Okay. Let's get started with these five steps to filter any business opportunities. No matter what industry you're in doesn't matter what product or service you offer, you can apply this to any business at all. First thing to know, as if you know anything about Richard Branson, he said, opportunities are like London buses, they generally come along all at once or never. And so most of you, I'm assuming are successful business owners. So those opportunities will be coming along quite frequently. And it's a question of which one do I pursue? Do I pursue one or two, maybe I pursue none whatsoever.
1. The 5 Step Process
So the first thing we look at is these five different criteria that you assess them with.
Now for some of you, you might be able to make a decision in five minutes if you know yourself and your business really well. For others, it may take a day or a week, depending on the complexity of the opportunity. This is the process we follow. Does the opportunity align with your mission, goals, values, interests and skills to when you evaluate the potential profitability and ROI against other projects? Where does it stack up? You have to assess your level of resources available such as time, money, people energy and assets? Does it fit your current risk profile? Are there any unresolved red flags or conflicts? This is the process we go through. And what we're going to do is apply some really strong rigour to your questions and your investigation of the winning business opportunity. So we're going to ask really deep questions. And like all entrepreneurs, I know we get bored, we get distracted by shiny objects, the idea is not to be distracted not to let the cash cow that is our business, our main business, or several if you have them. We don't want to give up time in those to be distracted by something else, which we haven't necessarily completely refined.
2. Using the traffic light system to refine the business opportunity
So the model that we use is this traffic light system. If you get a green light next to the question or the data, we go forwards, an amber means we wait. And we apply logic, analysis and intuition to that. Red means we resolve or we stop. If you get a straight red flag, red signal, it means we have to stop until we resolve that before we can move forward. It doesn't mean we end it now it just means there's something that we need to apply more information to. And a quick warning, don't get too excited. As I know when thing new things come in, particularly as entrepreneurs, we tend to get excited about it. However, if we get too excited, we allow our conscious bias to take over, we allow our mind to start manipulating our thoughts. And if you're familiar with Jeff Bezos, or Steve Jobs or Einstein, we know that when it comes to the final stage of critical decision making, they use intuition over analysis, they've done the logic they've done the analysis, they apply that intuition which is a very critical component of how we assess opportunities. So the first stage is the exploration of your mission? Do you have a specific mission? Yes or No? If you don't, you need to set a new one. And if you don't know how to do that, there'll be a link to another video below below this, in order to explore how you do that.
3. Aligning the business opportunity to your mission.
So the first stage of mission, do you have a specific mission, which means an objective a goal that you're looking to achieve the next three, six, twelve, eighteen months? If yes, you can go forwards? If no, you need to set one. If you don't know how to set a mission, there's a link to a video beneath this, in which case you can explore that. The reason we want to do that is because the opportunity is going to be congruent, aligned and tethered to that goal. If it isn't, we shouldn't be pursuing it. It's as simple as that. So is it aligned to that mission? Yes or No? If it's not we have to resolve that is aligned to our interests, our values and our skills? Do we know what they are? It may be aligned to our skills, but it may have no interest to us, in which case we stop? Does it energise us or deplete us? If you can't find a way to recalibrate your energy to re-energise, then it's probably going to be a straight No. So we have to ask these questions. Next, what resources do we have such as time, money, people and energy in order to pursue this? If we don't, maybe we need to raise funds elsewhere? Maybe we need to delegate? Maybe we need to hire people. But if you don't, the answer isn't Yes. We have to stop and analyse that before we can move forward. If you skip this process, you're going to be pursuing an opportunity which maybe you can't pull off, maybe you can't deliver. How does it fit in with your other projects? Does it get you to your goal faster? Does it add value? Does the business actually need it? Do you need it? Is the ROI better or worse than your other projects? Can I delegate it? All of these questions have to be resolved and filtered.
I am Ed Andrew. I built five businesses on three continents across four industries to eight figures in revenue and seven figure profits. I've helped hundreds of business owners around the world. People like Rod he's got a $40 plus million dollar business and we helped him increase his gross revenue 32%. You can watch the testimonial from Rod here. And it helped resolve all sorts of other problems as well for him, and it was very much life changing. In that testimonial you can see a few of the other people that I've helped. Now, if this is resonating with you, you can like and subscribe to the Business of Life youtube channel that way more people get to see it and if you are reading this join our daily 2 minute read on business and life tips.
4. Does the opportunity fit your risk profile?
So back to the process. You have to ask does it fit your risk profile? A really important question. And the reason I like the sharks on Shark Tank to analyse this is a few years ago, and probably maybe 10 years ago, I was working with one of the sharks called on the UK equivalent called Dragon's Den, exploring a business opportunity together, we spent about three months together. And the one thing that I really took from that is that he was completely aligned to everything that he did, he would never enter into a venture, which wasn't within his wheelhouse, which he didn't understand a risk for, it's very much a yes or no. And that's why it's really important that you understand what your risk profile is, and you don't go outside of that. Otherwise, if you do what's going to happen, you're just going to start burning cash very, very quickly, which you don't need to do. So back to the process, the environment you're in, do I need to change anything? That means it could be work, it could be a relationship? Is there anything I need to change in order to bring this opportunity in and work on it? Do I have the right support? And again, family, friends, employees, colleagues, whatever else it may be? Do I need a small business coach, do I need a business mentor, you have to resolve these because if we don't have the right environment to bring this opportunity in, the chances are we cannot help we cannot make it deliver in the way that we want to deliver and it probably will fall apart. If that is you and you need help then you can apply to have a free discovery call with me.
5. Asking for help when there are conflicts and red flags.
So it's very important, you analyse this as well. And then conflicts and red flags. Is there any conflict with other business opportunities, or any red flags which are unresolved, which are popping up in the back of my head, which you are just saying, now I'll push that away because I really love it. If you do that it will inevitably end in disaster. Does it feel right? Yes or No? If not, we need to resolve that. We need to give it more time and energy to find out why does it not fit within everything else. And then we do the research. And in the process of research, we're going to find out more about the opportunity, the people behind it, you have to apply all that rigour to that. And when we've done the research on the data, we go back and we asked the question again, does it conflict with anything that we have currently? Are there any red flags? Does it feel right? And if the answer is yes to or no to conflict, no, two red flags, and yes to two, it feels right, then we move forward. So then we're beginning to get to the tail end of actually, this looks like a pretty good opportunity. The one of the last parts of this is managing your expectations and outcomes of that opportunity. Everything is aligned. However, what am I looking to achieve from it? So a really good question. What's the purpose of this opportunity? Where does it fit in to helping me and my family? And my business? It's a very important question to ask.
6. Managing your expectations.
So we can resolve this using the four pillars of expectation? But ultimately how much control do we have over the process can only ever be 50%. How much has been communicated to me about this project? Does it answer the questions that I need to what's been promised? Or am I just assuming things will happen? How much knowledge do I have about the people? But the opportunities, is it something brand new, or something that I've seen in the market before something I know and understand? And how much trust regardless of all the rest of it? Is there any trust pattern established between you and the other parties? Because if the answer is less than five out of 10, for each of these, that's less than, you know, 20 / 40, then the chances are that the expectation is not going to be delivered, the project is not going to work. So you need to assess that really carefully before you decide to take the next step. Then you go back to your checklist. We've got a few more questions there, how likely is my chance of success based on that analysis of my expectations and the outcome, which is the opportunity most aligned to my mission, particularly if there are one or two, and which gets me to my mission fastest with the least risk. So if the chances are, if this is the one I want to pursue or if there are two that you want to pursue, which one is going to get me there the fastest, which was the most aligned.
7. Staying Calm under pressure
And lastly, you don't want to be in a space where you're overwhelmed. So ask for help. No one can do all of this on their own. If you need help from me you can apply to have a discovery session with me. Because you want to be assessing all of these opportunities from a place of being completely calm. If you want to work more closely, then of course we can do that. That's pretty much it for me. I hope that has been helpful. And I will see you again very soon.