Create A Vision For Your Business Without Being Cliché (Step By Step Plan)

0:02Mazda has been named Consumer Reports' safest new car brand. It starts with our approach. Every Mazda comes standard with proactive safety features. So you're more aware of what's around you, more focused on the road ahead, and ready before problems ever start. Mazda. More of what matters most to you. Go to mazdausa.com to learn more. Consumer Reports does not endorse or promote any product. Running a small business can feel like a real rollercoaster. The total solutions advantage only from Comcast Business can help keep everything on the rails. It's the largest, fastest, fiber-powered network designed for 100 % reliability with business internet and wireless connect.

0:45Plus gig speeds with security and equipment included and a five-year price lock. Get started for just$60 a month for 12 months when you add wireless connect to a qualifying internet package. Limited time offer. Restrictions apply. Call for details. Are you working incredibly hard, showing up every day, putting in the long hours? But when somebody asks you, what's your company's vision? You have no idea where you're actually going. You have a vague sense of wanting to grow. You have a feeling that you want more freedom. You want more revenue. You want more impact. But you have no clear vision. And without a real vision, in my experience, every decision is harder.

1:25It becomes more of a guess. Every hire is a guess. Every product that you build starts feeling like a guess. And this is because you have no clear picture of what you are actually building towards. What is the North Star? What are you trying to accomplish? And that is a major problem when you're trying to build for the long term. But don't worry, it gets worse. There's another problem. A lot of the content out there when it comes to business and vision is so abstract, it's really useless. They tell you to think bigger and to dream bigger and to reach for the stars. All of that is super generic and could apply to any business in any industry.

2:06That is not a vision. That is a motivational Instagram post. Today, I'm going to give you a five-step process to build a real, specific, actionable vision for your business. One that guides your actual decisions in your business so you know exactly if you're making decisions that align with your vision. One that's going to motivate you and your team through some hard seasons that you're going to have. It's just inevitable. You're going to have a vision that is complete, that is specific to your business, that you can go after and your whole team can rally around. So let's get into it.

2:46Welcome back to the$100 MBA show. I'm your host, Omar Zinhome, where I deliver practical business lessons three times a week, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday to help you start, grow, and scale your business.

3:23Step one, start with the life you are actually building towards. A lot of times we start businesses just wanting to be successful, and we don't really understand what we're building towards and what this business is actually going to get us. What is all the sacrifice and all this money and time and effort going to get us in our actual life? You know, a lot of business vision exercises start with the actual business, which makes a lot of sense. You know, they ask questions like how big you are a company to be, how much revenue you want to make, how many employees do you want to have in your business?

3:51That's all fine and dandy. But I want to try something a little bit different here. I want you to just think about what your life is actually going to be like. Because newsflash, the business is not the end goal. The life the business funds, the life the business enables is the end goal. It's a vehicle. Ask yourself these three questions and write them down. Write these questions down. Write down your answers. Okay, if you're driving, do this a bit later. But you can play along and you can answer these in your head right now. What does a perfect ordinary Tuesday look like for you in five years from now?

4:25That's the first question. And I find this question to be quite fascinating because we're not talking about the best day ever. We're not talking about you being on vacation. I'm talking about an ordinary Tuesday. And I actually did this exercise where I said, what's a perfect day look like on an ordinary day? And it took me like five hours. I wrote down an illegal pad and I just wrote pages and pages of just ideas. And I would start off writing things I thought I was supposed to be saying. And then realize, well, actually, I don't want that. I want something else. And I would rewrite it and rewrite it.

4:54So this is actually a pretty important question, because if you don't plan your life, life will just happen and you'll end up with whatever you're given. OK, so you have to actually set out to say, hey, this is actually how I want to live my life on a typical day. To give you some examples, when you're trying to come up with your perfect typical day, ask yourself a few questions like, where are you? What time do you wake up? What do you work on? Who do you work with? Who's with you in this process? What does the day feel like for you? These questions are going to start stimulating some things inside of you so you can start really seeing what the day is like and understanding, is this actually what you want?

5:31Second question, what problems have completely disappeared in your life? I love this question because we love to complain and we love to say what we don't like. And this is quite easy to kind of bring all the problems up to the surface and understand, hey, I don't have to deal with these things anymore. That would be great if that was my life. I'm talking financial stress. I'm talking about a time pressure, the feeling of being trapped, working on things that you hate. These are things that I'm talking about, the things that you wish could just disappear. What is gone? What is something that you don't even think about anymore?

6:01That's a really good thing to think about because it's going to start making you think about how do I build a business that solves these problems for me? How do I make sure that I build a business, like for example, that has very big margins, very thick margins. So I'm making a lot of money. I'm making a lot of profits so that I don't have financial stress anymore. Or maybe I want to build a business where I only work, I don't know, 10 hours a week, where maybe I'm not making so much money where I'm a billionaire, but I'm working 10 hours a week. I have no time pressure. I can travel the world.

6:28These are the things that you're looking for. You're looking for what are the things that I can solve through my business? Third question, what are you most proud of when you look back on that Tuesday five years from now. Let's put money aside for a moment, right? What is the actual thing that you built? What did you actually do for people? What value did you add to the world that makes you feel proud? Okay, this is actually a really profound question because you need meaning in your life. You need for your work to actually mean something to you so that you can keep doing it so that you can actually feel like getting up in the morning and do it every day.

7:01So at minimum, An exercise you could do for this step is to write one paragraph at minimum. You can write pages if you want, but one paragraph describing your ordinary Tuesday five years from now. What does that look like? Step two, define what winning actually looks like for your business. The good thing about business is that you define the rules. You get to choose what winning looks like. It's important for you not to think about what is winning in business in general. I'm talking about for you. Think specifically, because a lot of us, we just think what we should think, like, oh, success in business means making a lot of money or making a lot of impact.

7:39You get to make the rules, right? You get to choose what winning looks like. Maybe winning for you is just getting to do what you do. One of my favorite quotes was from the comedian Jerry Seinfeld. One of his first sets as a comedian, he would go out there and he bombed completely. No one laughed at any of his jokes. And he came off stage and another comedian said to him, hey, man, I'm really sorry. That went horribly bad. I hope you're OK. And he was like, what are you talking about? That was amazing. He's like, what do you mean amazing? You bombed. He's like, yeah, I know I bombed, but I'm one of those guys now.

8:06I'm one of those people that gets up there and tells jokes. I'm a comedian. And he didn't care that he bombed. He just was happy that he was doing his dream, right? He was living his dream. So maybe that's you. Maybe you're just like, hey, I just want to be in the arena. I just want to be playing the sport. I want to be in business and be a business person. I want to be a creative. I want to be able to create films. I want to be able to create art, whatever it might be. For you, that might be winning. So you get to define what winning looks like. For us, with our software company, Webinar Ninja, winning meant building something valuable enough that a larger company would want to acquire it.

8:38Now, why that specific definition of winning? Because I wanted to change my life financially forever. I didn't want to continue to be on the hamster wheel of trading my time for money and hopefully being able to make ends meet. My parents didn't come from means. They're immigrants from Egypt, barely had enough to get by. The same with Nicole, you know, didn't come from money. So I wanted to solve the money equation of my life. And this was my goal. Now, obviously, this is not everybody's goal, but I got to choose and I got to choose that was what I was looking for. I wanted to build a valuable company that I can sell one day and it would change my life forever.

9:16Notice that my goal was not to build the biggest webinar platform in the world. It was not to become a unicorn, a billion dollar company. It was to be acquired by a company that would take it further and pay me handsomely for it. That was the goal. And by having a clear definition, it shaped every product decision, every hiring decision, every feature was built and chosen in terms of which feature we're gonna build based on that decision. Is it adding value to the company so that it could be a more valuable company so when I sell it, I can get more out of it? That was the whole understanding. And by having a clear vision, it made all my decisions easier.

9:51For this company, The$100 MBA, our podcast and our media company. Winning means helping as many entrepreneurs as possible to build a profitable business through world-class business education. I actually enjoy what I do every day. I get to work with amazing people. That's fun for me. So I don't want to retire, right? I want to have enough free time so I can enjoy my hobbies and enjoy my free time and travel. But at the same time, I want to be able to build a significant business that makes an impact. That's my vision for this business. And this is why when we measure our results with our business, we choose things that are aligned with that vision.

10:27So for example, we have reached over 300 million downloads with this podcast. It's a milestone on the journey. It's not the destination. It is aligned with where we want to go. We want to impact as many people as possible. We want to be the number one resource for people that want to start and grow a business. So the more that the numbers that indicate that is leaning towards that vision, the better for us. This is what we kind of are aiming for. The definition of winning might not be building a business that generates enough profit to give you, you know, complete financial freedom. Maybe for you, it's something completely different.

10:58Maybe you want to be able to just have more time on your hands. Maybe you want to be able to create something that you always want to create and see in the world. Maybe you just want to put something in the world that says, hey, I'm here. This is my stamp on my understanding of this thing, whatever it's a product or service, a piece of art, whatever it might be. Maybe you want to become the most trusted person in a specific niche. All of these visions, all these are legitimate. None of them are wrong, but you have to choose. Okay. You have to choose and you have to commit because without it, it makes business so much harder.

11:31It makes it so hard for you to clear, have clear outcomes to understand what your goals are, to align everything that you're doing. Like, for example, if you're going to make your next hire, how do you know this is the person you need or this is the position you need to fill? What is it aligned with? Is it aligned with where you want to go? Or is it just something that you think you have to do because that's what everybody else does? So as an exercise for this step, I wanted to complete this sentence. Very simple. My business wins when blank. When does your business win? How do you know you've scored, right?

12:02That you're winning, that you're actually doing what you're supposed to be doing. What's that one sentence? Be specific. And it needs to be measurable so you can say, yep, five years from now, I have hit those marks. I've hit those milestones. And I know that it is aligned with the vision. So again, my business wins when so-and-so happens. What is that thing? What is that blank? Self-directed investing, trading, full-service wealth management, automated investing, financial planning, thematic investing, retirement planning. Phew. And to think that's just a small taste of what Schwab offers. Because Schwab knows that when it comes to your finances, choice matters.

12:39No matter your goals, investing style, life stage, or experience, Schwab has everything you need all in one place. So you can invest your way. Visit schwab.com to learn more. Running a small business can feel like a real roller coaster. The Total Solutions Advantage only from Comcast Business can help keep everything on the rails. It's the largest, fastest fiber-powered network designed for 100 % reliability with business internet and wireless connect. Plus gig speeds with security and equipment included and a five-year price lock. Get started for just$60 a month for 12 months when you add wireless connect to a qualifying internet package.

13:17Limited time offer. Restrictions apply. Call for details. Step three, identify one moonshot. Here's the element that separates a vision that actually motivates you from one that just sounds good. And this is often referred to as a moonshot. Now, it's called the moonshot because back in the day, going to the moon was pretty rare. Okay, it was very difficult. Now, it's not so difficult. And the plan now is to get to Mars, right? But you need to have a moonshot. One audacious goal that just barely is believable. Even you're kind of like, I'm not sure if I can do that. Something that stretches you.

13:55Something that makes you feel like I need to become something incredibly better. Something that I have to reinvent myself to make this happen. We're not talking about, you know, let's hit the target of 20 % more than last year. No, we're not talking about that. We're talking about a goal that requires you to become a fundamentally different version of yourself. And you need to change your business to evolve to a different version of it to achieve this moonshot. You know, when I decided to take the$100 MBA, this podcast to where we have gone, you know, back in 2014, when we were just starting out, I wanted to make sure that this podcast was impacting people so that we can grow to eventually, you know, our first goal is a million downloads.

14:31And then it was like two million dollars and it was a hundred million downloads. And then we're like, okay, we want to go to 300 million downloads. That was our moonshot. We hit that moonshot. And now we have new goals, right? Because now we're publishing on YouTube and we want to, you know, have a different impact there. And that 300 million number is now a billion. So we want to keep stretching ourselves and saying, hey, okay, we proved to ourself that we did the impossible before. Let's stretch that goal and go for another moonshot that we think that is impossible now because it's only impossible until you do it.

15:02Why is this moonshot concept important? Because when you have to stretch yourself, when you have to accomplish something that seems impossible, you need to take different actions. You need to do different things so that you can get different results. So for example, we're trying to impact more people, hit a billion downloads and get to a million subscribers on YouTube. That's not going to happen by accident. I got to take a different action. So that means hiring a team, a local team, building a new studio. As you can see, we're in a new studio. You know, we need to invest in new equipment, in better talent.

15:33These are new actions, different actions I need to do so that I can be able to get close to accomplishing the moonshot that I set out. It requires new content formats, new social media strategy that maybe we haven't attempted before. We need to experiment with that. All of this is making me feel honestly uncomfortable. But no one who's accomplished anything was comfortable, okay? If you want to get to the moon, you're going to get uncomfortable. If you want to accomplish something that you've never done before, by nature, it's going to be uncomfortable because you've never been there before. But you need to make sure that your moonshot is specific enough to plan towards and ambitious enough to genuinely force you to scale.

16:14That combination makes a moonshot very powerful where you're like, okay, I can see what are the steps I'm going to have to take to get there, or I can find out what those steps are. But at the same time, it's a little bit exciting and nervous, and you feel a little bit nervous about it because it's like, man, I'm not sure if I could do this. That's where you want to live because that's when you become better. Too small, it doesn't get you through the tough times. It doesn't get you to get out of bed where you don't feel like it. Too big, and you can get demotivated. So you want it just enough for you to feel like, hey, you know, this is not completely impossible.

16:47You know, I've seen other people do this. Maybe I haven't done this before, but I'm going to go for it. And the thing about it is that the journey itself is just as rewarding as the accomplishment. In fact, you know, when you hit those goals, like when we launched in 2014, six months later, we won Best of Apple Podcasts, which was awarded to 12 podcasts at the time. We won it with Serial and Startup, and it was really, really great for about a day. And then it was back to work, right? We hit that goal. Great. Awesome. Move on. And that's fine. But what I love about business is the journey because it's really who you become.

17:22Because let's say, for example, God forbid, you build an incredible business and it gets wiped out. You are not penniless. You're not in a situation where you can't recover. Why? Because you've learned the incredible skills to get you to that point so you can do it again. It's who you've become. You know, they say that if they divided all the money in the world evenly, eventually it'll just end up in the same pockets again. Because the people that know how to earn money and be valuable will figure it out. They have the skills to do it over again. So your exercise with this step is to name one moonshot goal for your business.

17:55Something that would require you to fundamentally level up who you are so you can achieve it and give it a number. Give it a deadline. Give it some specifics so that you can have a clear understanding of what you are trying to achieve. Write it somewhere so you can know every single day that's what you're going for. I can give you plenty of examples. You know, one of the things that Elon Musk, you know, love him or hate him, has said over and over for decades now, almost over a decade, I would say for about 15 years now, he's been saying, we're going to colonize Mars. We're going to go and move to Mars.

18:29He has a clear vision. Everybody that works at SpaceX believes they're going to Mars. Okay? this might sound insane to you, but they have a very defined vision. That's their moonshot. It sounds quite literal, but it's their Mars shot. One of my favorite performers of all time, Michael Jackson. Michael Jackson would write on his mirror at home, best-selling album of all time, best-selling album of all time. He'd wake up in the mirror, he would look at it every day. Guess what? Thriller, best-selling album of all time, till this day. I think he's like, his songs are the top 10 songs on Spotify, and he's been dead for over like, what, 13 years, or whatever it might be.

19:01But the point here is that you have to have something clear that you can refer to every single day so that you can get pumped, but also you can know what you're going for. I hope this episode's already showing you the gaps and how you are thinking about your business and the direction you're moving in. I want you to subscribe to the show because we have an upcoming episode I don't want you to miss. It's a Q &A Wednesday question where we answer a question from one of our listeners and it's how does an ex-con get past his past and his fear of judgment so he can start his personal brand. If you have something that you are afraid to share, or maybe you don't feel worthy, or you have what they call imposter syndrome, this episode's for you.

19:40So make sure he subscribes so you don't miss it because it's coming out really soon. We just finished recording it the other day, and it's in the editing process. So can't wait to share it with you. Hit subscribe so you don't miss it. Step four, build your one-page vision document. One page. And here is what makes this vision super tangible for you and actionable is that it's simple. It's one page, not 40 pages. It's not some huge strategic plan that takes you an hour to understand. No, it's one single document on Google Docs or whatever you want to use. OK, one page on this page. You're going to have four sections.

20:16Section number one is your life. Your perfect, ordinary Tuesday, five years from now, one paragraph. Be specific about what this day feels like, looks like, who you're doing this with. What are some of the things you don't have to worry about anymore? All that kind of stuff. Section two of this document is the win. What is the one sentence you want to define in this sentence? What winning looks like? Remember that you fill in the gap. Winning means this. When winning happens, this is what happens, right? You want to make sure that you're very specific about what winning looks like in your business.

20:46Section number three, the moonshot. The audacious goal. That one audacious goal you want to go after is the number one thing you have. Have a deadline of some sort. Have some sort of constraint so you understand, okay, this is what I got to do in this amount of time. This is the number. This is the goal. This is whether it's revenue, whether it's impact, whether it's downloads, whether it's whatever it is. But make sure it's clear. And section four, the values. You want to have three to five words that describe how you will build towards that vision, not some generic corporate values thing that no one ever reads.

21:18We want real operational values that actually guide your decision. In fact, our company, we only have one value, okay? And it's to care. Like, really just give a damn. Care about your work. Care about our listeners. Care about our customers. Care about our audience. Care about each other. Care about yourself. All that is just under the value of care. The purpose of values is not to feel good about yourself. It's so you can use them as a filter. When you're making decisions, do those decisions align with those values? or are these just theoretical values? So for example, if I shoot an episode of this podcast, did I put enough care into this episode?

21:57Do I feel proud of this? Do I feel like I'm actually serving my audience and I have their best interests in mind? If the answer is no, I need to reshoot this episode. If the answer is yes, awesome. Move on to the next one and do it again the next time around. You want your values to be specific again and specific enough to create friction when you violate them. And that's what you want to do. You want to hold yourself accountable and use those values to hold yourself accountable. So to make this tangible, let me give you one exercise to do for this step. Write on a page, doesn't have to be many pages, just any blank page, what are your values as a person, as a business?

22:35What's important to you? Some people, their values are, hey, we got to be profitable. That's number one value. Maybe some people, their value is, hey, we need to make sure that we do what we want anytime we want. Okay, some people want complete freedom. That's a value they have in their business. So you get to choose your values. But remember, you're going to hold yourself against those values. So choose wisely. Step five, make the vision a decision filter. A vision that lives on a piece of paper stuck in a drawer is not a vision. It's a document. And it's something that you thought you had to do just so you can feel like you're a real business person.