Build a CEO mindset: three tips for designers
Successful business owners have a mindset and way of acting that sets them apart from others and if you aren't seeing the growth or revenue that you would like from your business it could well be that you aren't behaving like the CEO that your business needs.
At the end of your day if you treat your business like a hobby then you'll get paid like it's a hobby!
Here are 3 key tasks you should be doing in your business every single week that will elevate you from being a hobby business owner to becoming the CEO of your professional (and profitable!) design business.
CEO Mindset Tip 1: Daily Lead Generation
Very few businesses (especially early stage businesses) grow without some hard work and hustle. When you are new and relatively unknown finding clients is going to be one of the hardest parts of your business and simply posting a couple of Instagram posts a week to your audience of a few hundred people is not the way to find a steady stream of new leads.
What I teach my clients is that every day you must be doing a range of proactive lead generation strategies. In fact consistent lead generation is what helps you avoid the 'feast or famine' problem that is so prominent among designers I meet, where some months you have too much work on and some months you don't have enough.
Lead generation is also something that needs to be tackled from a range of angles. Being happy that you get enough business via word of mouth is NOT a strategy!
I have a business short course where I teach my clients lots of different proactive (and free!) lead generation strategies that only take a few minutes each day to implement but result in new leads and clients every day. If you are interested in find out more about that course then click here.
In fact, recently one of my clients, Rebecca, implemented a quick strategy that I taught in that course and booked a paid design consultation pretty much straight away!
Daily lead generation WORKS if you know the right strategies to be doing. And it doesn't have to be difficult or time consuming either. It also needs to be something you are doing every single day - even on the day when you are busy delivering design work for your existing clients. This is how you will avoid the feast or famine revenue problem and make sure that you constantly have paid work coming in the door.
CEO Mindset Tip 2: Work ON your business (not just in it)
Designers with a CEO mindset plan their week and carve out time to work 'on' their business not just 'in' their business.
When I talk about working 'on' your business I don't just mean doing design or admin work. What I mean is planning out time to strategically think about what you are doing and where you are heading. This means spending time working on lead generation (as above), improving your sales skills, setting up systems and processes, marketing, goal setting, tracking your numbers, networking with opportunities, working on your own professional development and heaps of other activities as well.
Being the CEO of a design business is more than just about being a designer.
You have to love the game of business itself and the only way to improve and make more progress (and more money) is to always be planning, tracking, measuring and improving what you're doing.
If you need help getting better systems set up in your business and want to save time - grab one of my pre-made templates for designers here.
CEO Mindset Tip 3: Always be learning
Finally, designers with a CEO mindset are lifelong learners. They are always hungry for new ideas, new knowledge and new ways of doing things. They have a passion to always be growing and this growth mindset gives them the confidence to know that they can seek out the answers to everything they need to know in order to achieve everything they want to achieve in life.
If you aren't incorporating learning into your day then you need to start doing that now. As a business owner you have to accept responsibility for your own personal and business growth and the knowledge you develop will be directly related to the effort you put in to that learning and growth.
Learning can take many forms - but some examples include;
reading books
listening to podcasts or audiobooks
taking online courses
being willing to try new things on a regular basis
watching webinars or training videos
working with a business coach or mentor
An extension idea here is to also have a system that helps you summarise and recall what you are learning. This moves your learning from just being passive to being something that becomes useful every day in your life and business.
I have recently set up a 'Knowledge Library' where I catalogue books, podcasts, articles and other things I learn (or want to read or learn) and keep a log of these. For things that have resonated with me I will take some notes or save quotes as part of the entry so that I can refer back to these and make use of them when I want to.
You can find out more about how I manage my life and business in Notion in THIS VIDEO.
I hope you’ve found some of these ideas helpful. Enjoy the rest of your day!
Clare x
Dr Clare Le Roy
Courses and Templates for Designers and Architects
DO YOU WANT TO….
Improve your professionalism?
Find more clients?
Bring in more revenue?
Create better systems and processes?
Then check out my business courses and templates for designers and architects.
These courses and templates leave you with work done - not just a long list of things you need to do next. We have a really strong focus on taking action and getting things created that improve your business.
