A common conversation I have with business owners is to help them reconcile the stories which their head and heart are telling them.

This came up in the past week when I spoke with a business owner who, over the past six years, had built a successful business which meant he and his partner were financially secure.

In discussing the challenges going forward, the business owner disclosed his partner was pregnant with their first child. It was clear he was excited about becoming a father and that he and his partner wanted him to be a hands-on dad.

For him to be a hands-on dad, he recognized he must restructure the business such that it was not dependent on him working substantial hours.

However, he reached out as he felt the restructure had stalled and was looking for inspiration to get it back on track.

When we discussed the restructure, it became clear the prime reason it had stalled was that he was self-sabotaging the restructure. As a child of Italian immigrants, his family raised him to believe that success came from working long hours. Re-structuring the business to work less hours to spend more time with his family was contrary to what his family had demonstrated as what success was when he was growing up.

Thus, working long hours in the business was a place he understood and felt safe whereas he was out of his comfort zone when it came to understanding what being a hands-on dad looks and feels like. In these circumstances, it is a very human thing to stay within our comfort zones.

For him to start moving out of his comfort zone, he and his partner must have a conversation about creating a powerful vision of what being a hands-on dad looks like. After getting this clear in his head, he can start working out what the business must look like to deliver that outcome.