds to the rating and the area of the business, 10 meaning things are great and 1 meaning things are bad.)

Try to stay as content free as possible. We are just asking to get a general feel, so just get the number and move on. Of course, some people will not be able to answer without giving you a full story. Remember that they may need to get this information off their chest, so let them speak. But move on as soon as you can.

Note: If the finances are down it is often a reflection of other areas.

Don’t be surprised when you get to internal processes and you hear the response, “What’s that?” When you explain that these are procedure manuals for sales, marketing, collections, recruitment, etc., you will generally hear, “What? I need to have procedures for all these things?” This should be magic to your ears as this means no succession planning, no sell-able asset, and in short – months of guaranteed coaching.

Important – Avoid the urge to say anything; don’t challenge, suggest or hint. Just listen.

What ever they tell you is correct. We are just trying to get their perception of where the problems lie at this stage. Take good notes though. What you think, see, and read between the lines will be valuable information for later. A good example of a time you will want to say something is when they tell you their customer service is great. All business owners think their customer service is great. All business owners are generally wrong, but bite your tongue for now and take good notes.

Question 3 – If rating is “Needs Attention” or “Bad” – write down dot points of what you have noticed in these areas:

Ask the client, “You said (category) was bad, what’s bad about it?” Then wait for the answer, however long that takes. If you don’t let them think about the answer, you may miss out on the real cherry that could mean months of coaching and a rapid change in the businesses trajectory.

If they still say nothing, here are some ideas:

• Finances – “Do you have regular reports?”
• Customer Service – How many referrals their staff gets compared to when they deliver the product or service.
• Internal Processes – “If I started work with you, what manual would I read to learn my job?”
• Employee Performance – “Are they doing what you want?”
• Marketing – “How are you getting your message out to the world? Is it working?”
• Sales – “Are you getting enough sales at the right level of profit?”

Again, whatever they say you must go with. Don’t challenge them, as they learn from you and as their awareness raises they will discover things are not as good in other areas too.

The re-unfreeze

Here we bring everything that the client suggested as bad back to their major business challenge and explain how it is connected. For example, if they said their major challenge was cash flow and we find they said their staff are also an issue, we can then explain that cash flow is clearly an issue in part because of ineffective staff, meaning you need more staff that cut into your profit.

The realisation that their challenges can be fixed is a massive relief for many clients. Don’t be surprised if there are a few tears. Now you are ready to move on to the next part of this session. This will follow very soon.

Important – Don’t forget, if their biggest challenge mentioned in the Business Needs Analysis still exists, you must work on that in this session. No problem. You should have finished this sheet in just 30-40 minutes and you have plenty of time for other templates and helping the client fix their problem from the last session. You will probably find the problem fixes itself or the solution arrives during this session anyway.

Download the “Where is My Business Now” worksheet!

Items/links mentioned:

1. BBC 007 : Part 2 of 2 – First FREE Worksheet – The Business Needs Analysis
2. BBC 009 : Listen & Succeed, It’s That Simple! Learn The 5 Keys To Active Listening
3. BBC 010 : 5 Steps To Selling Business Coaching Without Feeling Like You’re Selling
4. BBC 012 : 3 Steps To Effective Change Management

Don’t miss a thing:

As the podcast will have sessions both in video and audio, make sure you subscribe to both the audio and video versions of this podcast.

Here are the links:

Video podcast – Click here to subscribe

Audio podcast – Click here to subscribe

I can’t wait to share this content with you; it’s going to make such a difference in your business coaching business. I am really looking forward to hearing the stories of success that you have with your clients.

So please subscribe!

I look forward to spending the next sessions with you helping you to make the best business coaching business that you could possibly have.

To find out more about me or the show, feel free to check out:

My profile – https://matthewpollard.com/aboutmatthewpollard

The full show write- up – http://betterbusinesscoachpodcast.com