Written by: Jody Kennett, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
The greatest asset we all have in building our business, career, and income is often underutilized and untrained, but it is the key to happiness and success; it is our mind and mindset. If you are an entrepreneur or leader, you have an even greater need to train your brain and thoughts due to the challenges you face with growing a business, developing people, leading teams, and navigating conflict or change. Yet, so few of us have been prepared with how we need to think or what mindsets will support us with the agility required to grow and thrive. Today, you will be prepared and your mind primed with 5 top mindset shifts that will lead you to be adaptable, resilient, confident, unlimited, and elevated!
The following mindsets I am about to share with you come from both my experience as a leadership coach coaching hundreds of leaders and also my own journey as an entrepreneur and woman in business. They have been compiled from the reoccurring themes that so many of us face, whether we are male/female, young or old, and highlight the human experience we all share when we are in an uncomfortable space; when we are shifting from one place to another, something is new, or we are striving to go where we have never been before.
These mindsets will help you to step into an elevated space where possibilities abound, where you feel empowered and capable, and where breakthroughs to your next leadership, career, or income level will happen. Let’s jump into these powerful mindset shifts that, if you practice daily, will transform you and your life.
1. Shift to Being the CEO of Your Business and Career
It is easy to skim over the word CEO and just conceptualize it in a minimized sense of being the leader of your business or career, but if you examine what it means to be a CEO, this is where you will have a transformation. A CEO is focused on forwarding progress, profit, vision beyond this year, expansion, new opportunities, monthly accountability, marketplace positioning, and hiring top talent who can get them to where they are going. Just last week, I had the realization that I have been a business owner and entrepreneur, but with my new vision of where I am taking it, I now needed to step into being the CEO. Ask yourself, ‘Am I being the CEO of my business or career?’ What would need to change for you to shift into this mindset and become the CEO? If we were to truly be the CEO of our careers, we would not be waiting for a promotion or an opportunity to land in our lap. We would be creating and leading it. We would not wait for someone to notice us. We would stand out, speak up, and share it.
The mindset shift happens when you start to think like a CEO, act like a CEO, make decisions like a CEO and lead from a proactive place instead of a reactionary space.
What is one step you will take to make this mindset shift to becoming the CEO of your business or career?
2. Shift from Expert to Leader or Employee to Entrepreneur
The majority of leaders, managers and supervisors advanced to those titles from first being an expert or a great technician in their specific skill set. In addition, most of these leaders had no training on how to lead, and from coaching many new and promoted leaders, they often feel ill-prepared to lead, leaving them not feeling confident in their new leadership role.
The first mindset shift that will support you here is that being new does not mean you are not capable or competent. You have already become a master at what you do, and just as you most likely learned those skills on the job, you will also learn to lead. However, the biggest mindset shift you will need to make, which actually must also be demonstrated in your actions too is shifting your focus from being an expert to now focusing on being a leader.
This transition from expert to leader in a company has similarities to the mindset shift one has to make when they go from employee to entrepreneur. As an employee, your work is provided for you, you are usually managed, and without fail, every 2 weeks, you get a paycheque. Everything from expectations to your schedule and your pay is all regulated for you. In contrast, when you shift to becoming an entrepreneur, there is no accountability to anyone else. There is no volume of work other than what you create yourself, and your paycheque is solely determined by your performance week to week.
The shift of mindset one needs when they become an entrepreneur is one of 100% accountability and commitment to creating and leading the growth of the business where every outcome, including your income, is attributable to your consistent action. It is a shift from focusing on one aspect of the wheel of a business to overseeing every aspect of your business.
When you become an entrepreneur, the biggest mindset shift is going from being the person who does the work to understanding you now have to create the work and do your work. In essence, when you say yes to entrepreneurship, you say yes to the marketing and business building required to do the work you love.
3. Shift from Current Circumstances to a What’s Possible Mindset
The circumstances we find ourselves in can leave us feeling drained, limited, defeated, and stuck. This can lead us to negative thinking or the dreaded loop thinking where we cannot get off the track of thinking that is unable to see any other options outside of what we have already considered. This is a very confining and destructive mindset to be in, and it can happen to the best of us due to the environment, culture, or circumstances that many have endured for far too long. If you are here or know someone who is, this is a great time to get help because you or they will need a coach or counselor to guide them gently off the loop track of thinking and inspire a space where fresh, new perspectives can be explored.
One of the coaching methods I use with people is what I call ‘Possibility Thinking,’ and it is where we expand our mind and thoughts beyond today, beyond what has been, and even beyond what we think could happen to what could be possible. It is exciting, energizing, and a creative process that often leads to options, solutions, and happiness.
The mindset shift one needs here is to go beyond the circumstances of today and live and play in the space of what is possible because when you do, it will lead you out of negative circumstances and into an exciting life you love.
When we combine the ‘Possibility Thinking’ coaching with Cognitive Behavioral Coaching, it uproots any self-limiting beliefs so that you become empowered to perhaps do what you once thought was not possible and make it so.
4. Shift from Feeling Less Than to Feeling Deserving
Well, this one feels a little too familiar for me. How about for you? This may just be a universal human experience at some or one point in our lives. It often occurs when we compare or when we do not feel worthy internally for one reason or another. No matter how someone treats us or what arena we find ourselves in, no human being is more worthy or deserving than another, not due to their possessions, their beauty, their talents, or any other identifying factor used to build one’s ego. Every one of you is deserving; deserving of joy, respect, love, abundance, freedom, and equality.
When you are able to shift your mindset to one of feeling deserving to stand side by side with people you may have idolized, deserving to be treated with respect, deserving of wealth, deserving to be seen and heard, deserving to claim and own your leadership space, and deserving to be paid your worth, you will have arrived at a great place to be.
This mindset shift requires letting go of indoctrinated beliefs that keep us small and instead embracing the thoughts and feelings of being as worthy and deserving as any other human being. We must give this feeling to ourselves and not depend on it from anyone else or make it dependent upon anything external to us.
This transformative mindset shift can only happen if you practice it. How will you shift from feeling less than to feeling deserving? And how will you practice it daily until…?
5. Shifting from One Money Bracket Mindset to the Next Level
Have you noticed a theme yet in these mindsets? At the root of many of these ways of thinking are our beliefs, and this mindset shift of going from one income level to a higher one not only requires an up-leveling of your mindset but also a possible upgrade of your identity too. Your identity is what you believe about yourself or who you think you are in this moment.
This mindset shift requires you to adopt thoughts that up-leveling your bank account is not going to be about working harder. It is going to be about working smarter with systems, strategies, and scaling in place.
To go from 5 figures to 6 or from 6 to 7 figures of income will demand you become someone different; someone who is going to play bigger, someone who gives more value, someone who takes the actions of a leader playing in the big field.
What do you believe about yourself? It is possible that your identity is getting in the way of your income. The mindset shift you may need is in upgrading your identity to being a six or seven-figure earner. It does not matter if you have never done this before; it is a way of thinking, and thinking leads to emotions which lead to actions.
Write down 3 thoughts or the identity you will embrace to take you to your next income bracket.
The power of your mind cannot be underestimated; it also can be the creator of your reality. We have the ability to transform our thoughts, manage our mindset, become our beliefs, and influence our identity. Then it is undeniable that our mindset matters not just for our wellbeing but also for our growth as leaders and entrepreneurs. Yet how many of us are cultivating and practicing the shifts of mindset we need to be at our best, breakthrough limitations, and become all we are capable of being?
Let these mindset shifts be your practice to elevating and energizing yourself beyond today to where you are leading and to who you are becoming.
Jody Kennett, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine
Jody Kennett elevates leaders with leadership, communication, and peak energy performance as an ICF-certified coach. She is impacting women in business globally and empowering them to own their power as a leader by combining women's leadership, confidence, and communication coaching. Her specialized training as a certified C-IQ (Conversational Intelligence) coach is transforming conversations, communication, and culture to foster positive relationships and a thriving workplace. As a co-author of The Winning Mindset book, she is inspiring and training people to master their inner-leader and mindset so they can have peak performance. She created Peak Energy 4 Performance to highlight the importance of energy input into not only our bodies, but also our mind, emotions, and environment. Jody is uniquely certified as a leadership, life, and health coach bringing 20 years of health and wellbeing expertise to energize leaders and entrepreneurs. She is the coach who will help you 'Lead Your Life', career, and business so you will, 'Lead it, Live it, and Love it!'.
