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The topics and opinions expressed in the following show are
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solely those of the hosts and their guests and not
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those of W FOURCY Radio. It's employees are affiliates. We
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make no recommendations or endorsements for radio show programs, services,
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or products mentioned on air or on our web. No
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liability explicitor implies shall be extended to W FOURCY Radio
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or its employees are affiliates. Any questions or comments should
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be directed to those show hosts. Thank you for choosing
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W FOURCY Radio.
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Welcome to Powerful Business Strategies, where you will find out
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that everything you have ever learned about growing your business
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is wrong. Finally, a show where you'll learn the right
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way to grow your business by learning business and financial
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strategies that your competition isn't doing. And now here is
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your host. Resident of Next Step CFO Michael Barbarita and
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joining Michael for today's show as an executive moderator is
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chooky obio.
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Yes, this is chookey in I believe that gratitude is
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undefeated and growth is about the next step. It is
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an honor for me to moderate today's discussion with my
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good friend Michael. Michael, how are you fantastic cheer k?
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Thank you. My name is Michael Barber, the president of
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Next Step CFO, and next Step CFO is a fractional
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CFO and strategic implementation firm, and business owners hire us
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to double and triple their profit using business and financial
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strategies that their competition isn't doing. And our vision is
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to ensure that overwhelmed business owners achieve the time, freedom,
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and consistent profits to build a legacy and the life
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they desire. While our mission is dedicated to guiding small
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business owners to leveraging their time, exploding their profits, and
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building a meaningful legacy, this show Powerful Business Strategies in
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our book of the same name, is a step toward
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accomplishing that vision and mission. So with that, I'd like
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to hand it back to my co author and moderator
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for the show, Chicky Obio.
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The title for today's show is really intriguing. So Michael,
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here's the title, The Change Paradox. Why business owners resist
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the very solutions that they need. And Michael, I've got
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to say, given a lot of the feedback that we've
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been getting from business owners through the years, you might
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provide some powerful insights today. I think Michael, are you
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prepared to change lives today?
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Michael, I am prepared to change lives and perspectives.
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Okay, I love that, so look we jump in, folks.
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Michael and I were both affiliated with a number of
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different organizations. I currently serve as a managing director of
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business development for Vetter Price, a global business focused law firm.
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In addition to that, it's truly an honor to collaborate
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with Michael to moderate business roundtables and document best practices
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from these roundtables. In fact, we packed all of those
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best practices into our book, Powerful Business Strategies. But please
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note that the views expressed on this show are personal
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views based on those successful experiences. My mission today as
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a fearless moderator is to ask the right questions to
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help you, the listener, learn the best strategies that the
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competition isn't doing. With that, back over to Michael.
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Thank you, Chicky. So before we get today's show, I
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do want to clarify that while we'll be discussing some
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psychological aspects of business ownership, I'm not a psychologist, neither
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Chucky or I. I'm psychologists or mental health professionals, and
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the insights that we share come from our experiences as
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business advisors and fractional CFOs, not from any clinical expertise
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or perspective. If you're experiencing significant distress related to your business,
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I do encourage you to seek that support from qualified
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mental health professionals. So business owners, I see the late nights,
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the constant worry about cash flow, the misfamily events because
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something came up at work. I see the weight of
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the responsibility you carry for your employee, for your employees,
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your customers, and your family. But here's what I know
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to be true. You didn't start your business to become
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a prisoner to it. You started it to create freedom,
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financial freedom, and time freedom and the freedom to make
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your own choices and the gap between where you are
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and where you want to be. Is it about knowledge
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and it's not about working harder. It's about your relationship
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with change. Today we're going to explore why even the
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smartest business owners resist the very changes that would set
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them free. And more importantly, we'll show you how to
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break through that resistance to create the business and the
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life that you truly want. And your breakthrough is it
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just possible. It's waiting for you. On the other side
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of change. So let's discover it together. And let me
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start by addressing something that might sound a little counterintuitive.
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The greatest obstacle to business growth isn't external, it's internal.
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And I've worked with hundreds of business owners across dozens
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of industries, and I've observed a really interesting pattern. When
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I ask owners what's holding their business back, they typically
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point to external factors like lack of capital, tough competition,
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maybe even challenging market conditions, economy and that type of thing,
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or even staffing staffing difficulties. But here's the reality that
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I've witnessed time and time again. Two business owners in
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the exact same industry, facing identical market conditions, with similar
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resources can achieve dramatically different results. And one remains stuck
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in constant firef mode, working seventy hours a week to
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just stay afloat, and the other bills a thriving enterprise
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that operates smoothly even when they're not present. And the
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difference is that market conditions, competition, or even capital. It's
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their relationship with change.
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Interesting.
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So think about it. If have you ever noticed yourself
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knowing exactly what you should do in your business, yet
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you're not doing it. And maybe it's implementing the new
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customer management system or finally delegating something like bookkeeping, or
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raising your prices to reflect your true value. You know
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these changes. Would you know these changes would improve your business,
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But something always holds you back. And this is what
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I call the change paradox. The tendency is resist the
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very solutions we know what help us. And I'm experiencing
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this firsthand in my own business journey. I mean this
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show to me, it is like a therapy session for
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myself as well. I need to delegate more to create
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better system and focus on high value activities, and I
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could even articulate exactly what needed to happen, but I
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kept falling back into old patterns. And I keep falling
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back into old patterns, doing everything myself, working longer hours,
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high on low value activities, and wondering why nothing's changed.
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So I'm realizing that my resistance wasn't logical. It was
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it was emotional and psychological. I'm not avoiding change because
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I don't know what to do. I'm avoiding it because change,
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even positive change, triggers uncertainty, and uncertainty triggers fear, not
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wiring you know, our brains are wired to prefer the
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certainty of current pain over the uncertainty of potential improvement.
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It's not but it's deeply human. And this insight is
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changing my approach to business growth, both for myself and
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for my clients. And I recognize that implementing effective business
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strategies isn't just about knowing what to do, It's about
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navigating the emotional terrain of change to They will explore
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three primary barriers that keep business owner is stuck in
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patterns that no longer serve them, and practical strategies for
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overcoming these barriers. Because when you change a relationship with
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change itself, everything else becomes possible.
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Michael, this is absolutely fascinating and I'm just shot in
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some notes down here. Look, you mentioned that resistance to change,
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and I really want to dig in on this now,
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that resistance to change is not logical, it's emotion, it's psychological.
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Can you elaborate on how specifically this shows up for
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business owners?
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Yeah, sure, Chicky, so so the emotional resistance to change
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kind of manifests in very specific patterns that I see
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over and over again among among business owners, and one
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of the most common is what I call implementation delay.
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A business owners will a business owner will invest in
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learning a new strategy. They'll attend to workshop, they'll read
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a bunch of books on it, they'll hire consultants and
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get genuinely excited about implementing changes. And then they'll even
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they'll even start planning the implementation. But then something happens. Urgent,
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client issues arise, employees need attention, or some other emergency
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demands focus, and the implementation gets put back a week,
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then a month, then definitely. And what's happening beneath the
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surface is that the brain is manufacturing distractions to avoid
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the discomfort of change. It's not conscious sabotage. It's a
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subconscious protection mechanism. And another patent is perfection analysis. The
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owner convinces themselves they need more information, more planning, more
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resources before they can begin. I'll delegate when I find
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the perfect person, or I'll implement that system once we're
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less busy. And this appears rational on the surface, by
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the way, but it's actually the brain creating plausible excuses
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to maintain the status quo. And then a third patent
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is what I call the comfort zone pull. After briefly
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venturing into new territory, perhaps delegating an important task or
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implementing a new process. Many business owners experience a strong
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urge to to their previous patterns, and they find themselves
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might go managing the person that they just delegated to
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or bypassing the new.
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Process because and they'll say to themselves, I'm bypassing it
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just this once, because it feels uncomfortable to operate differently.
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And these patterns aren't signs of weakness or lack of commitment.
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They're natural human responses to change. And when business owners
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understand that these responses are normal and predictable, they can
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develop strategies to work with these tendencies rather than being
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derailed by them. And so let's dive a little deeper
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into this first major barrier that prevents business owners from
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implementing change. And it's what I call the identity anchor.
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Your identity, your sense of who you are, is one
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of the most powerful forces influencing your behavior. And for
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business owners, their identity is deeply interwined with their role
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in the business. They're the problem solved, the expert, the
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person everyone depends on. This identity has likely been reinforced
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for years creating a strong sense of self type, type
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of specific behaviors, and when a change threatens this identity,
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even when that change would be beneficial, it creates profound
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psychological resistance. It's not just about doing things differently, it's
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becoming someone different. That's the fear. And let me give
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you an example. So a skilled craftsman built a successful
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custom furniture business, and he knew he needed to step
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away from production and focus on growing the business. But
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every time he tried to delegate crafting work, he felt
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physically uncomfortable. He'd find himself taking tools out of employees'
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hands to show them how it's done, or even redoing
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their work after houts. But when he done deeper, he
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discovered that his entire sense of self was wrapped up
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in being the craftsman who makes exceptional furniture. The thought
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of becoming just a business owner felt like he was
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losing his identity, even though intellectually he understood it was
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necessary for growth. So this identity anchor was keeping his
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business stuck and then him along with it. And he
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was working those eighty hour weeks and the business had
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plateaued because he couldn't scale beyond his personal production capacity,
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and the breakthrough came not pushing harder delegation, but helping
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it expand his identity to include master craftsman who builds
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both beautiful furniture and an exceptional team. And this subtle
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shift in psychology or name or whatever you want to
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call it allowed him to see developing crafts people as
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an extension of his craftsmanship, not a replacement for it,
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And within six months he had successfully delegated seventy percent
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of production while maintaining high quality standards. And more importantly,
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he found genuine satisfaction in his new role because it
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aligned with his expanded identity rather than conflicting with it.
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And this patent repeats across industries. The account who can't
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delegate client work because I'm the numbers person. The marketing
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consultant who can't hire other creators creative people because my
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ideas are what the client's paid for. The contractor can't
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let go of site visits because I'm the guy who
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ensures quality. The key insight is that lasting change requires
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identity evolution. You try to change behaviors that are tied
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to your sense of self without addressing the identity level
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you're simply fighting against one of the most powerful sources
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in human psychology. So how do you overcome the identity anchor? Well,
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here are three practical strategies to do this. First, practice
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identity expansion rather than replacement. Try to stop being that
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expert craftsperson, a consultant, or technician. Instead, expand your identity
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to include developer of other experts or builder of systems
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that deliver expertise. This allows for growth without loss. Second
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is find role models who have made similar transitions. You know.
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Connecting with others who have successive successfully evolved their identity
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creates both a roadmap and psychological permission for your own evolution.
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These could be mentors, they could be peers in your industry,
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historical or public figures, even whose stories might resonate with you.
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And then, third, create identity affirming rituals for your new role.
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If you've always derived satisfaction from hands on work, find
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ways to experience similar satisfaction in your own activities. This
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might mean celebrating team achievements as enthusiastically as you would
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as you once celebrated personal accomplishes, or creating visible metrics
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for business growth. They give you the same tangible feedback
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as completing a project yourself. Remember, changing what you do
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without changing how you see yourself creates internal conflict that
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almost always results in reverting to all patents. But when
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your actions align with an expanded sense of identity, change
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becomes not just possible but natural. Let me say a
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question from a listener.
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Yeah, yeah, really impladful stuff, Michael. So let's by the way,
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there are actually quite a few questions from listeners. But Michael,
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let's just go with this one. You mentioned this idea