Until a couple years ago, I avoided social media like the plague.

I was big on (and still to a large degree) a proponent of deep work. However, early on, I thought the slightest bit of distraction would ruin my efforts. But as I dove deeper into my solo business as a co-writer, I quickly realized that sharing your work is part of the work.

For a lot of mission-driven coaches and consultants that’s where the tension begins.

One coach shared with me, “I’m relational…and in-person. Online presence isn’t really me.”

This makes sense from a high level and to be fair, I’m more of an in-person person myself. Even Cal Newport, the creator of deep work, has an online presence. The difference is he’s cultivated a system where he publishes thoughtfully, on his own terms and uses platforms like YouTube to spread his message without being consumed by them.

The fear of ‘losing yourself’ online is real. But that hinges on one major assumption.

Believing a Mission & Business Can’t Co-Exist

Charlie Munger, Berkshire Hathaway Vice Chairman, kept a list of common cognitive biases he knew tripped people up.

These included:

• Doubt-Avoidance Tendency: Rushing towards certainty because sitting with uncertainty feels uncomfortable.
• Inconsistency-Avoidance Tendency: Resisting changing our beliefs because we committed to them. Even when new evidence suggests we should.
• Excessive Self-Regard Tendency: Overestimating our judgments, abilities, and perceptions.

There’s dozens more of these thinking traps (see more at farnam street blog), but it’s worth paying attention to why he kept this top of mind in the first place.

He knew he was subject to faulty thinking. And that faulty thinking would influence him away from taking the actions and making the decisions aligned with his goals.

Yet, most people fall prey to these thinking traps.

Scrolling your social media feed doesn’t make this any easier. You might come across a post that speaks negatively about someone’s experience with a coach or consultant and jump to the conclusion that everyone will feel the same way about your service. Or perhaps you do experience a negative event, like someone saying they don’t see the value of mental performance on a call and you take that as a reason, “my business won’t work.”

What service providers forget is that there’s billions of people on the planet. One experience doesn’t define how everyone else will feel about your offer. A coaching mentor once told me: “Not everyone likes ice-cream.”

It’s funny, but it’s true.

You can’t convince everyone which leads us to a key reframe.

Your Responsibility Is to Protect the Mission by Growing the Business

If you haven’t watched Alex Hormozi’s Scale or Fail on YouTube, I’d check it out if I were you. Especially if you’re into Shark Tank.

Very similar vibe, but with some big differences.

The basic premise of the show is that Hormozi walks entrepreneurs through strategies they should use to scale their business. The winner's, at least so far, are the businesses he believes he can help scale.

In one particular episode, one of the entrepreneur’s says something to the effect, “I don’t want people to feel sold-to.” She felt as though focusing on money or profit, makes her less genuine. Less mission-driven. To that, Hormozi gently replies, “your responsibility is to make sure your business survives and grows.”

That will stick with me forever.

Essentially, he makes the point that building your business doesn’t mean you must abandon your values or mission. It’s actually the opposite of that. You can genuinely care about what you do AND the people you serve.

One of the worst parts from being a head basketball coach at the high school level was cuts—I dreaded them.

Cutting young athletes doesn’t mean you don’t care about them. You can still encourage them, you can give them resources to help them come back better than before, or you can offer them a different role within the program. The options are endless. But at the end of the day, you have to focus on the team you do have and getting the best out of them.

Business works in a similar way.

Not every decision can be optimized for avoiding discomfort.

Sometimes serving your customers means charging appropriately, marketing consistently, or saying no to the wrong client so you can say yes to the right one.

Going back to Hormozi’s point. For your business to grow it has to take care of the customer.

And sometimes that calls for hard decisions.

So what do you actually do with that?

Identify the Roles of Your Business

One of the best things I’ve learned so far as a solo operator has been identifying the roles I must play in my business.

This includes:

• Lead Generator
• Salesperson
• Content Marketer
• Account Manager
• Writer
• HR/Operations

These roles are true for almost all other businesses too.

When you know your role, you know what to do.

It gives you an objective lens for deciding what actions your business needs to sustain itself.

Once you’ve identified the roles, the next step is determining what inputs produce the outcomes you’re after. This may look like reaching out to at least 10 people in your warm network letting them know you’ve started coaching or that you're taking on 2 clients this month for example.

It won’t happen unless it’s planned. That’s where a schedule comes in handy.

It could be a time-block planner, Eisenhower matrix, or a simple to-do list. What matters is getting what you need to do on paper. And doing it.

Building an online presence can feel awkward.

Especially, when working face-to-face is your jam.

You’re not alone in this. Most of the professionals I’ve talked to recognize the importance of marketing online, but restrict their efforts because its so hard to separate building their business with negative associations tagged to it.

Your mission expands in service of your business.

The stronger the business becomes, the more people your mission can reach.

You can build and keep your values.

As always, thanks for reading.
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Until next time,
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- Marcus W.

P.S. - If "sharing your work" still feels like the hardest part of growing your practice, that's fixable. I build email courses and newsletters for coaches who'd rather do the work than write about it. Reply and tell me where you're stuck, and I'll point you in the right direction.