For many businesses, the close of the year feels like a natural time to  ease off the accelerator, treating the final stretch as a time to coast. But the best companies know better. Instead of slowing down, they double down—sprinting through the finish line with purpose and momentum.

Why is this so critical? It’s not just about closing the year strong; it’s about setting the stage for an even stronger start to the next year.

A mindset that embraces the past, present, and future can significantly impact our personal and professional lives. This concept—often visualized as overlapping circles or an infinity symbol—offers a framework for living fully in the moment while being conscious of both where we’ve been and where we’re headed. Here’s how it works.

Have you ever taken a polar plunge, immersing yourself in an ice-cold pool of water? The shock hits immediately – your muscles tense, your breath catches, and your brain screams, "What was I thinking?" Moments later, your body begins to adapt. Your muscles relax, your mind clears, and afterward, you feel invigorated, renewed, and ready to tackle anything that comes your way.

In my many years of working with companies as a leadership coach, I've observed a common challenge that persists even among the most promising leaders. It's a pattern that often emerges after our leadership team meetings: leaders return to their departments and fall back into the habit of working in silos, not engaging their team in the department’s priorities and often with exhibiting poor cross-departmental communication. 

Throughout your career, you've likely encountered numerous sports metaphors – and for good reason. The parallels between leading a team on the field and in the office are striking, much like the similarities between scaling a challenging peak and achieving business success. Just as you carefully plan your strategy and recruit team members for a difficult climb, coaches prepare their teams for the big game.

Whether or not a business owner desires to sell his business at some point in the game, exit planning is simply good business strategy. This is why I decided to pursue the intensive Certified Exit Planning Advisor (CEPA) certification through the Exit Planning Institute. Business is truly an infinite game of continual improvement, and this new training has further enhanced my ability to unlock the value hidden in businesses for their owners. In fact, on average, 80% of a business owner’s net worth is locked in their business, and most owners can’t get it out.

Discover the power of visual learning! With 65% of people being visual learners, incorporating visuals can boost information retention to 80%. Visuals are processed 60,000 times faster than text, making them perfect for enhancing presentations, data displays, performance reviews, and guides. Transform your communication and engage your audience effectively.

In my leadership workshops, we use the "Brutal Facts Exercise" to confront hard truths in business. Inspired by the Stockdale Paradox, it emphasizes realistic optimism and resilience. By identifying 8 to 20 harsh realities, leaders can drive meaningful change.

Discover how hunger, humility, and emotional intelligence are key traits for building strong, healthy teams. These virtues enable teams to face challenges effectively and achieve results. A reflection exercise helps evaluate and enhance these qualities within your team.

The "Faucets and Plumbing of Managing Change" metaphor highlights that successful organizational change requires attention to both visible actions and the unseen efforts behind them. Effective leadership means not just implementing change but also explaining its purpose to ensure team acceptance and commitment.

We’re constantly striving to set new records and reach new heights, but there’s another dimension that leaders often forget about – raising the floor.

The concept of “Raise the Floor” (popularized by author Benjamin Hardy) has been gaining traction as a simple yet powerful challenge to the traditional approach of solely focusing on improving peak performance.

Every business and business owner is unique, a snowflake, if you will. Fortunately, all entrepreneurs and early stage businesses follow patterns. These patterns make it easy for a business growth and leadership coach like me to diagnose problems, predict fallouts and suggest a change in course before you (and your bottom line) suffer heavy consequences.

I think we can all agree that change is the one constant in both life and business. And as a business growth and leadership coach, I often encounter company owners who are hungry to grow and improve their organizations. However, they often don’t realize that the strategies that brought them success so far may not be the ones to propel them into the future…

Most founders and leaders want to grow their businesses because they believe that bigger is better. While having a growth mindset is crucial for leadership teams, it's important to recognize that the speed in which your team makes decisions and takes action can be a real differentiator for your company – because it’s ultimately what will allow you to unlock growth.

Effective leadership requires more than just managing numbers and targets; it's about being able to inspire, engage, and rally teams toward a common goal and shared purpose.

Think back to the last time you listened to a speaker. Do you recall the one who inundated you with data and graphs, or the one who wove captivating stories around their topic?

I bet it’s the latter…

Over the last 9 years of coaching and working with dozens of leadership teams in all industries, I’ve come to the conclusion that mindset is a critical – and often overlooked – component of the best teams and the best performing companies. A Growth Mindset and a Fixed Mindset are two contrasting approaches that can significantly influence…

Picture this: You've just received an email with the agenda for your upcoming Quarterly Strategic Session, and you feel prepared and ready to tackle the issues at hand. But here's the thing—sending you an agenda before our coaching session is not enough, and there's a good reason for it. The truth is, a simple agenda is not enough to ensure a successful and transformative coaching experience. When the clock strikes the top of the hour we are ready to go. The time for warmups and practice is behind us…