The Cost of Easy: Why Shortcuts Sink Small Businesses
Every entrepreneur hits that moment—the pressure is high, the cash is tight, and the whisper of a shortcut sounds like a rescue. But those “quick fixes” often come with a price you don’t see until it’s too late. In this episode of Grit & Growth Business, Ralph pulls back the curtain on the hidden dangers of business shortcuts. From rushed hires and delayed invoices to high-interest loans and marketing gimmicks, he shares how taking the easy way out often leads to deeper stress and instability. This episode is a wake-up call for anyone who’s tired of putting out fires and ready to confront the cost of easy.
Check out the full podcast episode here
You’ll learn how to identify your biggest pressure points, spot the shortcuts that are quietly undermining your progress, and replace them with foundational moves that actually work. Ralph shares four clear, actionable steps to get back on track—and offers a free download to help you start building with grit, not gimmicks. If you’ve been tempted to trade long-term health for short-term relief, this is the conversation you didn’t know you needed.
Chapters:
- 00:09 - Understanding the Pressure
- 03:24 - The Cost of Easy Solutions
- 08:06 - Resisting Shortcuts in Business Growth
- 08:21 - Starting with Intentionality: Steps to Manage Business Stressors
- 11:49 - Taking Action for Growth
Takeaways:
- The temptation of shortcuts can lead to greater challenges and complications in business.
- Building a successful enterprise requires perseverance, patience, and a commitment to foundational principles.
- Ignoring the hidden costs of quick fixes can ultimately jeopardize the stability of your business.
- Engaging in intentional and strategic planning is essential to overcoming common entrepreneurial stressors.
To access the action sheet for today's episode click here http://gritandgrowthbusiness.com/action
To book a call with Ralph to discuss how he can help you grow your business click here
To listen to listen to Ralph's other shows click here https://www.askralph.com/
Get a free copy of Ralph's book Mastering Your Finances
Buy Ralph's Latest Book - The Gospel of Entrepreneurship
00:00 - Untitled
00:09 - Understanding the Pressure
03:24 - The Cost of Easy Solutions
08:06 - Resisting Shortcuts in Business Growth
08:21 - Starting with Intentionality: Steps to Manage Business Stressors
11:49 - Taking Action for Growth
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You're exhausted.
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You're stretched thin.
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Maybe you're looking at the numbers, and they just, well,
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they just don't quite add up.
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It's in those quiet moments when you feel like you're all alone.
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When the pressure feels immense, that's when you start to hear it.
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that whisper of the easy button, that quick fix, that simple
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solution that promises to make all of this go away with magic.
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But what if I told you that easy button, that tempting shortcut may actually be
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setting you up for an even harder fall.
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What if that simple solution is quietly sinking your business?
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Today we're talking about the painful truth of shortcuts and
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how to find real strength to build something that truly lasts.
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I want you to stick with me today.
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Hey everyone.
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Welcome to Grit and Growth Business.
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I'm Ralph Estep Jr. I wanna thank you so much for joining me as we work
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together to put that grit you have, to work in building your business.
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And if you're here, I bet I know a little something about you.
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You are the kind of person who rolls up your sleeves.
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You believe in putting your name on the door.
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You're building something real, something you've poured your heart into.
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And if you're honest, some days that heart feels heavy for you.
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Maybe it's that stack of invoices you need to chase or the, the quote you just
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sent out and you hoping that it lands because, well, I need that revenue.
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You need that cash flow.
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Maybe it's that constant juggling of managing a team or finding good
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help while at the same time you're trying to deliver quality work.
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You skip your own paycheck often more times than you even want to admit.
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You cover the rent, you hold everything together, often on your own.
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It's tough.
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It's isolating.
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Listen, I truly get it.
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And in those moments, the siren song of the Easy Way.
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Well, that's incredibly powerful.
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For over 30 years, I've been right there with you.
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I've been the accountant looking at that.
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Struggling businesses, balance sheets, the coach watching entrepreneurs burn out,
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and I too been that business owner who's lived through those sleepless nights.
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See, this show isn't about telling you what you should do from some lofty perch.
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It is about pulling up a chair next to you and acknowledging the pain and
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sharing true strategies that work, the ones that build real lasting success.
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And our conversation today has to be about something fundamental,
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something that can be the biggest temptation and the biggest pitfall.
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And today we're gonna talk about the cost of easy and why
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shortcuts sink small businesses.
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We live in a world obsessed with instant gratification, social
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media marketing campaigns.
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Even some business guru scream about building passive income, automated
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success, six figure launches in 30 days.
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You see it, you experience, and it feels like everyone else has
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discovered some secret hacks, some magic bullet that makes it all simple.
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And if you're struggling, it can make you feel like a failure, right?
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You're just not smart enough to find that easy way.
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Well, let's cut through that noise, you and I, because the real truth
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is those easy fixes, they often come with a hidden, agonizing cost.
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Yeah, they look attractive upfront, but they create deeper, more
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complex problems down the road.
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I want you to think about one of your common stress points right now, like
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we talked about in the last show.
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Maybe for you it's cash flow.
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That feeling when payday is looming and the bank account looks a little
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too lean to even meet payroll?
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Well, the temptation is to find a quick injection, maybe that high interest
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loan that you know isn't ideal or maybe pushing off a necessary payment or even
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neglecting the properly invoice because you're rushing and you take that easy
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route to relieve that immediate pressure.
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But what happens?
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All of a sudden that high interest loan compounds creating a debt
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burden that suffocates you.
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I've seen this way too many times from businesses.
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They get these loans and they sink from these loans.
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They look great when times are tough, but in the end, they destroy you.
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Or maybe you've been delaying invoices and that means you're still chasing
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money month after month, probably even more frantically than before.
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See, neglecting proper invoicing means you're losing track, you're losing
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money, and eventually the cash flow problem gets bigger, not smaller.
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The easy fix just build you a bigger hole.
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Or maybe your stress point is finding good help.
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Right now you're saying to me, Ralph, I'm swamped.
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I'm stretched beyond my limits.
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And the easy solution might be to hire the first person who walks through
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that door without proper vetting, without a clear description, without
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even thinking about your team culture.
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You just need a body to relieve the pressure.
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What's the cost of that?
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Easy.
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Have you considered high turnover, poor performance, a toxic work
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environment, customer complaints, and ultimately you're back to being swamped.
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Now you've got the added headache of a bad hire.
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You thought you had found relief, but all you've done is create more chaos.
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See, The cost of easy isn't immediately obvious.
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Think of it this way.
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It's like neglecting a slow leak in your roof.
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At first, it's easy to ignore, put a bucket underneath of it, but eventually
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that small leak becomes water damage.
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It becomes mold, it becomes major structural issues.
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And fixing that is far more expensive and painful than dealing with that initial
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leak And see building a business, a real business is like building a solid house.
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You can't shortcut the foundation.
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You can't shortcut the framing.
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You can't shortcut the proper plumbing and electrical.
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'cause if you do, when the storms come and they always do, the storms always come.
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The whole thing is at risk.
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And that's why I always say this, You simply must fix your foundation before
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you can effectively scale your business.
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This isn't a slogan, it's survival.
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I've seen businesses get a quick burst of, of growth from that shortcut only
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to collapse because their internal systems couldn't handle it, or their
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financials were a mess, or their customer service was non-existent
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behind some flashy marketing campaign.
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See, that kind of success is fragile.
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It's built on hype, not health.
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That's the cost of easy, and unfortunately in my experience, many new businesses
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take that easy road only to find.
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In the end, they should have taken the harder road.
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See, the path to grit and growth compared to the easy way is
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about building health first.
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Is it slower?
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Yes.
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Is it harder?
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Absolutely.
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It is.
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It requires patience.
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It requires persistence.
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But it also results in a business that is resilient, a business that is
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adaptable and a business that's capable of generating true lasting value for you,
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for your employees and for your customers.
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I'm betting right now you're thinking Ralph, so how do we resist the seductive
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pull of those shortcuts and commit to the more challenging, but ultimately more
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rewarding path of building with grit?
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While I've got a simple answer for you today.
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It starts with intentionality.
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So here are some actionable steps that you can take starting today.
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First thing I want you to do is I want you to pinpoint your
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pressure point and its easy trap.
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Here's how you get started.
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I want you to start by taking a deep breath, and I know I'm all gassed up, but
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ask yourself this very simple question,
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What's currently causing you the most stress in your business right now?
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What is it?
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As we talked about, is it cash flow?
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Is it hiring?
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Is it marketing?
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Maybe just overall operations, just what is it?
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And then I want you to be brutally honest and ask yourself this
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next question, what easy or quick fix have you been tempted by?
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Or maybe you've even tried for that specific stressor.
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Again, what's causing this stress and what quick or easy fixes are you
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thinking about or maybe even doing?
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And let me just tell you, just by acknowledging this connection,
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it is incredibly empowering.
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It takes away the shame and it replaces it with clarity.
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So that's the first step.
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The second step, I want you to commit to one foundational counter move.
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Yes.
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We're gonna talk about counter moves today.
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I. From that pressure point that you chose, I want you to choose one small
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concrete, foundational task that you can do this week that addresses it the right
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way instead of that easy, quick fix way.
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Not 10 things, not five things, not three things, just one for you.
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Maybe it's accounting, maybe it's setting up a simple spreadsheet to track all of
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your income and expenses every single day.
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Maybe for you it's hiring.
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It could be writing down exactly what qualities you need in a person for your
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next hire before you even look at resumes.
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Start small, but start right again.
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Pick just one foundational task and address it.
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And now comes the hard part, what I'll call step three and
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that seek knowledge over magic.
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You're thinking, what is Ralph going to talk about next?
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See, often the temptation for a shortcut comes from feeling overwhelmed
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or maybe you were feeling unequipped to solve a problem the right way.
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And that's when many of us, and look, I'm guilty of this too.
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We start to look for that magic pill, that easy fix.
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But instead of, and this is my, this is what I'm gonna I'm gonna,
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I'm gonna challenge you to do, but instead of looking for that magic
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solution that quickfix, I want you to invest even 15 minutes this week
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in learning about the fundamental principles behind that stress point.
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If it's pricing, read a short article on cost plus pricing.
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Maybe for you it's time management.
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Maybe listen to a podcast on basic scheduling.
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And we're gonna be talking about time management here on the show
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very soon, because here's the truth, a little knowledge, it empowers
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you to build systematically.
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It reduces that allure of easy.
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And again, we're gonna cover many of these fundamentals right here
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on the podcast in weeks to come.
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And then step number four, I want you to share the load even a little.
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You're not alone in this.
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See, the isolation of entrepreneurship makes that easy button even more
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appealing 'cause you feel like you have to solve everything yourself.
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And let me be abundantly clear here and listen to me on this one.
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You don't have to solve everything yourself.
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You don't have to solve everything yourself.
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Talk to a trusted peer, talk to a mentor.
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Or even just listen to shows like this one, because just hearing
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someone else acknowledge those struggles can be incredibly freeing.
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So you're part of a community of builders and we're here to lift each other up.
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But now it's time to put this into action and to help you do
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just that, I've created a simple action plan sheet for this episode.
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I call it the Cost of Easy.
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This free downloadable sheet will walk you through identifying those potential
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easy temptations in your business and committing to that first foundational
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task This week, it's a practical tool to help you start building smart and
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building smart right away, and you can download it immediately by visiting our
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website and go into the shortcut for grit.
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And growth business.com/cost of Easy.
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Again, that's grit and growth business.com/cost of easy.
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I want you to go there.
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and download that action plan sheet and take that powerful first step towards
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true sustainable growth and do it today.
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Listen, the easy way will almost always promise quick relief.
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Its hidden cost is almost always greater problems down the road, the gritty way,
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the building way asks more of you upfront.
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It demands patience.
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It requires persistence, but hear me on this.
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But it leads to a business that is not just surviving, but thriving.
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A business that supports your life, not the other way around.
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A business that gives you peace of mind and true freedom.
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You are not alone on this journey.
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I'm here walking alongside you.
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We're gonna tackle these challenges together, one foundational step
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at a time, and I just wanna thank you for joining me on this episode
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of Grit and Growth Business.
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And I'm committed to bringing you honest conversations and practical
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strategies every week to help you build your business the right way.
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Now, next week, we're gonna discuss a fundamental and critical topic.
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Your business model might be the problem.
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We're gonna explore how to evaluate if the fundamental way you're
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structured is holding you back, and even more importantly, what
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steps you can take to fix it.
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So make sure you're subscribed to the show.
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You can do that by going to Grit and growth business.com/follow so
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you don't miss another episode.
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And again, don't forget to download your action sheet today at grit and
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growth business.com/cost of easy.
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And let me just leave you with this.
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You can do this.
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I have confidence in you.
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You've got the grit.
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Now let's get to that growth.
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God bless you, and I'll see you again next week.
