Managing Through Impatience

Here’s the challenge:  you’re waiting for someone else to finish their work before you can leave for the next appointment.  You don’t receive it on time and now you’re running late.  You get behind a driver that’s going 10 miles below the speed limit.  You feel your body getting tense and suddenly you yell at the car in front of you as if they can hear you.  You’re going to be even later!

Does this sound familiar? 

We can all be impatient at times and losing our cool can result in headaches and other physical ailments keeping us from top performance. 

This impatience, however, can be part of your natural behavioral factors.  Your behavioral factors (or hardwiring) operate(s) automatically and it can be your greatest asset or your biggest inhibitor.   This hardwiring creates patterns and is often the underlying reason for some of your actions and habits.

Each individual has a specific combination of hardwiring.  One of those traits is the expression of patient behavior.  While you may or may not have this trait, you will undoubtedly run into someone who does (usually behind you in the checkout line tapping their foot or drumming their fingers.)   When you meet someone with this trait, they may come across as intense, fidgety or nervous, depending on the combination of the person’s other hardwiring traits.

In Me, Myself, and Why? The Secrets to Navigating Change, there is a character named Juggler Jane.  Jane loves the variety she has in her work and is energized by it.  She is naturally wired to triage assignments and does an excellent job prioritizing and re-prioritizing depending on the urgency of the work.

If left unmanaged, however, this natural tendency to respond to the pressures of daily work life can also be a hindrance.  Jane will often underestimate the amount of time it takes to complete a project.  She puts pressure on herself and others and is always on the go responding to the requests.

Leveraging Strengths

So how does Jane leverage her strengths and manage her hardwiring?

It’s important for someone naturally wired with this trait to work in environments where they have multiple things to do.  People who have this sense of urgency do their best work in environments where there are multiple assignments rather than repetitive activities which are boring to them. 

In fact, they will be become restless with repetitive, routine activities or work which involves staying in one confined place.  If they are in such a work place, they will not be able to sit for long periods of time to complete their projects. 

Managing Your Hardwiring

If you’re like Jane, your natural hardwiring has its strengths, like the ability to respond to pressures.  If left unmanaged, however, these same traits could prevent you from getting results.  There are certain jobs in your company that are best done by people naturally wired to do them.  Your hardwiring (and that of who you hire) should be taken into consideration when structuring your business and executing your plan. 

Manage Your Tolerance for Delays.   You have a tendency to become intolerant with delays and want to get on with the next thing. You build up tension and the need to release it is through action.  You put this pressure on yourself and others.  But if you don’t have a clear plan, you could be putting a lot of action in many places but not producing any results.

When you feel that tension rising:

Make sure the plan is clear.  Establishing a clear vision and plan as well as setting realistic timelines ensures the action you want to take is proactive, aligned, and produces results. 

Ask.  Simply asking a customer when they need something helps you to manage priorities.  Often times, people don’t need something as quickly as you think they do and by asking, you’re managing expectations and your impulse to get everything done immediately.

Pay attention to your physical well-being.  If you are hungry, dehydrated or fatigued, this natural hardwiring will become amplified and difficult to manage if you need to.  Taking care of your physical basic needs are essential in managing this hardwiring.

Keep it realistic.  Individuals naturally wired with this hardwiring will set unrealistic timelines with themselves and others.  Give yourself permission to slow down.  If you think you’ve identified a timeline, add another week or month to it if possible. 

Small business owners naturally wired this way are often impatient with their results often piling on many projects at once.  Projects take longer because they are trying to complete all projects at once, often creating a start-and-stop habit.  Give each project focus and move on to the next one scheduling enough time on your calendar.  When using a schedule for each project, you’ll see the bigger picture allowing you to more realistically gauge the timeframes and create more focused execution. 

Remind yourself that impatience rarely gets others to move faster.  In fact, depending on their hardwiring, it may actually impede their ability to perform and you’re contributing to added stress.   Behaviorally if someone doesn’t move as fast as you do, it may be because they are wired opposite of you.  More pressure actually creates an inability to get things done.  Instead, back off, set expectations and timelines, and determine an agreed upon update each week.  You’ll be surprised at how well they perform when you’re not in the way every two minutes asking for an update.

Allow yourself to let go.  You can easily get in the habit of responding to all messages and pressures of the day.  Not everything needs to have this sense of urgency but, because of your natural wiring, you can get in the habit of responding to everything.  Then, it becomes difficult for you to relax at the end of the day.  This stress needs to be released in a healthy way like exercise.  It may also be a matter of delegating some of the details to others.  Allow yourself to let go.  Not everything is a priority or needs to be responded to that day.  Releasing your self-imposed response times can be the best solution to managing that natural urgency.

Interacting

When you’re interacting with someone with a high sense of urgency, remember these tips:

Make sure there is an established timeframe.  When there is an established timeframe, it helps to manage that sense of urgency.  With large-scale projects, make sure there are realistic timeframes established for each of the implementation steps so that that the dates can be managed.

Communicate Often.  When there are changes, people with that impatience hardwiring want to know how those changes will affect the results and timelines.  When there are changes, communicate what is being done and the adjusted timeline.

Denying this hardwiring for long periods of time actually de-energizes an individual.  Getting the hardwiring met and aligning your business growth plans with it, yields increased results more quickly.  Understanding your hardwiring is critical to knowing how to stay motivated, what might be holding you back from growing your business, and even what needs to be changed to seal the deal authentically.  

_____________________

Lisa Mininni is the Best Selling Author of Me, Myself, and Why? The Secrets to Navigating Change and President of Excellerate Associates, home of The Entrepreneurial Edge System^TM, the only national developmental and marketing program showing entrepreneurs how to put their personal, client and revenue goals on the fast track.  For more information and a free eBook on what you need to grow your business, visit http://www.freebusinessplanformat.com.

Isn’t it interesting that we know each individual has a different style of communicating and doing things, but many people never really realize why that is?  Yet, when we realize how individuals are biologically wired, we can be more effective in providing information the way the other person wants to receive it, often helping in communication, sales, and providing solutions. 

All people exhibit a combination of hardwiring factors.  Your hardwiring is automatic and it can be your greatest asset or your biggest inhibitor. It can also influence habits and belief systems. 

Each individual has a specific combination of hardwiring.  One of those traits is the external thinker.  While you may or may not have this trait, you will undoubtedly run into someone who does.   You’ll recognize an external thinker when you meet them.  They are outgoing and communicative as well as socially oriented and poised.  When they participate in groups, they often will be one of the first to speak up and are capable of stimulating and often persuasive conversations. 

In Me, Myself, and Why? The Secrets to Navigating Change, there is a character named Spirited Sandy.  Sandy is an external thinker.  She is naturally wired to express her thoughts aloud and her main motivation is to get things done by working with (and through) other people.  Sandy is motivated by meeting new people and is energized by lively company.

As a Sales Representative, Sandy was generally energized by her work.  One day, Sandy joined a networking group – gravitating toward her natural ability to connect with people.  A natural extrovert, Sandy did most of the talking rather than managing her innate need of fluent conversation.   

Some people perceive her as “all about Sandy” and didn’t feel that they had an opportunity to contribute.  However, Sandy perceived that she was being helpful by providing solutions.  

How does Sandy leverage her strengths and manage her hardwiring?

Leveraging Strengths

Create opportunities for interaction with people.  Since external thinkers, like Sandy, tend to be energized by face-to-face contact with others, they will need to get this underlying motivation met each day.  For business owners, this can be accomplished through active participation in networking groups.  Be aware, however, of your natural need to communicate your thoughts.  Networking is about what you can learn about the other person so manage your natural urge to chat about you.

Work involving service to others.  When you have this external thinker trait, your best work is in environments where you have opportunities to stimulate and motivate people.  

Participation in Groups.  As a business owner, you prefer working in groups and enjoy the interaction groups provide.  You generally prefer being in the company of others as opposed to working alone.   You do your best work when you have time to bounce it off of others, as you externalize to crystallize your ideas.

Managing Your Hardwiring

If you’re like Sandy, your natural hardwiring has its strengths.  However, there are areas where, if left unmanaged, could prevent you from getting results and must be taken into consideration when structuring your business and executing your plan. 

Silence Is Golden.   You have a tendency to talk through what’s in your head (as opposed to internal thinkers who keep it in their head until they have processed it.)  This live streaming gives people the perception that you are only concerned about your thoughts and contributions.  It can cause people to tune out and people may think you are disingenuous because you say the first thing that comes to mind.   

While you may be the most trustworthy person, being verbal about your thoughts has its disadvantages especially when it comes to building trust.  While you may think you’re generating ideas aloud, others who may be opposite of you, take everything you say into consideration.  While in your mind you were just generating ideas, they started implementing those ideas.  When you clarify that you were just brainstorming, they perceive you as changing your mind because, after all, you said (fill in the blank.)  This perception often erodes trust with others you work with because of what they see as inconsistencies in what you say aloud. 

Don’t overshare. It is important to manage your natural impulse to share what’s on your mind and carefully articulate to others when you are just brainstorming or thinking aloud.  In addition, allow silence especially if you have individuals who are internal thinkers on your team.  Resist the urge to fill the silence with words.  Silence gives the internal thinkers, who are opposite of you, time to process particularly if it is a new subject.  Internal thinkers and external thinkers are not so far apart.  Internal thinkers just process their information on the inside and external thinkers process their information on the outside.

Be Present.  External Thinkers, like Sandy are able to empathize and understand another person’s point of view and want to be of help often giving their advice or suggestions without being asked.  The other person doesn’t always want advice or suggestions and is looking for someone to just listen.  Before giving your advice, ask the individual, “what do you need from me?” or “how can I help?”  They will often tell you what they need and may even say, just listening was helpful. 

An extroverted client of mine often had difficulty staying present with his clients.  To stay in the moment, he repeats (in his head) what the other individual is saying.  This internal scripting allows him to stay in the moment with the individual and avoid going into problem-solving mode.  This simple trick has helped hundreds of my extroverted clients stay in the moment especially when they naturally wanted to “fix” an issue or take over the conversation.

Build in Face Time.  If you want to expand your business and are more of an external thinker, remember that you naturally gravitate toward communicating with others face to face.  If this is absent in your Marketing Mix, you will become de-energized unless you get this natural motivator met.  Live speaking engagements are one of the ways for you to express yourself expanding your business in a way that leverages your social and communication skills.

Interacting

When you’re interacting with an external thinker, remember these tips:

Establish An Agenda with Timelines.  External thinkers by their nature need to verbalize their thoughts.  They do their best when they have an opportunity to express themselves.  They are stimulated by spontaneous brainstorming but you have to identify and stick to timelines; otherwise, you’ll find your meeting going on longer than anticipated.

Acknowledge Them.  External Thinkers are motivated to do even more when they have been personally acknowledged.  Whether it is their work or a contribution they made in a meeting, a verbal response or simple thank you goes a long way with an external thinker.

Control Business Costs.   External thinkers by their very nature often will use more words to communicate their thoughts and this can increase your phone bills.  One company’s Sales Representatives were consistently exceeding their cell phone minute limits.  Instead of trying to get the External Thinkers to have shorter conversations, they realized they needed a different cell phone plan.   They adopted a flat rate plan ultimately saving the company thousands of dollars a month in overage charges while allowing the sales representatives to continue to be in their natural mode. 

Denying this hardwiring for long periods of time actually de-motivates an individual.  Getting the hardwiring met and aligning your business growth plans with it, yields increased results more quickly.  Understanding your hardwiring is critical to knowing how to stay motivated, what might be holding you back from growing your business, and even what needs to be changed to seal the deal authentically.  

_____________________

Lisa Mininni is the Best Selling Author of Me, Myself, and Why? The Secrets to Navigating Change and President of Excellerate Associates, a business mentoring company. For more information on human wiring, download our free eBook, Get More Clients Now! at http://www.excellerateassociates.com.

Once you make the commitment to grow your business, there are essential elements that will affect every decision you make and are largely the place where your fear, hesitation, procrastination, decision making, communication, motivation and even your belief systems are derived from.   It’s your hardwiring.   It operates automatically and it can be your greatest asset or your biggest inhibitor.

Each individual has a specific combination of hardwiring.  One of those traits is the internal thinker.  While you may or may not have this trait, you will run into someone who does.  An internal thinker is introspective and logical.  When they meet you for the first time, they will be pleasant but not overly expressive.  When they participate in groups, they often will not express themselves unless they have thought about what they are saying, it adds value, or if it is something they consider important.

In Me, Myself, and Why? The Secrets to Navigating Change, there is a character called Analytical Ann.  Ann is an internal thinker.  She is naturally wired to think things through and her main motivation is to get things done.  Afterall, to Ann, social chit chat is inefficient when you have a task at hand.  She prefers to communicate through email because it gives her time to think through her answers.

Recently, Ann attended a social event that included individuals she did not know from the company that was merging with her company.  She spent small amounts of time in group discussions but removed herself from the group so that she could be alone.  This behavior was motivated by her internal hardwiring because she had an internal need to collect her thoughts.  This was a critical time for Ann to be an influence during the merger. 

Some people perceived her behavior as unsocial and unfriendly, which didn’t help position Ann well in the merger.  However, Ann needed this time alone because it was draining for her to be with a group of new people.

So how does Ann leverage her strengths and manage her hardwiring during this changing time?

Leveraging Strengths

Make Use of Your Thorough Thinker.  Since internal thinkers, like Ann, tend to be introspective, and like to think through things before they talk or act, they will do their homework and come prepared.  They will want to plan for a meeting especially when they are asked to present in front of the group.  People with this hardwiring contribute work of great quality and make use of their natural tendency to think things through so they spot errors before they occur. 

Work with Tangible and Concrete Factual Matters.  When you have this internal thinker trait, you focus on work-related activities than social activities.  Your best work is in environments where you have opportunities to communicate factually and sincerely. 

Use Small Group Interactions.  As a business owner, you will network but you’ll gravitate toward smaller groups at networking events, which work more in alignment with your natural hard wiring.  You generally prefer these smaller social interactions and will hesitate on your decision making when it involves addressing large groups or groups you don’t know.   You do your best work when you have time to think, which generally means you have great ideas about an hour after a meeting so structuring follow up feedback is important to leveraging your contributions.

Managing Your Hardwiring

If you’re like Ann, your natural hardwiring has its strengths.  However, there are parts where, if left unmanaged, could prevent you from getting results and must be taken into consideration when structuring your business and executing your plan. 

Acknowledge when others are speaking to you.   You have a tendency to go into your head when asked a question or your opinion.  When others are talking with you, this may give them the perception that you do not understand what they are saying because you’re not acknowledging their question.  Behaviorally, when you are thinking, it generally results in a blank stare which can be perceived by others as cold, unfriendly, withdrawn or moody.  It is important to verbalize with a simple “yes,” “I hear you” or “give me a minute to think about it” so that the other person knows that you understood them, especially external thinkers who you may perceive as too verbose or saying what’s on their mind before they even think about it.

Make a decision and develop a plan.  Internal thinkers, like Ann, can over analyze a plan and never implement.  Give yourself a timeline, develop the plan and implement resisting the temptation to over analyze or over think your solutions.  You may miss out on an opportunity to grow your business and this over thinking is often the underlying cause of procrastination.

Accept help.  You often believe you need to figure things out for yourself.  While that may be noble, it may not always be in your best interest especially if you’re committed to growing your business.  Understand that your natural hardwiring influences you accepting help from others or getting help from others.  As a business owner, you can’t do everything yourself.  It will be necessary to ask for help rather than assuming someone should know you need help.

Record Your Achievements.  Since you internalize your thoughts, when someone asks you about the results you achieved, you might have to think about it unless you write them down and celebrate those accomplishments.  A hesitation on your part brings about the perception from others that you don’t have any achievements.  In reality, you just need time to think about them.  When you write them down, they remain top of mind helping you to articulate them timely.

Address the social aspects of change.  While all people are by nature socially based, internal thinkers have stronger propensity toward the task and this will affect the amount of their socializing.  For example, internal thinkers will engage in some very minor verbal courtesies, but then want to get down to business. 

When growing your business, you may continue to focus on the tasks and not address the feelings of others.  This leaves others with the impression that you are unfriendly or don’t care.  Keep in mind that others may be external thinkers and may need to articulate their feelings and have a higher propensity for social exchange. 

Phone or email are preferred modes of communication.  If you want to expand your business and are more of an internal thinker, remember that you naturally gravitate toward communicating through phone or email.  This avoids the face-to-face stimulation you don’t innately need.  Teleseminars are ideal ways for you to express yourself expanding your business in a way that not only leverages your ability to communicate with so many more people but gives you a vehicle that gives you time to prepare and allows you to script it using the best of your think-through wiring.

Interacting

When you’re interacting with an internal thinker, remember these tips:

Provide Preparation Time.  Internal thinkers do their best when they’ve had time to prepare what they are going to say.  This is why spontaneous brainstorming is difficult for them particularly if it’s with people or a subject they are unfamiliar with.

After a meeting, give them time to think about things.  Their best ideas come when they’ve had time to process their thoughts internally.  About an hour after a meeting, loop back around with them once they have had a chance to think about it.

Give opportunities to ease into participation.   Internal thinkers generally have a hesitation to networking because it requires spontaneous social interaction with people they don’t know.  Giving them time to get to know the group they are networking with is essential to their excelling in these environments. 

Denying this hardwiring actually de-motivates an individual.  Getting the hardwiring met and aligning your business growth plans with it, yields increased results more quickly.  Understanding your hardwiring is critical to knowing how to stay motivated, what might be holding you back from growing your business, and even what needs to be changed to seal the deal authentically. 

_____________________

Lisa Mininni is the Best Selling Author of Me, Myself, and Why? The Secrets to Navigating Change and President of Excellerate Associates, home of The Entrepreneurial Edge System^TM, the only national developmental and marketing program showing entrepreneurs how to put their personal, client and revenue goals on the fast track.

Frequently, small business owners are excited to build their business, but often have lulls in their motivation.   What most people don’t realize is that you derive your motivation from your natural hardwiring.  When you create awareness about your natural hardwiring, you will be able to tell when it is working for you and when it is getting in the way. 

Your hardwiring affects how you communicate, create relationships, react in stressful situations, stay motivated, and even how you will tend to market your business.  While each individual has their unique blend of hardwiring, this article will cover the story of Adam from Me, Myself, and Why? The Secrets to Navigating Change to demonstrate how you can leverage one of the many hardwiring traits.

Adam is described as an independent-minded person who needs freedom to express himself.  He is motivated in environments where he is able to be innovative, venturesome, and achieve tangible results.  He is described as an independent expeditor; that is, he likes to create and execute his own ideas. 

Leveraging Strengths

By no surprise, Adam thrived as a Director for his Company negotiating (and winning) many new contracts.  When he was laid off, he didn’t agree with that decision (largely because it wasn’t his.)  After some self-reflection, Adam realized that he wasn’t as entirely motivated at his job and this was an opportunity for him to start a brand new business and career.

As a resourceful problem solver, he responds favorably to challenges or unfamiliar situations.  Starting a new business, filled with opportunities to blaze new trails, is in line with his hardwiring.  Adam will also need to look at how he structures his business to support his blend of natural hardwiring so that he remains consistently motivated.

Managing the Hardwiring

While Adam’s natural hardwiring has its strengths, there are parts where, if left unmanaged, could prevent him from getting results and must be taken into consideration when structuring his business.  Since Adam is naturally self-assured receiving his self-confidence internally, he is motivated by internal things – his way of doing work, his ideas, and his results.  He is willing to debate his ideas with you and this individualistic behavior to dominate people or situations can come across as edgey, unapproachable or intensive depending on Adam’s unique mix of other hardwiring traits.

While Adam is an independent innovator of ideas, he may ignore the advice of others in favor of his own way of doing things and this is an area he will need to manage.  If he isn’t getting out of a conversation what is most important to him, people may feel dismissed by him as he will quickly shut down a conversation.

While Adam is excited about new ventures, he may not fully execute a single idea before going on to the next, causing delayed results or limited outcomes because the infrastructure is not there to support another new project.  This puts more pressure on him and the more pressure or stress, the more his particular hardwiring will be amplified; that is, the more directive or competitive he will become, putting pressure on himself and others.  He may need coaching or learn to manage his social interactions with others which he typically will look into as a last resort.

If you’re wired like Adam, how do you manage this hardwiring and stay motivated?

1.            Create an Environment That Allows You To Independently Perform Functions Your Own Way.   Since independence over your decisions is important you’ll need a daily dose of challenging decision making in your work environment.  With an environment rich in challenge and independent execution, you’ll stay motivated depending on the mix of your other hardwiring, which will be discussed in other articles.

2.            Create Opportunities with Freedom of Decision-Making Built In. People wired like Adam need freedom to make decisions that correspond to their results, ideas, and their way.  Identify the end result and give them the opportunity to carve the path to get there.  If you’re a business owner and want to leverage this hardwiring, remember to use resources that will help execute the remainder of your plans so you focus on what’s most important.  You will typically gravitate toward getting new business and developing new ideas which you are naturally wired to do.

3.            Implement Active Listening Techniques.  People hardwired like Adam may not fully consider other people’s contributions.  Active listening helps.  It is a structured way of listening and responding to others, focusing attention on the person speaking. Suspending one’s own judgment and frame of reference are important to fully consider the speaker.  Since you naturally listen through the lens of your own ideas, this technique helps you focus through another lens allowing you to open up to other people’s contributions.

Interacting With Adam

If you’re interacting with a client like Adam, remember these tips when interacting with them:

•             There are degrees of just how much people need their independence and how they like to be challenged.  Informing someone wired like Adam that something is difficult or they cannot do it creates the “I’ll-show-you” attitude and they will perform until the desired results are achieved. 

•             If X is what you need them to do and Y is what they want – (i.e., more freedom or autonomy from supervision) then let them know that achieving X will get them Y and not achieving X will give them less of their own autonomy. 

•             When communicating with someone hardwired like Adam, communicate in bullet points and factual or tangible-based examples. 

•             They will choose marketing vehicles that are innovative and give them their biggest return on investment, quickly dismissing options that don’t perform well the first time as they have high expectations for the best in anything.

Denying this hardwiring actually suppresses performance, productivity and motivation.  When you get your natural hardwiring met with a bit of self-management, it helps you to keep motivated, creates more results, and improves outcomes.  When you understand how your natural hardwiring works, you learn how to stay motivated and communicate with your prospects in the way they want to receive their information, enhance your prospect-to-client conversion rates and create more effective marketing messages.

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Lisa Mininni is Best-Selling Author of Me, Myself, and Why? The Secrets to Navigating Change and President of Excellerate Associates, home of The Entrepreneurial Edge System^TM, the only national curriculum showing entrepreneurs how their clients find them, choose, them, and buy from them, filling their practice in record time.  For more information, visit http://www.freebusinessplanformat.com

Have you ever been stopped by fear – fear of conflict, fear of taking risks or fear of failure?  The problem is, it is innate for some people and holds them back from doing what it takes to get more clients and create a life and business of their dreams.   You see, we’re all naturally hardwired a certain way.  This hardwiring impacts how we communicate, how we behave, and how we give and receive information.  There are both strengths to that hardwiring and limitations.  For some people, fear of conflict and risk is part of their natural hardwiring that could be hurting their business if left unmanaged. 

The best way to describe how your hardwiring can be the underlying cause of your fear is learning about it through Hazel’s eyes.

There once was a business owner named Hazel.  Hazel shied away from conflict in her life.  She didn’t realize it, but she worked in fear:  fear of conflict and from taking risks.  She often says, “I’m afraid or concerned that this or that will happen” and spends a lot of time consumed in what others will think or say and worried about all the things that could go wrong.

Hazel lives in “what if,” and tries to remove all barriers before taking action.  She carefully weighs risks, and often delays decisions or takes no action because she has talked herself out of it.   She works well in a team environment primarily because that team gives her safety and security she innately needs.  She seeks consensus from the team especially if there are risky decisions. 

Part of Hazel’s natural hardwiring is her need to remove or retreat from conflict.  In fact, when people are in disagreement or disagreeing with her, she will not say anything.  In those situations, she walks away often with incorrect perceptions because she wants to avoid the argument.  Her employees are left with unresolved feelings that only build up over time. 

What To Do
What’s underneath Hazel’s fear is, in part, her natural hardwiring to avoid conflict as well as a fear of taking risks.  This hardwiring, if left unmanaged fosters an environment of unresolved conflict, prevents her from going big with her message, and ultimately hurts her business.  She often walks away from conversations because she doesn’t think it would accomplish anything to debate a situation anyway.  Since debating ideas, comes across as conflict, and that type of interaction is naturally draining for her, she wants to avoid it.  

If you feel your blood pressure rise, your face turning red and your first instinct is to shut down and run at the first sign of what you view as conflict, you may have a bit of Hazel in you. 

So how do you handle that conflict and risk taking when you’re naturally wired to avoid it?

1.  Take a deep breath.  Often times when under stressful situations, your breathing shallows placing stress on the body.  A deep breath gives you a second to gain some perspective and gather your thoughts.

2. Clarify Assumptions.  In situations where there is conflict, your instinct is to shut down and walk away without clarifying your assumptions.  Spend more time finding out why the individual feels or thinks they way they do about the situation by asking clarifying questions.  Clarifying questions are open ended that require a response.  They begin with words like what, who, where, when, and how.   

If it’s risk you’re not taking and it stops you in your tracks, you need to also consider what you could gain versus what you would give up when making decisions. People who naturally want to avoid risk often will look at what they need to give up (time, money, etc.) versus what they will gain.  Much of the fear for people who are naturally wired to avoid risk, is because they are going into unknown territory and that is unsettling to them.  By identifying what you can gain, helps balance your assumptions.

3. Focus on the Problem or Situation Not on the People or the Personal.  Resist getting into the blame game or focusing on who’s right or wrong.  When you focus on the problem or process that is causing the issue, it focuses the energy in developing constructive solutions.

4. Identify a Plan and Timelines.  People who are naturally wired to avoid conflict or risk may never implement a solution because they are fearful that the solution may create more conflict or not work out.  Give yourself a time limitation to think through the next steps.  Write down the steps creating a plan for yourself.  Identify timelines for yourself and stick to them.  This gives individuals who are risk averse to create a tangible plan so the solution becomes more real (or known.)

5. Recognize That you may Gravitate Toward What you Know.  Because what you learned or what you know, you may stay where you are because it is comfortable and less risky than something new.  This causes these entrepreneurs to not implement or invest in those new things that very well could bring in more business, more clients or bring their business to a new level.  Simply recognizing this behavior can help you understand why you may be resisting a new idea or solution.

Interacting with Hazel
If you interact with someone like Hazel, understand that she has an innate ability to be a team player but may be perceived as not saying what is on her mind, especially if she believes there may be conflict with something she says.  She may not feel safe enough in the situation to share her ideas.  If you interact with someone like Hazel acknowledge her contributions and consider her ideas without an immediate comeback, which she will see as debate.    Instead, consider her contributions thoughtfully watching for tone and pace in your conversation. 

As a business owner, if you are naturally hardwired to avoid conflict or risk (as risk is often seen as a conflict to avoid), it can prevent your small business from growing, if left unmanaged.  Remember to create awareness about your natural hardwiring and implement these simple techniques to manage it.  When you make the investment in yourself to grow personally, you’ll see the investment grow your business exponentially.

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Lisa Mininni’s is Best-Selling Author of Me, Myself, and Why? The Secrets to Navigating Change and President of Excellerate Associates, home of The Entrepreneurial Edge System^TM the only developmental and marketing program taking a systems approach to profitability for small businesses helping them fill their business in record time.  To learn more about your hardwiring and other business growth techniques, pick up your free copy of Get Ready, Get Set, Go! 3 Steps to Jump Start Your Start Up at http://www.freebusinessplanformat.com