The Best Way to Grow Relationships

12 Jun The Best Way to Grow Relationships

When clients come to us, they do so with a specific business issue. Whether it is wanting to grow their revenue, increase their team productivity, or achieve their business goals, we onboard our clients the same way.

We start with what they are trying to accomplish and what their vision is. This helps us to structure how we work with them and help them resolve the challenges that may be standing in their way.

And, the most important exercise we have our clients complete is we have them identify what we call their “core 4”.

They are…

1. Physical Health
2. Mental Health
3. Relationships
4. Business/Finances

These core 4 are huge to make sure you are able to achieve your goals. Believe it or not, business owners fall short because one or more of these core areas are out of alignment or worse completely ignored! Many times as we are working through this with our clients, they forget about nurturing their relationships.

For relationships, this isn’t just romantic or personal relationships. This also includes connections you’ve built or need to build with employees, mentors, clients, vendors, community agencies, etc.

But, then the question becomes… how do you nurture these relationships?

For me, I make a list of at least 125 people that are important to me, both personal and professional. I then pick 5 people from that list that I want to spend the most time with over the coming year. Next, I select 20 people that I may not want to spend as much time with but I do want to nurture and grow our relationship. And, finally, you’ll have your list of 100 of people who you are connected with (or want to be connected with). Many of these 100 people may be distant acquaintances or people you want to eventually establish a working relationship with. When you do this exercise it helps you prioritize how to nurture your relationships and ensure that you are continually evolving and elevating your relationships to position you to execute.

With your list in hand, start scheduling touchpoints or milestones to ensure you are actually putting time into these relationships. If you don’t make the time now, something will likely get in the way. You may schedule time every week for your top 5, every month or quarter for your top 20 and at least once a year for your list of 100. The key is you want to make building your relationships a priority and to do so, you have to stay organized and focused on putting forth the effort.