Peer Pressure

As I was leaving my monthly peer group meeting recently, I had a strange thought. For the past 4 hours plus, I’d been locked away in a conference room with a group of my peers listening to advice and working on strategies for not only my company but theirs. Could that be categorized as peer pressure? You know like when you were in school. Back then the groups you surrounded yourself with were very vocal about how you should live your life. Your parents were always worried if you were associating with the right crowd. I think the same is true now in my world. Am I hanging out with the right crowd? There are individuals and groups that swear by their way of doing business. Which do you follow? If you’re like most true entrepreneurs, you will build your own path to success. Most of the time acting like that young teen that already knows it all. CEO Peer Groups are not so much about pressure as accountability. As adults we’ve selected our path and are driving full speed ahead. Most likely looking for advice but maybe not taking it. When I first heard of this weird thing called a peer group, I had my doubts. Some are expensive. They take a lot of time and, you know; I’m very busy. Most importantly, why would I want to share my deep dark secrets, faults, and failures with others? Nope, not for me. Fast forward a year later and that peer group has helped me define my business model, they’ve critiqued my website, and helped me to scale my business. Holy cow! Who’d a thunk it? When I miss a meeting, I actually “miss” the meeting. Good news is, that entire group is available to me outside of that once a month meeting. My own little advisory board, psychiatrist, and sounding board. There are many options for peer groups. I chose mine because of a networking relationship with the owner, price for entry, and that it was a ½ day and not a full day. See. It filled all the excuses I had at the beginning of this story. My peer group is CEO Focus of Nevada. We are accepting new members, by the way. Just saying. Dida Clifton is CEO and founder of TheOfficeSquad. A management firm for start ups, micro and small business. They specialize in virtual bookkeeping, hosted QuickBooks, admin, and management.