Ep. 216 Mini-series 1 Definition of success

Are you crystal clear on what really matters in your life and business? In today’s episode, Anna looks at the 1st pillar of building a life outside of the 9 to 5, identifying your personal definition of success.

*Resources mentioned during the episode*

Outside of the 9 to 5 – Your practical guide to designing and building a profitable business that gives you freedom, flexibility and fulfilment. outsideofthe9to5.com

Definition of success

Hello there, and welcome to a special podcast episode today. And this week it because in fact is the start of a little mini podcast series in celebration of the launch of my new book outside of the nine to five. So I’ll be here every day this week for five episodes, five little mini episodes, celebrating the book, and in particular going into the detail of each of the five pillars on which the book is based. So let me first introduce you to the book for those of you who perhaps are new to the community. And for the rest of you, it’s always good with a reminder, because I’m sure you have other things to think about them the story and the thinking behind my books. So let me tell you a little bit about it.

So my first book that I launched with the One Step outside business was in 2018, it was leaving the corporate nine to five.

And I interviewed 50 People who have left the corporate nine to five, to basically forge their own path, as I called it to either one of a few different things right to move into a different sector. So for example, moving from corporate into public, going freelance or launching their own business, creating a portfolio career or taking a leap of faith, not yet knowing what the next step would be. And actually, that last one was the category that I’ve fallen into. And of course, I shared some perspective in that book. But it was mostly celebrating these brave souls who had left the nine to five, to give you all inspiration, as well as practical tips, I’ve always felt that there was a bit of a gap there, as I may have shared before, because I really wanted to share. Okay, I’m inspired now, but how do I go about it. And of course, that was actually, oh, goodness, that’s four years ago now. And I’ve been in business for longer than that.

So I have so much more value to bring, which has brought me to this second book, which of course, as ever has taken me longer than I’d like to pull together. But this one is outside of the nine to five. So I’m continuing the journey from leaving a corporate nine to five, focusing on that initial decision to quit your job. And here I’m looking at what’s needed to sustain that initial escape from the nine to five. So I’m looking at designing and building a profitable business that can support your lifestyle, the lifestyle that you desire, and allow you to achieve success on your own terms. So I’m going through those five pillars, which will I’m sure be very familiar to you if you’ve been part of my community for a while. But that’s what I’m going to be going through in the mini series this week. So lots of fun things happening as part of the launch. Now, I’ve done a bit of a soft launch before the end of the year because I wanted to, for my own satisfaction, I guess get the book out, unfortunately wasn’t very well. So I didn’t, I wasn’t able to do the big sort of launch shebang that I want to do.

So that’s what I’m here to do now, early 2023. So today, I’m going to be going through pillar one, identifying your personal definition of success.

And I’ll be breaking each pillar down into four steps. And then of course, I’ll be telling you how you can find out more so you can get the paperback now at a special pre sale offer price that will be going up at the end of this promotional period to period to the full price. So do grab that copy while you can. It’s available on Amazon, it should be available in all all the countries. So let me know if you have any issues. But you’ve got the paperback and then I’ll be launching the Kindle at the end of this series as well. I will be planning on recording the audio version later in the year. So keep an eye out or rather an ear out haha for that one. And but in the meantime, let’s look at pillar one, which is identifying your personal definition of success. And all of them. Pillar one for me is the most important. It’s about laying the foundation for everything else in the book, but also in your business and in your life. And it’s the message of redefining success is really cool to what drives me it’s my bigger, bigger purpose, my why, for my business, but also personally. So I’m really excited always to talk about this with you. And I think most of us haven’t asked ourselves What does success mean to me, we’ve either been following someone else’s definition of success that we’ve inherited from our parents, family, teachers, education, society, and so on. Or we haven’t really thought about it at all right? So we’ve either been kind of going through a little bit on autopilot, just plodding along or following the past, we think we should be taking, or we have been, I want to say coerced, I guess also, perhaps subconsciously into following someone else’s definition of success.

And unfortunately, without having a clear vision of what you want, what you’re working towards, and why that’s important.

It’s really difficult to actually end up where you want to be. So the danger is in terms of designing this business, that you’re not actually designing the business, right, you’re developing what you might call an accidental business model. So perhaps you’ll be copying the structures and principles that you’re familiar with from your corporate work. So you’ll end up pretty much working the same Monday to Friday nine to five and so one all you’ll try to copy someone else’s some other gurus, apparently successful model, or you might just try lots of different things and not really know what you’re aiming towards. And so it becomes a bit of a kind of patchwork hold poach of things that don’t really work. So either. Unfortunately, the result will be a business that fails all together. And then you might, unfortunately be tempted to take a full time job again, just because it hasn’t worked out as you wanted it to. Or it might be successful with quotation marks, but not in a way that’s meaningful to you. So you’ve created the same structure, the same cage, if you will, that you had in corporate, or maybe you follow followed someone else’s blueprint. And you’ll end up with a version of success that doesn’t fit with who you are, and what you want, because it’s so individual, right. So let me dig into the four steps of pillar one, the definition of success that I go through in the book. So the first thing is to get super clear on what you want, and why it’s so important to you. So the first step, as part of this first pillar of defining success is to get clear on your big picture vision.

Now, when I say big picture, that means that you’re looking not just at what you want from your work from your business specifically, but from all areas of your life. Because work is a part of life. It’s an important part, but it is just one part of several or many. So we’re going to start in the book by looking at your vision for how you want to live your life. And that’s really the underlying work that you need to do. And I can imagine some of you might think I don’t need to do that I know what I want, but bear with me, trust the process, this is a really important step. So number one, get clear on your big picture vision. Number two is to clarify your core values. And this is one of the very first exercises my first peer coach took me through and my coach training, so enlightening for me, I returned to it again and again for myself. And it’s one of the first I often take my clients through. And so it’s one of the first steps in this book, too. So clarifying your values, is going to give you a compass to guide your decisions along the way, then we move on to your purpose. Step three is clarifying your purpose. And I know purpose is a really big word, and it can be quite intimidating. But I will break it down for you. And I’ll show you how I use it in a very specific and tangible way to help you design your business. And then finally, we’ll look at how you can achieve balance. So you know I mentioned those different areas of your life, we’ll be looking at so called work life balance, but I prefer the term work life integration in pillar five actually, so I’ll talk about that later in the week. But I want to introduce the concept already. Now in pillar one.

And here, I really encourage you to think about having balanced goals across the different areas of your life, rather than just focusing single mindedly on your business.

So that’s pillar one, your definition of success. So four steps, getting clear on your big picture vision, identifying your core values, defining your purpose and finding the right balance. In the interest of keeping this a mini podcast series, since it’s five episodes this week, I will actually leave it there. So it is a short one today. But again, the book is called outside of a nine to five, you can search for on Amazon, you should be able to preorder the Kindle, as I said, and you can get the paperback now I should say I would prefer the paperback. Personally, I’m a huge fan of Kindle and audible and so on. But this is really sort of a work bookie kind of thing, right? I’ve got exercise at the end of each step, I’d love for you to get the paper back and grab a pen. And really use it as a practical notebook, not just a pristine, you know, oh, I’ll read this passively. And then forget all about it, I really want you to dig into it, to use it to reflect to circle to highlight light, and so on. So again, outside of the nine to five, it’s your practical guide to designing and building a profitable business that gives you freedom, flexibility, fulfillment. That’s pillar one definition of success today. And I’ll be back tomorrow for another mini episode on pillar two, which is cultivating your confidence and resilience. So do grab your copy of the book. Let me know how you get on. And of course, if you do read it, when you read it, I would love a review on Amazon. That helps me hugely as I’m sure you’re aware if you do have your own business, these things are so important getting reviews and testimonials. But also it’ll help other people to find the book and I really truly believe and hope this will be an incredible resource for so many people who are trying to build that business outside the nine to five. So thanks so much and I’ll see you back here for tomorrow. Bye for now.

WORK WITH ANNA

Let us help you design a business and a life that gives you freedom from the 9 to 5. There are several options for how you can work with us. Choose the programme that’s right for you.

The Outsiders Business Incubator

A year-long business incubator for experienced corporate professionals who want to translate their skills and passions into a profitable and fulfilling business. onestepoutside.com/9to5

The Outsiders Business Accelerator

An ongoing mastermind for service-based business owners, freelancers and online entrepreneurs who are ready to achieve success on their own terms. onestepoutside.com/accelerate

The Outsiders Business Academy

A self-paced course for you to work through in your own time, to learn – and implement – the foundations of building a profitable business that lets you escape the 9 to 5. onestepoutside.com/course

1:1 Coaching & Mentoring

If you’re looking for one-to-one support to help you achieve your specific life and business goals, Anna has a limited number of spots for individual coaching and mentoring. onestepoutside.com/coaching