Post-Pandemic Reflections: Things I Can’t Afford To Forget

I’ll nev­er for­get this past year…

Just 12 months ago I was sit­ting in an all-day busi­ness meet­ing when my phone and com­put­er start­ed to light up with cus­tomers want­i­ng to talk to me about can­cel­ing, paus­ing, or adjust­ing their mar­ket­ing ser­vices. I wrote about that expe­ri­ence, and my first few months of the lock­down, in this blog post: Embrac­ing Uncer­tain­ty. I’m sure you have your own moments that you can clear­ly recall, when the world as we knew it seemed to grind to a sud­den halt. 

Dur­ing a recent call with my busi­ness coach, she asked me what I had learned over the past 12 months. I start­ed list­ing off a few lit­tle things. 

“What else?” she asked.

I list­ed a few more top-of-mind takeaways. 

“What else?” she asked.

She was push­ing me to keep dig­ging. Not easy, but so valuable. 

I’m learn­ing so much about myself, my cus­tomers, my envi­ron­ment, my busi­ness, my fam­i­ly, my rela­tion­ships, and real­ly just about peo­ple! I’m learn­ing to nev­er stop reflecting. 

So, What Did I Learn (and con­tin­ue to learn)?

Here are a few key things I’ve dis­cov­ered I can do:

• I can change and adapt
• I can grow and get stronger
• I can do hard things for my busi­ness, and make hard decisions

Here are a few key things I’ve learned:

• How to write bet­ter job descriptions
• How to cre­ate SOPs
• How to interview
• How to hire and train
• That it’s okay to lose clients and find new ones
• Nev­er give up & stay in the game

Noth­ing forces eval­u­a­tion and growth like hav­ing the rug pulled out from under you. It can be painful in the moment, but it’s so worthwhile.

I remem­ber how help­less I felt a year ago, cry­ing out to God and ask­ing for His help. I real­ized just how much I need­ed to spend time in prayer and read­ing the Bible, and that encour­aged me to start a week­ly con­trac­tor prayer group that con­tin­ues to this day. 

And Here I am Today

So here I am a year lat­er, reflect­ing on the past 12 months and look­ing ahead to the next year. 

I have hired sev­er­al new peo­ple, found an excep­tion­al busi­ness coach that has pushed me beyond what I thought was pos­si­ble, and have new busi­ness sys­tems in place. I also have a half dozen or so new clients. 

My prayer group is grow­ing — we pray for the con­struc­tion indus­try as a whole, as well as indi­vid­ual needs. I also am part way through a coach­ing pro­gram, learn­ing how to be a bet­ter coach! It has been awesome. 

In clos­ing, all I can say is that I am grate­ful. I am blessed. I am learn­ing that as I move for­ward in 2021, I can­not for­get what hap­pened in 2020. I’m not ashamed to lean on the Lord Jesus Christ, espe­cial­ly since He is the One who got me through the COVID crazi­ness. I hope I nev­er lean on my own strength but rely on His good­ness and mercy. 

I am also so thank­ful for the new friend­ships and rela­tion­ships I’ve devel­oped over the past year. Final­ly, I am tru­ly look­ing for­ward to grow­ing and devel­op­ing as a mar­ket­ing guru, and help­ing my cus­tomers con­tin­ue on their own journeys.

How about YOU? What have you learned that you can car­ry with you, and that you can’t afford to forget?