Once Upon a Time by Nancy Becher
Once upon a time, many years ago, there lived a girl who loved the world of business. She worked from the age of 12 to build a business for herself with all kinds of ideas from crafts, to office admin, and even to becoming an executive suites owner. Over the years people started to rely on her and she hired employees as well as bigger and more expensive offices and the “toys” that went along with all that. Her biggest shared view was that no matter what you do, you’ve got to have fun doing it. Along the way somewhere, however, she realized that she herself was no longer having fun, and decided that she needed to rethink what she was doing. She knew that in order to do what she was meant to do (help others) that she needed to first figure out how to help herself, and then, most importantly, what it was that others wanted from her. She searched for a mentor, a group to be part of, and she found the perfect one... even though it met early in the morning, and more than an hour away from where she lived. She knew that they would help her to find her spot in the world, and so she started moving in that direction. After she had been part of that group for a while, her soul started to sing again with passion for what she was doing, and she began to focus on how helping herself was going to help others. She created meetings for people that let them listen (and share) with other like-minded individuals who had boots on the ground and were trying to build their businesses. Her Entrepreneurial Forums brought ideas like Customer Service, and Using Social Media, as well as Marketing Fears and How to Push Past It to the forefront, so that everyone would be able to take a message back with them to their own homes and offices, saying “Wow. This is going to help me now”.
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From the Forums came other advancements. The Peer Advisory Boards sprang into existence. Heavy questions like “What is our mission?” and “Who is our Ideal Customer and why do we need to know?” made heads hurt as people struggled with those answers, only later to realize that it actually made business much easier. People lined up to see just what the next question would be. Then, after 9 months of joy and pain, exhaustion and exhilaration, came the birth of this girl’s own dreams for her business and her success. Along the way she had come to realize that God had asked her to do this... He wanted her to be there to support those around her (although she had been in business now for over 35 years, she had never had the support and training of others, and this was her calling to do that so that new businesses wouldn’t struggle so much). By helping those others, she was, indeed, helping herself. And finally, the culmination of that gift was a national magazine, Small Biz Forward, that provided answers, ideas, values, information about other businesses, all in a format that allowed for people throughout the country and world, to read and put into use immediately things that would help them grow their businesses without taking years and thousands of dollars. It was her dream and her goal come true. I’m sure you have one (or two) as well. What are you going to do to create your own Happily Ever After? Nancy Becher
Small Biz Forward