How many of you have heard the saying “get out of your own way”? I have been part of a small round table with my business coach and we have been discussing this topic for about 6 months now. We have gone over ways to automate our systems, hire new employees, creating corrective action plans, and even finding a sounding board to talk us through the good the bad and the ugly of business ownership. But I think the most favorite thing that I have learned in trying to get out of my own way, is how visionary’s need an integrator and vice versa.

So in few short words a visionary is somebody that can see what they want for the future of their business. They have this grand vision of what they want their business to be like; who they want to work for them; how they want to support their customers; where they want to be doing it; and what exactly it is that forms the business culture. Visionaries are the dreamers… and you know just as well as I do, that dreamers may not always have the best ideas.

Now the Integrator is someone the visionary trusts enough to share all these grand ideas with. They will decipher the ideas and determine what is a good idea and what isn’t… and what ideas will get them to their Grand Vision. They will then determine how to get to that end goal. The Integrator determines the how of the visionaries big dream; they create the checklist that are needed in order to get the business to where the visionary see their business going. They determine what team members strengths will get them to the dream and how it will all be done. They are the managers of the dreams. Make sense?

I personally have found myself transitioning from the integrator to the visionary, just with experience and new personal goals. While I joined the team as an integrator (the daughter of the visionary). I was hired to “do the do’s” of the business and take the business where mom saw it going. I was very good at taking moms vision and turning it into a task list. Sometimes I felt like the translator. I was the one that could see the vision that mom had, but I had to interpret it into integrator language for our team. I had to create the task list, I had to create the steps that was necessary to get that goal completed. Now that mom is transitioning into retirement, I’m finding myself naturally taking on that visionary role. I have always been someone that has dozens of ideas a day. Maybe not all business ideas but I would get stuck on step one. I never realized I needed and integrator the take MY ideas and discern them. I never considered myself to be a visionary in MY business…. And now the dang idea’s never stop!

Now, I see where I want my business to go. I see how I want it to get there but converting my own ideas to integrator language is exhausting. It’s overwhelming taking your own ideas, deciding if your own ideas are good, converting your ideas to the task list and then delegating the ideas… especially when new ideas show up every day. I still see myself as a very successful integrator for my customers. But their ideas are easy to discern. As an outsider I can evaluate my customers business and determine the processes that are needed to get them where they want to be.  But when it comes to my business, I find myself with 1,000,000 new ideas every day and I’m paralyze at the thought of having to implement my own ideas.

So with all this fun new info for you to ponder, I also have a book suggestion if you would like to dig a little bit deeper on the topic.

The book is Rocket Fuel: No they did not copy us 😊 You can download a free chapter at https://www.eosworldwide.com/rocket-fuel-book if you want to check it out with no cost.

….or check out this excellent video explaining the value of having an Integrator.