Thought for today:
Many of us in business for ourselves have used verbal or handshake agreements, only to find out later that the other person had a totally different idea of what we meant. Without a signed document, we left too much room for misinterpretation.
Other times we let the other person write our agreements for us. This left us with no input into the agreement. We often took a financial loss as cost overruns crept into a project.
In Business Debtors Anonymous, we learn to shape our own agreements:
BDA Tool 8“We put all our business agreements in writing and write our own Letters of Agreement.”
Members their story:
“I’m in a service business. Before BDA, I would ballpark a job based on experience, but I’d usually bill customers for more money when it turned out to involve extensive work. They would balk, and negotiate me down. I’d have the keys, so I was in a good bargaining position, but I usually lost the customer that way.”
“I usually had to invest in equipment up front, so I used credit cards. I never knew what it would take to do the work, so I could never accurately bill my customers.
“I would let my vendors chase me for months for payment while I haggled with customers over back invoices. I never wrote business agreements down, so I would guess at what I promised, and when someone called me on a contract discrepancy I would panic and react emotionally, usually with fear and anger. Reacting emotionally always cost me.”
“Today I work out with my sponsor what I need for my business. I also know there are many templates for business forms and letters available online. I adapt them to fit my business needs. This makes it possible to join forces with my customers and with other businesses to build a good service line.
“I can tell where I stand in the agreement at any time, so there is never any doubt what the next step should be.”
Ask:
Meditation for today:
Many people ‘go with the flow’, drifting through their life like a rudderless sailboat. Some aspire to do great things. They raise their sail, but when a strong wind comes, they let it blow them where it wants.
A rare few engage in life fully, and use both rudder and sail to channel the energy of the wind and the current of the water, to steadily approach the shore.
Affirmation for today:
“I will focus my energy on writing my own letters of agreement to meet my goals.”
“I intelligently use all the tools available to help me navigate my business dealings.”
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