Inside Strategic Coach: Connecting Entrepreneurs With What Really Matters Strategic Podcast Network

In this episode, Dan Sullivan reveals his secret weapon for entrepreneurial success: The Impact Filter™. Learn how this powerful tool can boost your confidence, sharpen your focus, and dramatically increase your productivity. Also, discover how Dan uses it to clarify his thoughts, set intentions, and make decisions rapidly—all while reducing meetings by two-thirds!Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:* How Dan Sullivan uses Fast Filters (the “sprint” version of The Impact Filter) to have focused conversations with himself before important events.* The importance of being in teamwork with yourself first to enhance collaboration and productivity with others.* How the Fast Filter can help you decide which ideas are worth pursuing (and which aren’t).* The value of clarifying your thoughts and setting context before meetings, leading to more efficient and productive interactions.* Dan's practice of reviewing five major life goals daily and aligning his actions to support these long-term objectives.Show Notes:* Dan uses Fast Filters to have focused conversations with himself before important events, boosting his confidence and intentionality.* Engaging in self-conversations can also improve focus and productivity. By defining goals and action steps, you can prioritize tasks, eliminate distractions, and make progress toward your goals.* Being in teamwork with yourself leads to better collaboration and productivity with others.* It can also lead to more intentional decision making in entrepreneurship. By aligning your thoughts, actions, and goals, you can make informed choices that support your long-term vision.* Fast Filters provide mental focus and energy and help you decide which ideas are worth scheduling meetings for.* Clarifying thoughts and setting context before meetings leads to more efficient and productive interactions—and reduces the number of meetings you end up having!* Dan’s approach has reduced his meetings by two-thirds over the past 10 years.* There’s a difference between your "thinking brain" and your "acting brain," and Coach tools help you get them in teamwork with each other.* Focused thinking time directly impacts entrepreneurial success.* Fixating on an unpredictable future limits your productivity in the present, similar to being trapped in the past. Resources: Perplexity (https://www.perplexity.ai/)The Kolbe A™ IndexThe Impact Filter™

In this episode of Inside Strategic Coach, Shannon and Dan discuss the profound impact of setting context over focusing on content. Renowned for his ability to create powerful contexts in coaching, Dan shares insights on how this approach shapes thinking and decision making among entrepreneurs. Through real-life examples and coaching strategies, they explore how clarity of context not only simplifies complexities but also enhances community building, personal growth, and self-confidence.Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:* The distinction between context and content in coaching and communication.* How setting a clear context enhances decision making and clarity.* Examples of powerful contextual frameworks in history and technology.* The impact of context on community building and personal growth.* Practical applications of context-setting in everyday communication.Show Notes:* Setting context empowers people to think independently.* Context allows you to focus on what's most important to you rather than conforming to external influences.* Content is what is discussed or shared, while context defines why it matters and how it relates to personal experience.* Dan offers the example of Steve Jobs, whose ability to redefine contexts, such as with iTunes, simplified music consumption.* Context also simplifies decision making and reduces mental clutter by providing a clear framework for action.* Context ensures clarity in communication by explaining the purpose or relevance of information.* Community building and productive conversations are a natural result of context-setting.* Macro contexts, like demographic shifts and geopolitical factors, significantly impact daily experiences, such as economic decisions made at grocery stores or reactions to political messaging.* Demographic shifts, such as the retirement of the Baby Boomer generation, are altering economic landscapes globally, and understanding demographic changes can help anticipate shifts in consumer behavior, workforce dynamics, and economic policies.* Understanding both these contexts helps individuals and businesses navigate uncertainties and make informed decisions that align with broader trends and changes.* Thinking about your thinking and focusing on context leads to more confidence and independence in all areas of your life.* Contextual understanding also empowers people to resist manipulation and make informed decisions. Resources: Unique Ability®The Strategy Circle®The CliftonStrengths® AssessmentThe Entrepreneur’s Guide To Time Management (https://now.strategiccoach.com/timemanagement)

In this episode of Inside Strategic Coach, Shannon Waller interviews Colleen Bowler, a Strategic Coach Associate Coach with over 20 years of experience. Colleen shares her journey from an early entrepreneurial mindset, influenced by her family, to becoming a leader in the financial planning industry. They discuss Colleen's current company, C&J Innovations, and her leadership in the industry, as well as her passion project, Generous Kids. Tune in to learn how Colleen's early entrepreneurial mindset shaped her career and the impact of Strategic Coach on her journey.Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:The power of collaboration and identifying individual strengths in an entrepreneurial journey.Strategies for personal and professional growth, emphasizing continuous learning and development.Insight into building successful firms and the impact of empowering others.Practical examples and applications of concepts such as Unique Ability® and strategic growth.The importance of quick assessments in empowering individuals and advisors for success.Show Notes:* Colleen shares her journey and early exposure to an entrepreneurial mindset, emphasizing the value of hard work, earning opportunities, and the importance of translating this mindset two her own parenting.* She also highlights the importance of systematizing the predictable to focus on connecting with clients—a key strength for entrepreneurs.*  Colleen explains how she built a top financial planning firm by empowering her team and avoiding the "I" mentality, instead using "we" to serve clients.* Colleen talks about how Strategic Coach® helped her achieve real work-life balance, going from not taking any time off to taking a week's vacation within two years.* Colleen referred 10 people to Strategic Coach before even qualifying herself because she saw how the Program helped people achieve an extraordinary quality of life.* One thing that makes Strategic Coach workshops so valuable is that they’re led by other entrepreneurs who understand firsthand the challenges members face.* Colleen highlights the value of being around like-minded people and getting her "butt in the chair" every quarter for creativity and growth.* Colleen talks about selling her firm and starting her new venture, C&J Innovations, where she creates assessments for financial advisors.* These assessments help advisors align with clients' future goals and mindsets for better relationships and growth.* She also promotes her passion project Generous Kids, teaching the habit of giving to children. ResourcesThe Experience Transformer®More about Colleen (https://www.linkedin.com/in/colleen-bowler-cfp%C2%AE-09576796/)C&J Innovations (https://candjinnovations.com/)Unique Ability®

For 35 years now, The Strategic Coach® Program has been helping entrepreneurs to achieve business success and business growth while living happy lives. But Dan Sullivan didn’t set out to create a program for entrepreneurs. He set out to c...

Everyone knows that AI is going to be an increasing factor in business success and business growth, and it’s essential that entrepreneurs are aware of the technology’s limitations as well as its potential. In this episode, business coaches Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller speak with special guest, AI expert Evan Ryan, about what’s holding back the productive application of AI and what you can do instead to best take advantage of AI in your organization. Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:* How to use AI, an intangible, to achieve measurable goals.* Where Evan has seen the most success in companies’ use of AI.* The first question every executive asks Evan.* Ways of thinking that make AI more accessible.* Why many people are hesitating to adopt AI in their businesses.* Examples of where hesitation to use AI has prevented business growth.* Entrepreneur ideas supporting making the change to AI.* How to convince people to take a big leap using AI.* The way AI disrupts established thinking about budgets.* Why the successful use of AI requires a growth mindset. Show Notes: No matter how fast the technology itself moves, it's as slow as the humans that are adopting it. If a solution works for one person, you know 50% of what it would take to work for 10 people. Humans don't naturally think in terms of exponentials because nothing in our world really operates exponentially. If you experience sudden growth, and it’s behind you, you can do your own exponentials going forward. If you don't know where the leadership is, you don't know where the rest of the organization is. It's hard for people to grasp intangibles unless they're conceptually prone, so you need tangible proof of selling an intangible. If software is magic, AI is magic times a million. Something that’s inherently unclear and inherently vague is inherently a little scary. Technology doesn't become normal until it becomes boring. We have to normalize our way into the future. And that means that you have to start small and get used to it. San Francisco, Silicon Valley, and the media talk about AI like it's the end times. A lot of what goes on in Silicon Valley is getting people to bet on the bet. They're not actually betting on the technology. One new capability always introduces new capabilities. That's a feature of technology. The problems we want to solve are the same. We just keep getting better technology with which to solve them. To grasp future jumps, people need to grasp past jumps. Technology is automated teamwork. AI won't necessarily replace people, but people who know AI will replace people who don't. Resources: AI As Your Teammate by Evan Ryan TeammateAI.com (https://teammateai.com/) The Gap And The Gain by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy 

Do you give yourself time to think? Many people don’t. And for entrepreneurs, the stakes are higher because they’re in the marketplace independently. In this episode, business coaches Dan Sullivan and Shannon Waller talk about why thinking time is so important for business success and how entrepreneurs can get the highest quality thinking time through The Strategic Coach® Program. Here’s some of what you’ll learn in this episode:·     Why deep thinking is scary.·     The question that The Strategic Coach Program was based on from the start.·     Why it’s easier to get entrepreneurs thinking about their thinking than most people.·     Why thinking about your thinking is something that has to be consciously learned. Show Notes: Most people only do the kind of thinking done in Strategic Coach® in extreme emergency. Most people engage in three levels of thinking: thinking about things, thinking about other people, and thinking about other people’s thoughts. But there is a fourth level: thinking about your thinking. Higher education is almost entirely based on people who spent their whole lives thinking about somebody else's thoughts. In any sale, the first thing that people buy is a relationship. There’s only one expert on what progress is going to make a client happy, and that's the client. Some people don’t think about their thinking because they’re afraid of their thinking. For most people, it’s an unnatural act to think about their thinking. The Strategic Coach Program is about the clients, not the coaches. Instead of thinking about their thinking, most people just engage with whatever the world throws at them during the day, and then watch TV in the evening. Thinking about your thinking means taking agency over what actually goes on in your mind. The more you think about your thinking, the more normal it becomes. The problem is never the problem; the problem is not knowing how to think about the problem. Tightly scheduled entrepreneurs cannot transform themselves.Resources: Thinking About Your Thinking by Dan Sullivan The Dan Sullivan Question by Dan Sullivan Who Not How by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy Your Life As A Strategy Circle by Dan Sullivan The Impact Filter™ Article: The 4 Freedoms That Motivate Successful Entrepreneurs (https://resources.strategiccoach.com/the-multiplier-mindset-blog/the-4-freedoms-that-motivate-successful-entrepreneurs)