Kelly: Creating a Business Mandala

In my last post, I talked a bit about the Pathways used to create a mandala for your creative business.  The mandala is made up of several pathways, and each one is important and specific.  Each one needs to be explored to complete the mandala and help you figure out the things you are struggling with in your business.  I shared two of my pathways with you in the previous post, and now here is the finished Mandala for my business.

I drew from each pathway some of the information, and compiled it in the flower shape, recommended in the book.  This may not be my favorite journal page of all time, but the point here is that you are doing the thinking, and going through the process of figuring things out.  For me, the hardest of the pathways was the Value and Profitability, because that is the territory that I am the least familiar with.  One thing that I do to help surprise my customers and add value to their experience of buying a piece of my artwork, is that I like to do special giftwrapping, and I write thank you notes.  You know, the old fashioned, handwritten type of thank you note.  And I think people love that.   Tools was the other thing that stood out to me.  I have noticed that some of the artists whose work I admire, do not go the extra mile to make themselves available online.  I believe this is so, so important in today's world!  And can you believe that there are still so many artists who don't even have a website or a blog?!?  I recently found an exhibition I was interested in and I did some competitive analysis of these folks, only to discover that 90% of them didn't have a decent online presence.  Who are these people and how are they going to succeed in their creative biz if they don't have an online presence???  They definitely need to spend some time working on their biz plan for 2011!


So back to the Mandala.  I also did a journal page thinking of the mandala and what I learned.  I was a little surprised by how confidence (or lack thereof!) affects me in so many ways in my creative biz.
So, already I am seeing some patterns of how I usually address business tasks, and I'm seeing ways I can definitely improve.  And I love these layouts - they are so much easier on my eyes and they actually make sense to my creative brain.  I simply cannot read those dull, dry business plan books,  that seem to go on and on and on.  This is a format that is definitely working for me!

In my next post, I will be hitting on a something called "Structural Tension", which is a phrase I have needed! I always knew I had this problem, but I never knew what to call it! Stay tuned!

~Kelly