The Biz Survival Test: Could You Step Away for Two Weeks and Know Exactly Where to Pick Back Up?
A quick question:
If you couldn't work on your business for the next 2 weeks, would you know exactly where to pick back up?
Not eventually.
Not after spending 2 hours digging through Google Drive.
Not after rereading old notes and trying to remember what Past You was thinking.
Would you know exactly where to start?
What’s most important to start with?
Many coaches assume their biggest challenge is finding more time.
But after working with 100s of coaches over the years, I've noticed something different.
The coaches who make the most consistent progress aren't always the ones with the most time.
They're often the ones who can get back up to speed the fastest after an interruption.
Because real life happens.
Vacations. Sick kids. Busy work weeks. Family obligations. Unexpected opportunities.
The issue isn't that interruptions happen.
The issue is what happens after them.
In fact, that's 1 of the reasons I wrote my recent article, What Successful Coaches Do Before They Go on Vacation (That Most Coaches Forget).In that article, I share a few simple things coaches can do before stepping away so they're not spending their first week back trying to remember where they left off.
But even if you aren't going on vacation anytime soon, the same principle applies.
The easier your business is to return to after an interruption, the easier it becomes to make consistent progress.
For many coaches, getting back into their business takes far longer than it should.
They spend valuable time trying to remember what they were working on, deciding what deserves their attention, and hunting down information they know they created somewhere.
That's why I created this simple assessment.
To help you identify where friction exists and where a few small changes could make your business much easier to manage.
Before You Start
This isn't a test you pass or fail.
The goal is simply to create awareness.
To identify what's already working well.
To uncover where a little extra clarity, focus, or organization could make your business easier to run.
And most importantly, to help you understand where to start.
Because trying to improve everything at once is usually what creates overwhelm in the first place.
So as you answer these questions, don't ask:
"What do I need to fix?"
Instead ask:
"What would become easier if I improved this area just a little?"
For each question, give yourself:
✅ 2 points = Yes, absolutely
⚠️ 1 point = Sort of / sometimes
❌ 0 points = Nope
Don't overthink it.
Your first instinct is usually the right one.
Category 1: Clarity
Score Yourself
Do you know which offer you're actively trying to get clients for right now?
If someone asked how you help people, could you answer without stumbling over your words?
If someone asked what you're working on in your business right now, could you answer in one sentence?
If you sat down to create content tomorrow, would you know exactly what to create?
Your Clarity Score: ____ / 8
What Your Clarity Score Means
7–8 Points: You've Got a Clear Direction
You know what you're working toward, who you're helping, and how your offers fit together.
That doesn't mean you never get stuck, but you're less likely to waste time wondering what to focus on, promote, or talk about.
4–6 Points: Some Things Feel Fuzzy
You likely have valuable offers and plenty of ideas.
The challenge is that some of the pieces don't feel fully connected yet.
As a result, you may find yourself changing directions, overthinking content, or spending too much time deciding what to do next.
0–3 Points: You're Carrying Too Much in Your Head
If you scored low here, don't panic; this doesn't mean you're bad at business.
It usually means you're juggling too many ideas, projects, or priorities at once.
The good news is that clarity can often be created much faster than people think.
If Your Clarity Score Was Low, Start Here:
Choose 1 Primary Focus
Pick 1 thing you're trying to create more of over the next 60 days:
Email subscribers
Discovery calls
Workshop registrations
Clients for a specific offer
Referral partnerships
Visibility events/collaborations
Trying to focus on all at once is usually where overwhelm starts.
Create a 1-Page Business Snapshot
Open a blank document and answer these 5 questions:
What offer am I currently promoting?
Who’s it for?
What specific problem does it solve?
What am I focused on growing right now (see above)?
What is my primary goal for the next 60 days?
That's it.
1 page. 1 place. 1 source of truth.
If your messaging, offers, content ideas, testimonials, and business information currently live across multiple documents, notebooks, folders, and sticky notes, you’re gonna wanna grab this.
Category 2: Priorities
Score Yourself
If you had 1 hour to work on your business tomorrow, would you know exactly how to use it?
Do you know the next person you should follow up with?
Do you know specifically how you're going to get in front of new people this month?
Examples might include:👉 Hosting a workshop
👉 Building a referral partnership
👉 Networking
👉Guest speaking
👉Participating in a summit, podcast, or email resource bundleDo you know who you're going to invite to work with you next?
Your Priorities Score: ____ / 8
What Your Priorities Score Means
7–8 Points: You Know What Matters Most
You may not have unlimited time, but you usually know how to use the time you do have.
When you find an unexpected hour to work, you're able to get moving quickly instead of spending that hour deciding what to do.
That's a huge advantage.
4–6 Points: You're Busy, But Progress Feels Slower Than It Should
You probably have plenty of things you could work on.
The challenge is knowing which ones deserve your attention first.
As a result, important activities like follow-up, visibility, relationship-building, and client-getting can get pushed aside by whatever feels most urgent in the moment.
0–3 Points: Decision-Making Is Eating Up Your Time
Many coaches think they need more hours.
What they often need is fewer decisions.
If every work session starts with, "What should I work on first?" you're already losing valuable time.
The more decisions you can make ahead of time, the easier it becomes to make progress when life gets busy.
If Your Priorities Score Was Low, Start Here
Pick 1 Client-Getting Activity
Choose 1 of the following and complete it this week:
Follow up with 3 warm leads
Reach out to 2 potential referral partners
Invite 5 people to your next workshop
Send 1 email or social post announcing you have 2 private coaching spots available
Reconnect with a past client
Just start with 1, celebrate yourself, and you can move on to the next.
Create a "When I Have 1 Hour" List (this could also be a when I have 15 minutes or 30 minutes if that works better for you)
Make a short list of tasks that move your business forward.
For example:
Follow up with leads
Send an email to your list
Pitch a workshop
Reach out to 3 collaborators
Apply to be on a summit or podcast
Promote your lead magnet
Then keep that list somewhere visible.
That way, when you find an unexpected pocket of time, you don't have to decide what to do.
You already know.
If prioritizing client-getting activities is something you struggle with, Your Profitable Weekly Schedule can help you create a simple plan that keeps the most important activities from constantly falling to the bottom of your to-do list.
Category 3: Business Survival
Score Yourself
If you couldn't work on your business for the next 2 weeks, would you know exactly where to pick back up?
Could you find everything you need to work on your business in one place or document?
Your Business Survival Score: ____ / 4
What Your Business Survival Score Means
3–4 Points: Your Business Can Handle Real Life
Life still interrupts your plans sometimes because, well...life LIFES.
But your business is set up in a way that makes it relatively easy to return after a vacation, a busy week, a family obligation, or an unexpected detour.
You know where things are.
You know what you're working on.
You know what comes next.
That doesn't mean everything is perfectly organized.
It simply means you've reduced enough friction that interruptions don't completely throw you off course.
And that's a huge advantage.
2 Points: You've Got Some Friction
Your business probably works well when you're actively engaged with it; the challenge shows up when you step away.
You may spend more time than you'd like trying to remember what you were working on, where information is stored, or what should happen next.
Nothing is broken.
You simply have more restart friction than you need.
And those small moments add up.
10 minutes looking for your offer notes.
17 minutes trying to remember your content plan.
24 minutes spent deciding what deserves your attention.
Before you know it, your work session is over and you've barely moved anything forward. Frustrating, right?
0–1 Points: Every Interruption Feels Like Starting Over
If this score feels familiar, you're definitely not alone.
In fact, I'd argue this is 1 of the most common challenges coaches face.
Your business may currently live across:
Google Docs
Canva folders
Sticky notes
Emails
Screenshots
Random notebooks
And whatever happens to be floating around in your brain at the moment
The result?
Every interruption feels bigger than it should because finding your place again requires a lot of mental energy.
If Your Business Survival Score Was Low, Start Here
Before I share a couple of practical suggestions, let me tell you a quick story.
A few years ago, I was constantly frustrated by how much time I spent looking for things.
I have 100s of Google Docs. Kid you not. Especially after being in business nearly 10 years.
And because I rarely deleted anything, I'd often create a new version of a document instead of updating the original.
That meant the same workshop outline, sales page, freebie, or messaging document might exist in 3 or 4 different places😳.
I'd search for what I thought I'd named it.
Not find it.
Get annoyed.
Then recreate it from scratch.
Which, of course, created yet another version of the same document🙄.
The cycle kept repeating.
It also made things harder for my team.
If I couldn't find something, there was a good chance they couldn't find it either.
Now, to be clear, I still have Post-it notes everywhere.
I'm pretty sure that's never changing😆
The difference is that my business foundations no longer live on those Post-it notes.
Once I started keeping my offers, messaging, testimonials, content ideas, audience insights, and business information in 1 organized place, everything became easier.
Just easier.
Create a Pick-Back-Up Document
Create a simple document that includes:
Current projects
Important links
Ideas you don't want to forget
Simple, specific next actions
Keyword here: simple and specific.
When life gets busy, this becomes your roadmap back into your business.
Create One Home for Your Business Foundations
The goal isn't to organize every file you've ever created.
It's to create one place where your most important business information lives.
Your content ideas
Your bios and elevator pitch
Your brand color hex codes
The less time you spend hunting for information, the more time you have available for actually growing your business.
Want to see the exact system I use to keep my offers, messaging, testimonials, content ideas, and business information all in one place? Click here.
What Was Your Lowest Score?
Now that you've scored all 3 categories, look for the area with the lowest number.
That's probably where you'll see the biggest payoff from making a few simple changes.
If Clarity was your lowest score, start by simplifying what you're focused on and getting your offer, audience, and goal into 1 clear place.
If Priorities was your lowest score, start by deciding which client-getting activities matter most this week.
If Business Survival was your lowest score, start by creating 1 place to track your current projects, priorities, links, and next steps.
And please, for the love of your future self, don't try to improve everything at once.
Pick the category with the most friction and start there.
Small improvements compound.
A little more clarity. A little more focus. A little less "Wait...what was I working on again?"
That can make a surprisingly big difference over the next few months.
The Goal Isn't Perfection
If there's 1 thing I hope you take away from this article, it's this:
You do not need a perfectly organized business.
And you definitely don't need to overhaul everything at once.
The goal is simply to reduce friction; to make your next work session easier than your last one.
Small improvements compound.
Over time, those small changes create a business that feels much easier to run.
Final Thoughts
Vacations, busy weeks, and interruptions will happen; real life isn't going away.
The question isn't whether life will interrupt your plans. The question is whether your business will be easy to return to when it does.
And that's a skill every coach can improve.
Ready to Make More Consistent Progress?
If you know what to do but struggle to consistently make time to do it, that's exactly why I created Laura's Get It Done Club.
Twice a month, you'll get real-time coaching, accountability, implementation time, and support designed to help you stop spinning your wheels and start making meaningful progress on the projects that matter most.
Frequently Asked Questions
How can I stay consistent as a coach?
Consistency isn't about having more motivation or discipline.
It's about reducing friction.
The easier it is to know what you're working on, what deserves your attention, and where to pick back up after an interruption, the easier it becomes to make steady progress.
This is especially important if you only have a few hours a week to work on your business.
You don't want to spend half of that time trying to remember what you were doing.
You want to sit down, know what matters, and get moving.
Why does my coaching business feel scattered?
Many coaches keep important business information spread across multiple documents, folders, notebooks, notes apps, emails, and random ideas they swear they'll remember later.
Spoiler alert: they usually do not remember later.
Over time, that creates confusion and friction.
Your business starts to feel harder to run than it actually needs to be because every task requires extra searching, deciding, remembering, or recreating.
The more organized your messaging, offers, priorities, and business information become, the easier your business is to manage and grow.
What should I focus on when I only have a few hours per week?
Focus on activities that help people discover you, trust you, and work with you.
That usually means things like:
Building relationships
Growing your email list
Increasing visibility
Following up with potential clients
Creating opportunities for conversations
Inviting people to work with you
When time is limited, client-getting activities should take priority over low-impact tasks.
That doesn't mean admin, planning, branding, and content don't matter.
It means they shouldn't constantly push aside the activities that actually create clients.
How do I know what to work on first in my coaching business?
Start with the area creating the most friction.
If you're constantly changing your message, rewriting your offers, or struggling to explain what you do, start with Clarity.
If you know what you offer but keep avoiding follow-up, visibility, or invitations, start with Priorities.
If your business information is scattered everywhere and you waste time trying to find things, start with Business Survival.
You don't need to fix everything at once.
You just need to choose the next simple step that will make your business easier to return to, easier to run, and easier to grow.
What if I scored low in all 3 categories?
First, take a breath. That is very common.
A low score does not mean your business is doomed, broken, or secretly being held together with Post-it notes and caffeine.
Although, no judgment if Post-it notes and caffeine are currently involved.
It simply means your business needs a little more structure.
Start with Clarity first.
When you know what offer you're promoting, who it's for, what problem it solves, and what you're focused on growing, it becomes much easier to choose priorities and organize the right information.
Clarity makes the next steps easier.
So start there.
