Emma Warren
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Emma Warren

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On November 2, 2020 • By Admin
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    About Me

    About Me

    Welcome to a little corner of my world – I look forward to sharing some life experiences with you… ‘Do what you love with people you like’ is probably one of my favourite sayings and I’ve finally managed to bring it to fruition.

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    Recent Posts

    • It should be the icing and not the cake…
    • Certainty, Clarity and Consistency
    • Of Motto and Memento
    • The only really good idea is the one you’re actually working on…
    • It’s all a matter of perspective…

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    It should be the icing and not the cake... It sho It should be the icing and not the cake...

It should be the seasoning and not the soup...

It should be the snack and not the meal…

You’re probably wondering what I’m talking about here, it’s quite a smorgasbord of food analogies isn’t it? 

But they all make the same basic point about priorities, which is a very relevant, and I feel timely, one if you run a business.

Similarly, social media is not the be all and end all of your business – running your business and making sales is what ultimately matters. Social media plays a part in that but it is just one of the tools at your disposal – not the only tool.

I run a few businesses and oversee their social media accounts (I’ve tagged them on the photo alongside Rachel), and I know how easy it is to get pulled off course. 

So I’ve pulled together my thoughts on why a targeted and balanced approach to social media is key to running a profitable business. It was a bit too long for a post, so I’ve popped it onto my blog and put the link in my profile.

So if you’d like to read more about gaining some balance, and more importantly, check out the other gorgeous cake photos that I borrowed from @rachelbraggphotography - please click the link in my profile and hop over to my blog.

I’d love to hear your thoughts below and please do let me know if the three words at the end of the blog resonated with you.

Have a great Easter 😘
    Old maps, new stories... I found this map when I Old maps, new stories...

I found this map when I was searching for a prop for a photo shoot. I ordered it and then thought no more of it, until it arrived…

It came out of the envelope and as I looked at it I realised that it held the story of many journeys. Journeys that will never be mine to know but entrancing all the same.

With me, it starts a different journey, its age and battered beauty, adding  to, not detracting from, its use for me.

You see I believe that our forward path is made up of learned experience from our past, and our curiosity and appetite for new experiences in the future.

Our learned experience from the past helps us make decisions, sometimes good, sometimes bad, about the path that we will take for the future.

A map helps spot where these paths might lead us. It doesn’t provide the answers, it doesn’t necessarily stop us from making decisions, but it does give us an overview of where we are and where we might end up.

In business, we need all of these things - some experience (our own or from others around  us), a map for us to understand where we might go and the curiosity and the daring to take the first step on the journey…

How about you - do you like a map or do you prefer to fly blind?
    I find it mildly amusing that @formidableover40 & I find it mildly amusing that @formidableover40 & I will be like Harry & Meg’s warm-up act tonight-I mean, no pressure eh?!

Seriously though, I’m delighted that we’re going to spend an hour together chatting, but there’s no telling where we’ll end up, as our chats are usually quite wide ranging!

Our main reason for scheduling a chat was to celebrate International Women’s Day, and to pop a high five into the air for all the many women we know, who like us, juggle busy work, Mum and life days. 

Juggling priorities is never easy and whenever one of them has a bit of a conflict with another one, the rest of the priorities seem to sense it and start agitating for attention too - when all you want to do is to tell them to form an orderly queue and you’ll deal with them in turn!

But life’s not like that is it?  It doesn’t arrive all neatly ordered and in a manageable schedule - it usually presents like a tangle of knotted necklace chains that need a bit of shaking and picking to set them straight.

It’s really easy to see multi-tasking as the answer and to a certain extent it is, but not when you’re trying to unpick the necklace chain in 3 different places at once, as ultimately you clear one knot but also pull another one into place.

Over the years, Sarah and I have both learnt to manage this dynamic - to be sparing with the multi-tasking and more importantly - to select what we can’t/don’t want to do as carefully as we select what we do want to do.

We see sharing this experience as a really important leg up for other people - it’s not that we necessarily know more, it’s just that, with a few miles on the clock, we’ve had the chance to see a bit more and work out what works - for us. 

The addition on the end of the last sentence is an important one - it works for us.  Whatever you hear in life, you need to look at it and decide if it could work for you.  It’s not always the case that it will, but looking at things and considering them opens you up to the possibility that you can learn from other people’s successes/ trial & error - and that in itself might save you some time and anguish.

So, see you there? 

March 8th 7pm on @formidableover40 insta.
    Call it serendipity if you like... But, after my Call it serendipity if you like...

But, after my last post updating you on a bit of a lightbulb moment about values, I ended up doing some work with someone I have mentored for long time & as we worked through an issue, it turned out to be values related - so obvious when it emerged but it hadn’t been easy to spot.

Values - “one’s principles or judgement of what’s important in life.” 

This would suggest that they inform how we think & what we do, but very often they’re not obvious to us.  If someone asked you to list your values, you’d probably name a couple, have a think & then a few more would come to mind. 

They’re usually subliminal & difficult to spot, even though they underpin most things we do - a bit like the foundations of buildings.

However, if we tune in to our bodies, we can feel when we’re compromising them, we feel uncomfortable about what we’re about to do, we might even try to avoid doing it.

Anyway, back to the issue in hand.

My special skill is that I can see business paths, not just the normal ones - the more unusual ones too. I used to do it for a living & coach people, but now I mainly do it for my own businesses.  However, there’s a very select group of people I still work with.  I scope out their business development and chew through issues with them that they can’t see their way around themselves.

So, an opportunity had arisen, on paper it looked like the right thing to do, from a financial value point of view it stacked up - but something wasn’t right. A bit of digging around & sure enough that naughty values gremlin was the problem. 

It did make sense on paper, but it didn’t tick the box of some personally important values & it was clear that this could cause problems later.

So we went back to core values & by centring the solution around them, we ticked the values box as well as the value one & resolved it.

Values based decision making is really powerful & sets you up from the get go, because when you work in tune with your own personal & business values, decision making is easy.

So, values are the first thing that we’ll be looking at in my new course - I’m working on it right now and can’t wait to share it with you 🥰
    Join us live on insta - 7pm on 8th March 2021 #IWD Join us live on insta - 7pm on 8th March 2021 #IWD2021
———————————————————

You know sometimes you just click with someone...

@sarah_pittendrigh purchased one of our very first @hihosilveruk cherry rollers and wanted it blinged up, so it was also our very first personalised cherry roller bracelet. 

At the time, she was running her extremely successful @simplybowsandchaircoversuk business and a very busy lady.

Alongside this, she then went on to diversify her family farm with her husband and develop & sell a gorgeous range of barn conversions at their family farm at the same time as being super mum groom for her son @william_pittendrigh_equestrian

Then last year, one of my lockdown bonuses was that we started chatting and found out our outlooks on life were very similar.

Recently, she launched @formidableover40 and is now helping many other women power their way to success.

Since then we’ve chatted more and worked together on a few ideas, so I’m really looking forward to chatting on Monday night about all things women in business and the tactics that have stood us in good stead over the years.

We’d love you to join us - Let me know in the comments below if you can come along - and if there are any questions you’d like us to answer.

#womeninbusiness #formidableover40 #collaborationovercompetition #collaborateandconquer #hihoandco #womeninspiringwomen #femaleentrepreneurs
    I asked a question yesterday... About values and I asked a question yesterday...

About values and lots of you very kindly messaged me and shared your values. Thank you.

But why were values on my mind?

I looked up the definition of Value and Oxford Languages came up with this - 

“principles or standards of behaviour; one's judgement of what is important in life.”

It can also mean “the material or monetary worth” amongst other meanings.

I’m a great believer in business being about the former first and only then the latter. A values led business will always play the long game, but there’s more to business than immediate money.  Values over value has always been my preference.

So you think I’d be really good at ensuring things that I do tick the values box first - and I am, usually!

However, for the past year or so, I’ve been working away here and there, on something that I’ve wanted to do for a while, to share some of the knowledge I’ve gained along the way.

I’ve researched, done masterminds,  had some really good ideas about the areas to work in & even worked them up to a fairly advanced stage, but something hasn’t been feeling right and I wasn’t sure why.

My vision was clear on each occasion, I was keeping focused with the offering - my time available to do this dictated that. 

Yet it still wasn’t right, I was feeling blocked and not yet ready to press the button.

I persevered, I worked through things again, I tweaked the idea - still no joy.

Then suddenly, after a training call with @daretogrowuk , I absolutely knew what I should be offering and how, the excitement about the opportunity flooded through me, so I knew I was on the right track.  That realisation then triggered total understanding for me about why it hadn’t been sitting right until now.

I’d been ignoring one of my key values - it’s what informs how I develop the businesses I work with, it’s the thing I help people with all the time because I can’t help myself...I am so excited about this now!

I will have some more info about this soon, once it’s fully formed.  I just wanted to share that sometimes things take a while to percolate and that it’s OK to wait until the excitement butterflies start flying - that’s when you know it’s time.
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