Enter the draw to WIN…

Grant Difford and Paul Sills are launching a new coaching programme and platform to help entrepreneurs deal with the mental challenges of business.

ENTER THE DRAW TO WIN A SPOT IN THE FINDTHEGAPS COACHING PROGRAMME valued at $299, GO TO www.waking-giants.com/nzbusiness   

There are few people who understand more about the struggles of developing a business in the face of personal difficulties than Grant Difford, founder and head of strategy at Waking Giants, and business partner/director Paul Sills.

They’ve faced family tragedy and mental illness respectively; have learnt numerous lessons along their business journey, helped each other out of dark holes, and now they want to help others in similar circumstances through their new coaching program and platform findthegaps.com.

It officially kicks off on August 14 this year.

“Paul and I started working together when I had some really challenging things going on in my life that left me very lost and unable to see what the future looked like for myself, my business and my family,” recalls Grant. “Paul guided me through a coaching program comprising six weeks of face-to-face sessions and ‘homework’. Then six months ‘checking-in’ to hold me accountable for what I wanted to do. 

“It changed my life. We became friends through our love of triathlons and would often run up to a couple of hours discussing course learnings and how we’re all under increasing mental and physical pressure in the way we lead our lives. 

“Paul wanted to use his learnings to help more people and I was a graduate.

“Through Waking Giants we found many leaders would share some of the more challenging aspects of their business that went beyond just the running of it, and how they were coping with their own position in the organisation.”

“So the culmination was in taking a programme and set of thinking and formalising it to help people really make a change – with the focus on accountability,” says Grant. 

Grant explains that the biggest takeaway from findthegaps.com will be about the action it takes to move forward. “We always use the marathon as the classic case study – too many people want a shortcut to success, to take a magic pill, get to the start-line and get the perfect time. What they don’t realise or, more accurately, want to do, is take the first step, or the one-hundredth, the one-thousandth, and do the work to get to the finish-line ready to deliver. So they give up early or just don’t try.” 

Grant and Paul want participants to ask themselves some tough questions and what they’re prepared to do about it; then get the participants to commit to a key change in their lives, and live that way permanently. 

Grant says findthegaps targets people who want to evolve, to re-program their life for long-term sustainable change. Accountability is the key component, through both coaching and technology.

Business and mental health

Running a business is not for the faint-hearted, and both Grant and Paul recognise the warning signs leading to negative outcomes. These include:

• People competing with others too much. “Do your thing for your reasons. No more ‘keeping up with the Joneses’.”
• Ego! It distracts people from true awareness. “Imagine you are following another person’s strategy and your ego drives that! What is it you are actually trying to do?” 
• Wanting a quick fix. There’s a lack of patience and willingness to develop new habits and positive changes over time. 
• Thinking you need to go it alone and put on a brave face when things are going seriously down the toilet. This leads to isolation.
• Fear of getting it right or getting it wrong. Fear that the business might fail. “But that’s OK, it’s how you deal with it that’s important.”

There are no new issues in running a business, concludes Grant. “We all go through the same things over the life of a business – so don’t be brave or a soloist; reach out and ask for help. The answers have already been found.”