Using the 4 Entrepreneurial Freedoms To Make a Career Altering Decision
There are pros and cons to the various career paths we can follow in life. Some career options offer more certainty and safety but likely come with restrictions; others offer more flexibility, upside and risk. Perhaps the greatest benefit of following the entrepreneurial path is summed up in one word: “freedom”. During the worst times of my career when I wasn’t an entrepreneur I can distinctly remember feeling trapped, which ultimately was part of the ‘push’ factor to pursue the entrepreneurial life and its promise of freedom.
Therefore, ‘freedom’ and ‘entrepreneurship’ have become almost synonymous for me and countless other entrepreneurs. The freedom to do what I’m best at & most passionate about, with people I want to help and want my help, and are willing to be open minded about the approach.
A few years ago I was faced with one of the biggest decisions of my entrepreneurial life. A coaching organization I had been a member of decided to transition to a franchise model and I was faced with the decision to either join the franchise or no longer be associated with that organization. This was a big decision, and besides consulting trusted advisors and confidants in my life, I used Dan Sullivan’s The Four Entrepreneurial Freedoms to process the decision. The Four Entrepreneurial Freedom’s helps entrepreneurs clarify their thinking and actions. Here is how I used the four freedoms to make one of the biggest decisions of my career.
Freedom of Time is about having the agency to spend your time doing what you love to do and are best at, but equally as important is having the freedom to pursue passions outside of your work, and to rest from work. Of the four freedoms, the freedom of time is the one that joining the franchise would have come out more favorably in a narrow sense, as choosing to not join the franchise has caused me to spend many hours learning new tools that I can implement with clients, as opposed to only implementing the limited set of fixed and rigid tools in the franchise's toolbox. This need to spend more time learning new tools has been solved by recognizing that this pursuit of continual learning is one of my highest priorities and therefore I have to delegate &/or stop doing other less important tasks to make time for the vital activity of being a lifelong learner around the tools and best practices of my craft. In order to retain entrepreneurial freedom overall, I believe one has to approach the Four Freedoms more holistically, as my exploration of the remaining three freedoms will show.
Freedom of Money is about not having a lid put on your earnings potential. The particular franchise agreement I was presented with had in my view many overly onerous terms and upon the agreement’s renewal I suspect may have different ownership & possibly additional financial terms more favorable to the new franchisor than the franchisees. Franchises can be a great way for entrepreneurs to live their ideal life, but in my opinion franchises are not the optimal structure for business coaches and their clients. In my case, this was the first of the four freedoms to break toward not joining the franchise.
Freedom of Relationship is about spending time with people inside and outside your business whom you love working with. The particular franchise agreement I was presented with had numerous prohibitions against being in a relationship with whom I wanted and on the terms I believe are best for a relationship, such as not having a third party monitoring email communication between me and my clients. This one was easy - don’t join the franchise to retain the agency to be in relationship with whom I want and on “win-win or no deal” terms for all parties.
Freedom of Purpose is about doing something greater through your work that relates to how you want to make the world a better place in some particular way. My purpose is to help people achieve their potential, and as a business coach this includes helping clients continually take their business to the next level. Therefore, when I was presented with serious limitations on being able to live out my purpose by only using the fixed number of tools that haven’t changed in almost 20 years, I knew immediately that joining the franchise would violate my purpose. To live out my purpose requires the freedom to bring the right and best tools to my clients no matter where they are found and to implement them in an agile and customized way.
Strategic Coach and Dan Sullivan’s Four Entrepreneurial Freedoms is a phenomenal construct to use on a frequent basis to evaluate how you as an entrepreneur are living out these four opportunities you have to live your best life. For your entrepreneurial life, joining a franchise may be the best option for you, and I celebrate that - presuming that decision on the whole allows you to live out the Four Freedoms on the whole better than any other option. I hope this blog post helps more people (including non entrepreneurs who need to make the leap to entrepreneurship!) use this great Strategic Coach construct to ensure they are living their ideal life.
About the Author
Tom Barrett is a Leadership Team Coach based in Nashville, and is a Certified Scaling Up Coach™, Certified Pinnacle Business Guide, & former Certified EOS Implementer™. He helps his clients build scalable businesses by clarifying their vision, simplifying their strategy and achieving their goals one quarter at a time.
