Now is about the time that owners and key leaders think, “we need a plan for next year!”
You are right...you do. What about last years plan? Did it work? Did you stick to it?
Do goals and plans even work?
Through our in depth research we have uncovered the secret in what plans and goal-setting tools work and which do not. Stay tunes and I will answer that in a minute.
But first, why do we need a goal setting plan in the first place?
This is a story of two boats. Both boats were planning to leave the safe harbour of Ft. Lauderdale with their destination (vision) set on Marsh Harbor in the Bahamas.
One boat arrived safely in Marsh Harbor the same afternoon they departed Ft. Lauderdale ...the other boat was lost at sea, frustrated and cursing God for not “blessing” them with a safe arrival.
When we dig a bit deeper we find some helpful information learned from both situations.
The first boat that arrived safely had spent two weeks preparing for the trip with a simple, written checklist on a simple sheet of notebook paper.
Fuel, check.
GPS, check.
Fresh batteries, check.
Food, check.
Water, check.
Weather, check.
Safety equipment, check.
The second boat decided on a whim to go.
Fuel, not enough.
GPS, broken.
Fresh batteries...nope, drained.
Food, couple packs of crackers.
Water, a few water bottles
Weather, never bothered to look.
Safety equipment, a child’s life vest and a whistle.
The people in the second boat were rescued by a charter sportfishing boat and their crew and brought safely back to the coast of Florida, but their boat was badly damaged.
Upon return, the captain of the misshapen boat talked with disdain and jealousy about the boat that had safely made it to Marsh Harbor without incident using language that made it sound like the successfully arrived boat was “lucky”.
Meanwhile, the shattered and unprepared captain continued telling harrowed sea stories at the local watering hole about the time he made it back safe to shore after he had beaten back the winds and the waves, enduring dehydration, a lack of food and lifejackets and on and on and on...as if he were a hero.
Business owners can sometimes confuse unpreparedness and a lack of planning with unforeseen persecution and suffering. They will tell others, “the market was against me” or “employees are impossible” or “we could never catch a break”.
In reality what they meant to say was, “I was unprepared”.
Here is the easiest preparation tool we have found; Brian Moran’s 12 Week Year.
We have adapted his principles into a simple 12 Week Plan tool that everyone of our heroic small business owners use and refresh every 12 weeks.
Here are three reasons it works so well and why you should try it beginning on Thursday December 19th, 2019…
First, twelve months is TOO LONG!
With twelve month plans we get to April and think, “well we haven’t done anything with our twelve month plan, but we still have nine months.”
Then we get to July and think, “well we haven’t done anything with our twelve month plan, but we still have six months.”
Then we get to October and huff frustratingly, ““well we haven’t done anything with our twelve month plan, but we only have three months till the new year so we’ll scrap this one and do one next year.”
And the cycle repeats into insanity.
Second, the twelve week plan only allows for three goals. Moran defines goals simply as “outcomes”. In other words, what are the three major outcomes you hope to achieve over the next twelve weeks?
Is it to “clean up your bookkeeping” or to “finalize a hiring process”? Perfect. Whatever it is, it is ok for the goal itself to be broad (I know, I know...it feels like a violation of the S.M.A.R.T. goal process...stay tuned).
Finally, each goal has an unlimited number of tactics with Moran defines simply as “actions”.
In other words, if your goal is to “finalize a hiring process” then your list of tactics may look like this…
By principle, when all of the tactics (actions) are completed, then the goal is completed...all within the timeline of twelve weeks.
It’s simple. Twelve weeks, three goals, unlimited actions steps.
So what is the secret to finding a plan and goal-setting tool works? The one you IMPLEMENT and DO!
MAKE the time on your calendar, get out a sheet of paper, and IMPLEMENT. Then create a line item in your weekly team meeting agenda for each person to review progress to their twelve week plan so you can track their progress to “Marsh Harbor”.
What about the ones who don’t implement? They will likely be the ones griping and complaining about how they braved the elements and were left in a hopeless goal of reaching their vision. Not sure if they are a good fit for what you are building.
FYI, we are hosting our next Business On Purpose 12 Week Plan LIVE Event on Thursday December 19th, 2019 in Bluffton, SC at 9amEST. You can sign you and your team up here.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose, author of Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. Scott also hosts The Business On Purpose Podcast and can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
In his book Work The System Sam Carpenter writes, “systems are the invisible threads that hold the fabric of our lives together.”
Carpenter goes on in his book to describe how his spiritual atheistic worldview was even changed not because to typical religious education or training but instead because of the systems he saw around him.
In order for you to read or listen to (check out the Business On Purpose YouTube channel and the My Business On Purpose Podcast) this article, thousands of systems must have been working in symphony. The electricity grid, my Macbook Pro, the internet connection, my bluetooth keyboard, operating systems, Google Docs, the English language, your education and ability to read, and on and on. All of these systems must be functioning in concert with predictable repetition so that I could share this message with you.
Once I complete this article we will then create images and headlines that we hope will appeal to you based on the system that we have designed to help us understand what you are struggling with. I will then take the written article record and broadcast it on Facebook Live, send that recording to be edited as a YouTube post, a podcast, and a LinkedIn article. We will use all of those content locations and use a system to share it with you around the world.
It is all a system.
We hear frequently this pushback, “systems make everything feel robotic, and we want to be a people-centered business.”
Good news, we are a people-centered business and the only way we continue to deliver on that the best possible way is with thoughtful, intentional, compassionate, and kind systems.
I cannot imagine having a business that coaches even just one client without having a system to help steward and support that client.
It is currently Monday and I have a document that I print out each Monday called the “Monday Checklist Master - BOP”. It is an incredibly simple system that reminds me exactly what needs to be done with great repetition each Monday so that I serve our heroic business owners with consistency, predictability, and a personal word from me.
Sound robotic?
One of the tasks on that checklist is writing this article which requires human creativity, intuition, awareness, and a constantly adjusted empathy pushing me to ask the question, “what is the chaos that is keeping our heroic business owners from experiencing the freedom that is front of them?”
I am due to fly on a plane next week and the captain of the commercial plane I will board will likely have thousands of hours of experience in the left seat of a commercial airliner. Regardless of the number of hours, maneuvers, delays, takeoffs and touchdowns (which we hope that number always stay equal) I will only feel comfortable flying that particular plane knowing that the captain has done the robotic work of her pre-flight checklist.
If the pilot is so experienced why should they even bother with the checklist?
1935 near Dayton, Ohio Major Ployer P. Hill barrels down the runway of Wright airfield and is set for lift off in what was the most sophisticated airplane in human history to that point. Everything was perfect until just seconds after liftoff when the plane stalled, banked, and crashed.
Everyone on board was killed.
The crash was investigated and studied and the determination made was not that the airplane was marred due to complexity, instead it was found that the Boeing 299 (The Flying Fortress) was, “too much plane for one man to fly.”
With all of the complexities of this massive airplane in motion, the crew simply forgot to release the control gust locks. That’s all. One tick of a checklist forgotten, and everyone paid.
Boeing responded in the most human AND robotic way they could and built the most innovative and life-saving piece of aviation technology still in use today…
The pilot’s checklist.
Your business is “too much business for one person to fly.”
Systems help by offering three powerful realities in the face of the simple complexities of business.
First, systems communicate to everyone, “we care enough about you to put in the hard, repetitive work.”
In business we are noticing an epidemic that is being intensified in a market of low unemployment. Many business owners need talented people and need them “yesterday.” One of the five stages of business that we teach our business owners about is the “pulse and passion” stage (stage two of a business). It derived its stage name because so many owners simply want to know, “Do you have a pulse? Do you have some level of passion for this work? YOU’RE HIRED!”
The new hire then is introduced to the center of chaos with a lack of clear direction and true understanding about what they are being asked to do. The assumption is that because this new employee has “common sense” then they will figure it out.
Just because a new hire has managed projects or sold mattresses before does not mean they know how you manage projects or how you sell mattresses. A captured system (or process) allows others to see that you spent time putting in the work to allow others to feel comfortable coming in. Capturing systems is a most human discipline.
Second, systems invite and set the stage for the human mind to expend energy on creativity innovation.
Can you imagine a world where you woke and had to go through the months-long process of remembering how to walk? How to drink without spilling? How to brush your teeth without jamming a toothbrush in your ear?
If we were to all live in a constant state of amnesia, that would be a world without systems. In order to write, to draft, to design, to construct, to teach, to drive, or to manage, we must not spend our valuable time doing things that systems can easily automate.
Allow systems to automate while you create and innovate!
Finally, systems scale, scale, scale.
As systems automate the monotonous, we are able to bring more production, more conversation, and more serving into our lives and the lives of the clients we serve. Without systems we are stuck performing one task to one person.
With systems a business coach can serve hundreds, restaurateurs can feed thousands, comedians can sketch comedy to millions, and engineers can deliver power to billions.
Without systems...we go dark.
To celebrate the power of systems watch this time-lapsed video put together by Mitch Brown and Boat Float company who captured the natural beauty of systems. Watch the solar system, the tidal system, and the ecological system all working like clockwork so that Mitch and his team can build a dock and a homeowner can enjoy an incredible view!
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose, author of Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. Scott also hosts The Business On Purpose Podcast and can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
An article from Gettysburg College tells us we will spend roughly 90,000 hours of our life at work.
That is one third of every day of our life...working.
Owners have a responsibility for creating businesses that produce value for customers, profit for the business, and jobs for millions of people.
As you build your business in whatever stage you are in (typically five different stages from “Survival” to “Legacy”), people are going to be a part of it.
If you are a solopreneur, a gig-er, or a freelancer, at some point you will outsource bookkeeping, taxes, graphic design, marketing, or some other service that will dramatically help you focus on your narrow brilliance.
Surveying heroic business owners for the past five years we have found that outside of managing time, their biggest headache is found in one simple word; employees.
It does not have to be that way.
Life is loaded with concrete reality and fluid emotion.
Employees and owners alike both bring that dualistic reality with them at home and to work, it is why the sentiment “it’s just business” cannot be right.
Owners have an opportunity to create a powerful human experience for employees within the platform of their business if they will only slow down.
I received this email from a co-owner (Matt) at Modern Door in Maryland. They began intentionally following the methodical hiring process that we built together and this was a result...
Another owner “caught” a key leader in the act of using their printed Hiring Process to bring on a new team member.
THIS IS HUMAN!
Why?
Following a hiring and onboarding process does three things for you, your business, your new team members, your existing team members, and the families at home.
First, a hiring and onboarding process gives you and your team clarity on who fits what role in the business. Too many times we bring someone into the business because we are desperate and conclude that this person can be the ibuprofen to our headache.
When we bring them in without a process, without a clear role, and without a 90 day onboarding plan, instead of ibuprofen, it feels more like another knife in the back.
We then blame our frustration on the new person when in reality, we are the problem. We were too caught up in “needing help” that we forgot (or neglected) to “help the need”.
Second, a hiring process intentionally slows down the entire process. Historical wisdom has prioritized slown-ness verses speed. Rarely have solid, decisions with great longevity been made in haste. Proverbs 19:2 minces no words in saying, “it is not good to have zeal without knowledge, nor to be hasty and miss the way.”
Hiring has been notoriously hasty. Currently Amazon is needing to hire over 50,000 people. Wow. Haste may have to be an option for Amazon but it certainly does not for you.
Write the process down, communicate it with your team and your potential hires, and follow the process...every jot and tittle.
Third, a clear process puts the potential hire on alert declaring “this is the type of company you are dealing with.” It has been overwhelming to hear the number of times a potential hire will tell an owner or key leader, “wow, you all really have your stuff together” or “I’ve never interviewed with a company like this.”
The truth is you made the hiring up from scratch, you didn’t consult an HR manual or a professional hiring service, you just thought through, what are the key elements we need to know and what are the key elements they need to know before we join up for a long term relationship.
Rarely will you find a good talent fit, instead choose to make a good talent fit for your business.
What is the next step? Go grab a sheet of paper, lose the distractions for 30 minutes and write down everything you want to be a part of your hiring process. Share it with your existing team (or just with yourself if you are solo), and follow the process!
When you follow the process, you create a human experience.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose, author of Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. Scott also hosts The Business On Purpose Podcast and can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
Recently I received an email from a client who is a part of our Architects coaching program which is known as the Architecture Firm Freedom Formula (Dream Practice Accelerator) serving Architects, Engineers, and Interior Designers..
It is a program that Enoch Sears and I have run jointly for four years and we’ve had the privilege of seeing more than 100 Architects through the program around the world from Namibia, to Croatia, China, to Scotland, Canada, and the United States.
We hear regular feedback from our heroic firm owners about real life challenges they are facing, and struggles of running a successful firm.
This is an honest peek into the life of one such firm owner who was literally about to throw in the towel, but has been refreshed and recommitted after seeing the simple power of serving her widowed mother.
Dear Scott and Enoch,
This is just an email to touch base and let you know I'm still alive:)) But more importantly, that I had a break through recently, thanks to the influence of you guys, that has me super excited and pumped to press forward with our company and renew/refresh....again!
I had hit a bad place of uncertainty mid-year that derailed intentions initiated at the start of this year when I signed up for AFF. I may have shared snippets between Thursday calls and the one time chat with Enoch (which was meant to discuss technical road block i have with trello), that indicated the turmoil & overwhelming state I'd arrived at with so much changing so fast in our company/structure/culture/vision, which left David and I very unsure what we wanted out of the business anymore. Vision temporarily lost! Confusion was compounded by us both turning 50/51 and re-evaluating goals and means to accomplish them. We called into question if it made sense to keep Fusion going or take our experience/skills/knowledge to alt career paths as employees elsewhere.
Meanwhile, we continued to be busier than expected this year, but unfortunately not all due to new revenue generating business, but rather, a considerable amount devoted to trouble-shooting and fixing unacceptable/inaccurate work performed by our ex-young team who had since moved on (we had taken time to train, or so we thought, but they didn't care enough apparently), but left us plenty of potentially liable mess ups to follow up and deal with. Needless to say, the motivation to keep the business going waned even further as I evaluated our numbers, implementing AFF lessons, etc.
Then October rolled around and suddenly it was time for my almost 3 week solo trip to India (booked months ago) to visit and help my mom. Now a widow, she has relocated to her birthplace in a beautiful but remote town and I was there to help her finish out a construction project she stubbornly started at age 85, with the desire to reside on the small lakeside lot of land she inherited, next to the chapel she had built over 20 years ago for her community, from her retirement savings. The place is fairly remote, natural, with no internet connection at her place (attaching a pic taken from roof terrace of her new final home). So I'd hoped I'd have plenty of quiet blocks of time to really catch up on AFF modules, plus some reading, in this potentially peaceful setting. I took both books you guys sent us (Profit First and E-Myth)...had only half finished the former in January, implemented immediately, but never finished the book. This was going to be my time to read both! Well, turned out to be wishful thinking!!
My 3 weeks flew at a very busy pace, as I found myself having to manage union/communist mentality labor taking advantage of a single old lady; having to communicate strictly in a foreign language that I only have basic conversational skills with, amidst heavy rain storms, etc. Kept me so fully busy every day, with no energy to read or think beyond what my mom needed. But i was there for her primarily, so it was cool. Accomplished a lot to settle her. Left her happy and comfortable, and excited that I will be back next month with David and the girls. Something for her to look forward to this Christmas:)
But...as I boarded the plane on Nov 11th to head back, I recognized I was still hungry to gain some clarity and sense of thoughtful professional gameplan before returning to USA, but had exhausted time, and quite frankly, my energy. Not quite ready to give up, I decided to try something I've never succeeded at doing in the past....to stay awake in flight and read!
I deliberately slept my first 4.5 hours flight from Kochi to Doha. That refreshed me from immense fatigue I had felt from intense pace through day of departure. Then on 2nd leg of journey, 14.5 hours to go before touchdown in Atlanta, I buckled down with Michael Gerber. I thought I'd at least get the book started before I returned to David.
Simply put....Wow! What a great read. Just a couple of chapters in, I was hooked. I could relate to so much, and every page resonated with sense. I devoured the book cover to cover without inflight movies or sleep for 14 hours straight -- much to the annoyance of my fellow passengers who probably wanted my light turned off. But selfishly I wasn't about to turn it off when so many mini lightbulbs were mentally being triggered as I read on.
The book helped me better understand the systematic modules you have organized for us to implement. I feel stupid for waiting this long to read it! It even inspired me to crack open my notepad and think through a different ORG chart with fresh perspective (I've attached my sloppy inflight sketch here for your amusement -- lots to still iron out -- have some questions I hope AFF team can help clarify before finalizing). I realized, the Entrepreneur in me wasn't ready to give up. Not just like that after more than 16 years of a fairly profitable business -- messy and sloppy as it has been. So much room for improvement, and with some clarity gained, I know Fusion can be so much better and stronger, even if maintaining our desire not to get much bigger! I am convinced we've just experienced really painful adolescence as a company, and I am so ready to grow up/mature, but recognize the need to reset bad childhood habits and practices first. So...I am ready to implement from basics again.
The most exciting result of this trip for me is that i've returned EXCITED and believing in the purpose of my business in our life's goals again. This trip gave me time to recognize in deep gratitude the many luxuries our small business has provided us as a family. Not just the financial means and freedom to travel internationally as a family every other year, but especially for the blessing to allow me personally the freedom to take as many trips across the seas to reach my parents to help whenever needed.
When in 2015 my dad was diagnosed with ALS, he and my mom needed my help and I ended up making 5 trips to India over the next 12 months, 2-3 weeks each; the last of which was to bury dad. Had I been an employee anywhere, I would have been fired or had to have quit. Which employer would allow for that kind of time? Or which small company, unsystematic as we are in many ways, could tolerate a COO in absent minded/depression/anger/grief for the next 12-18 months and still generate adequate returns to keep all staff compensated while finishing several big projects to full client satisfaction? Somehow that's what my business has afforded and provided us.
The recent years seem a blur so I don't know how we did it, but we did. No doubt being blessed with a handful of key people on my team is definitely part of the 'how'; but boy, thinking back to the intense stress and toll we've experienced through these last 4 adolescent years, while it's been a decent business it could've been so much better had I known and implemented then what I am learning now. I recognize that while the business hasn't been a lucrative one unfortunately, it has been a blessing in disguise that has afforded us significant and priceless life experiences. And I believe it still has purpose for at least a few more years.
So I want to re-commit to my initial intent at the start of 2019, to renew and refresh Fusion A.I. Design. Really thankful to have discovered AFF to help guide me to accomplish that intent. Now it is time. I aim to IMPLEMENT!
Thank you both for sharing what you know and doing what you do!
What role does your business play in serving others? Alice is working to build a business on purpose...and we hope you’ll do the same!
Three things Alice did that I challenge you to do…
Last week NFL players Miles Garret and Mason Rudolph were locked in a nasty tussle that left one with a bruised head and ego, and the other with an indefinite suspension without pay (his contract is said to be worth roughly $34mm over four years).
Last week Ambassador William Taylor (acting Ambassador to the Ukraine) read prepared testimony giving insight into questionable practices from high ranking members of the United States government. While the testimony was thoroughly prepared it spawned a news cycle reaction that was swift, biased and opinionated.
I’ll never forget watching a cable news network anchor standing outside of the United States Supreme Court after a judgement was written as to the opinion of the court regarding the infamous “hanging chad” ordeal in the election results of the contest between George W. Bush and Al Gore on December 13th, 2000.
The on-site reporter was literally trying to interpret the written Supreme Court decision while on air. No preparation. No moments of sobriety...just get it out and be the first to arrive.
We are obsessed with being first.
Yours truly has been known to anticipate the ticket agent who picks up the handheld microphone just prior to welcoming “Group 9” to board creating a mob-rush to the gate door in preparation for boarding so we can grab the coveted overhead space.
In sports we are losing our joy for the game in favor of coming in first. It used to be that we would sell out stadiums even when a team had a .500 season. Now, if one college team loses even just one game, they are “out”.
I went back and looked at the U of S. Carolina Gamecock football team I played for from 1994 through 1997 and found we were a combined record of 22 wins, 22 losses, and 1 tie (against LSU in 1995). I am not under the illusion that fans were not unsatisfied. Our attendance was still pretty incredible through those years.
Just this weekend , Baylor University after having a monumental run being undefeated through nine college football games (an incredible feat in itself) lost in the last minute to Oklahoma and the college football powers TROUNCED them bumping them down in the rankings.
Why are we obsessed with first?
We assume that first equals easy, recognized, and having the satisfaction of “having arrived”.
We really believe that “first” is going to fix things. Once we hit “first”, we’ll get the respect, we’ll get the credibility.
It is all empty.
Of course there are comforts that come with first. Possibly big pay days, awards, recognition. If you sat with everyone who has ever come in first, you will probably find a theme.
The “before coming first” was a lot more meaningful than the “after coming first”.
Many men and women who have successfully sold their businesses (aka coming in first), felt more significance while leading their business than they did upon selling their business with the contracted payout.
How can we appreciate life without having to have the constant need to come in first?
First, pause.
Start asking yourself realistically, what is the purpose? Pause, remove yourself from the emotion of the moment and and ask that question. Currently that same University of South Carolina football team, with different coaches and team members of course, are sitting at a record of 4 wins and 7 losses.
They have been calling for the head coach (Will Muschamp) to be fired for weeks. But what if we paused.
What if we thought, “who else is out there?” “What would that do to recruiting?” “Is Coach Muschamp doing a bad job?”
Turns out, last year the University of South Carolina had the highest graduation success rate in college football behind four Ivy Leagues schools and Northwestern University. Not first, but pretty impressive.
When we pause, we can think with greater clarity as to the full scope of information.
Second, pause before each transition.
The current research and literature sings in unison, multi-tasking is a lie. Time blocking is clearly a better way. Multi-tasking does not work both in research and in my own experience.
Of course time blocking does not make us feel like we are coming in first, multi-tasking does. As the day goes on today, I am committed to pausing and at least taking a deep breath before transitioning into the next action or opportunity on my Monday checklist (yes, I do have a Monday checklist.)
Third, realize that being first comes with responsibility and burden...not just opportunity.
A friend of mine is a professional musician and sometimes I think he has the life, it seems like he came in first. Until I realize that he wakes up in a different city multiple days of the week sometimes forgetting where he is because the crowds all look the same.
Then realizing that even amidst all of the lauding of fans, he has zero flexibility in his schedule. A road manager guides his every time slot.
A friend of mine has a cousin who is a NASCAR driver and is still young in his thirties. My friend got us passess and access to spend the afternoon with his cousin leading up to a famous race that evening. This driver is a multi-millionaire with major access. He spent his entire afternoon, and most of each week out of eleven months each year beholden to sponsors and crew chiefs. His time is not his own even though he came in first.
It almost seemed as if he was bound by his freedom. There are about 43 drivers on the planet that have the access he has. He came in first, and yet he’s walking away from full time racing this year.
As you grow and as your business grows, make sure to pause, breath deep, find places of respite, and spend time learning how to navigate your new responsibilities, burden, and opportunity of coming in first. Not the first of winning, but the first of having the opportunity to play the game.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose, author of Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. Scott also hosts The Business On Purpose Podcast and can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
My very first job in High School was working for my neighbors who owned Country Boy’s Home & Garden Center in Greenville, SC.
My office space was an outdoor nursery filled with plants, herbs, shrubs, pine needles and produce. Allen and Lucy were generous to provide me with more responsibility than a 15 year old kid should have had. It was a great training ground.
From there my office spaces consisted of a cubicle, a car, an airplane, and now a secluded space overlooking a beautiful lowcountry view.
Even with seclusion, distraction is just a click away. Owners and key leaders must have incredible discipline to resist distraction and to set space where distraction is a minimum.
Enter the “owners space”.
While working with a non-governmental organization I spent time with a number of stakeholders of the organization. One such stakeholder was a much older man who was a land developer and philanthropist in North Texas. In the 2000’s, his office still carried the interior design touches of an office outfitted in the late 1960’s. Not much had changed; mustard yellow kitchen appliances, retro toilets, shag carpet, and brown panel walls. It was gross and touching.
What struck me was the desktop computer in his office that was never powered on. On one occasion I walked into his office and asked to pull up and article, he spun around in his chair and called for his assistant to come power up his computer. He had no desire to even learn the simple power button. Just another distraction.
This owner was focused and locked in on developing land and giving away money.
Your workspace is important. We are constantly encouraging owners and their key leaders to paint the walls of their space with heads-up-displays of mission, values, process, and workflow.
Recently, during one of our Architect coaching calls (Architecture Firm Freedom Formula with myself and Enoch Sears), one of the firm owners shared this picture with us...
This is the owner's space. Notice a Master Process Roadmap (the large printed image), an updated Org Chart (the smaller printed image), printed process, books, notebooks, and no computer.
Obviously we are not saying you do not need technology, you do, but it needs to be harnessed in boundaries.
The owner’s space should be setup like the dashboard of a cockpit with all of the necessary instruments to fly your business. What are those?
First, every business owner should have their vision story, mission statement, and unique core values printed out, posted and reviewed continually. These are the ultimate leveling tools to help you the owner determine if you are on course with the correct heading.
I write about how to develop a vision story, mission statement, and unique core values in full detail in my book Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters.
Write them, print them, post them, and implement over and over.
Second, every business owner should have copies of a current Org Chart, Weekly Schedule, and Master Process Roadmap (all processes that exist in the business...see the larger printed image in the picture above) printed out and posted on the wall.
Also, owners should consider using our Business On Purpose Implementation Dashboard. It is a brief snapshot of what you should be thinking through daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, semesterly, and annually as a business owner.
Finally, every business owner should have completed and printed their updated 12 Week Plan. Brian Moran has written a powerful book, 12 Week Year: Get More Done In 12 Weeks Than Others Do In 12 Months.
We have sent hundreds of these books to people over the past couple of years. We even run an entire event based on these principles every 12 weeks so our local and virtual business owners and their teams are on the same page with their 12 week plans.
Your space should be set apart, special, unique, and should facilitate your highest and deepest level of work.
If technology or those trophies from 10th grade are distracting you, move them somewhere else and setup your office on purpose. The owner’s space should be an intentional place to think, to lead, to vision, to innovate, to build, to design, and a place that empowers you to say “yes” to the right things and “no” to the wrong things.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose, author of Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. Scott also hosts The Business On Purpose Podcast and can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
Too many owners see their businesses either as an irritation to endure or as a machine merely for profit-generation.
A business is so much more.
Business and commerce are incredible tools in the hands of thoughtful owners that can be leveraged as a powerful force for life transformation in the major areas of life-- faith, family, finances, friends, etc.
Ryan O’Shaugnessey’s is a growing Project Manager at Premier Exteriors LLC. Ryan and his wife are an intentional young couple who have been working hard to set up into adulthood found themselves, as so many do, in debt that placed a constriction to the household.
Zack Howard, the head of Operations for Taylors Quality Landscape Supply likewise found himself swimming both in “big boy toys” and swimming equally in debt.
Culturally it has become the norm to look down the proverbial block and see what “The Joneses” have and make a subtle, often subconscious, and consequential decision thinking, “surely if they can afford that then I can too.”
Credit lenders abound in both their availability and often their simplicity in extending what Dave Ramsey so comically and truthfully stated is money to “... buy things we don't need with money we don't have to impress people we don't like.”
For some it is the “Joneses” mindset, for others it may be student loans. Regardless, owing other people money stinks and is well cautioned, “the borrower is slave to the lender”, I’ll add, no matter the purpose, the terms nor the interest.
Owing a debt is usually a weight.
Justin Harvey owns Premier Exteriors and Gerrick Taylor owns Taylors Quality Landscape Supply. Both owners separately saw an opportunity to leverage their business as a force for personal transformation and began to offer Dave Ramsey’s Financial Peace University to their team members as a means for personal growth and development.
Gerrick partnered with Live Oak Christian Church who provided trained facilitators for the course.
After the entire 13 week course was complete for both Premier and Taylors team members, the results were almost unimaginable.
The O'Shaughnessy's systematically and courageously paid off $68,000 in 15 months! That is a weight of $151 every day for 450 days they got rid and whimsically whisked away to the beach to celebrate! This letter from Ryan and Amber is a tangible momento for Justin and proof that you can build a business on purpose.
For Zack, he single-handedly starting barreling down his debt to the point he paid off $50,000 during the course of the program. Gerrick as the owner provided the opportunity and the vision, Zack brought the hard work and implementation. Vision without implementation is hallucination.
To prove Zack’s lack of hallucination he courageously stood in front of the entire Taylors team and shared, numbers and all, his journey and success. It led to eight other team members filling up another Financial Peace class so the momentum could continue.
Your business IS your mission. Your business can transform the lives of real people. As the owner, leverage your business for profit, leverage your business for connection, leverage your business for impact, and leverage your business for the transformation of lives!
Here are three ways to leverage your business for the transformation of your team and the people they influence.
First, write your business vision down on paper and share it with your team. Seriously. Don’t just think, “oh, that’s a neat idea!” Do it. Write it down. Share it openly.
Your business vision should have seven categories you write out: duration (18-36 months ideally), family and freedom, financial, product and/or service, team and employees, client type, and what your culture will be.
Once you have shared your vision invite your team to write a vision for their family or household. What do they want for their family, their faith, fitness, finances, and friendships?
Next, teach financial literacy in your business and provide opportunities for your team to work on their own financial stewardship. Talk about how a dollar that comes into the business does not remain as a whole dollar. Explain that every dollar gets fractionated out in payroll, taxes, cost of goods, etc.
Also, talk about the importance of personal financial stewardship both at work and at home. Bad stewardship should never determine compensation either way.
Finally, tie a team members work back to the community they serve and the purpose they have in their life. Of course this requires that team members know their purpose. Walk with them through a simple process of asking each person, “what motivates you?”
Real transformation will not take place the first time you take advantage of any of these opportunities but instead evolves over time and repetition. Team meetings and intentional time calendaring serves as the invitation for solid repetition.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose, author of Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. Scott also hosts The Business On Purpose Podcast and can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
Coaching business owners has allowed us some pretty exciting highs. Coaching also requires the thickening of a coach's skin. There are plenty of days where I show up to “practice” ready to coach and the response is a subtle eye roll from an owner, “Really? We’re going to talk about this again?”
Most Tuesday nights throughout the school year we have a group of teenage emerging-men to our house for “Man Up Night”. It’s really a case study in teenage male interaction. Shiny squirrels, bazaar sounds, curious thoughts, unrealistic competition, and the world's newest game, plunger wars (don’t ask).
One of these young emerging men walked into the house on a Tuesday and I asked him, “how was practice?” His response, “just like always...it sucked.”
The truth of that statement is that it is hard. What gets missed in our bemoaning practice is when that young emerging-man shows up this Friday night to his live game, he will be overwhelmingly grateful and satisfied that he put in the hard work of repetitious, enduring, methodical practice.
As your coach, at least for this moment, I am inviting you into the methodical, repetitous, sometimes painful work of writing.
Writing down your vision. Writing down your mission. Writing down your unique core values.
Why write them and not just discuss them?
Michael Gerber said, “if you don’t write it down you don’t own it.”
I am not sure who said this statement but it is true nonetheless, “if you do not write it down it does not exist.”
My first book Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters only exists because I took the time to write it down. Obvious huh? Think through the inverse. If I do not write it down, the book does not exist.
We have written down tutorials, modules, documents, and templates, and now they all exist and bring enduring value for others. Just this year over 1,000 people have my book, my thoughts, my perspective in their hand. Just this year our tutorials and templates have been used thousands of times.
How? I wrote it down.
Author, psychologist, and educator Kelly McGonigal reinforces the intentional act of writing, in this case, your values. McGonigal writes, “It turns out that writing about your values is one of the most effective psychological interventions ever studied. In the short term, writing about personal values makes people feel more powerful, in control, proud, and strong. It also makes them feel more loving, connected, and empathetic toward others. It increases pain tolerance, enhances self-control, and reduces unhelpful rumination after a stressful experience.
In the long term, writing about values has been shown to boost GPAs, reduce doctor visits, improve mental health, and help with everything from weight loss to quitting smoking and reducing drinking. It helps people persevere in the face of discrimination and reduces self-handicapping. In many cases, these benefits are a result of a one-time mindset intervention. People who write about their values once, for ten minutes, show benefits months or even years later.”
Why do we resist?
First, writing feels so “9th-grade-English”. We wrote in 9th grade because we were forced to write. Many of us found no joy or purpose in the writing other than simply to write. There was no “Friday night game” that rewarded the joy of writing, to the detriment of this great skill.
I walked into my son’s room as he was pounding away at a keyboard the other night working on a short essay. As I write and speak this out now I am thinking, “we need to have a Friday night game experience for his collection of writings.” The old adage is true, “what gets rewarded gets done.”
Second, we resist writing because writing feels so beneath us. We are smart people, we don’t need to write it down! We think, “I’m a grown adult, I’ll leave the writing to the 9th graders.” I get it, but we are wrong when we think this. Writing, documenting, capturing, recording is one of the most thoughtful, human, empowering tools you have in your toolbelt.
When you write and capture a process, a value, a vision, a mission, an idea, that written statement transforms into a powerful motivator and invitation that forces the rest of us to either run towards what you have written (in agreement), or run away from what you have written (in disagreement).
If you want me to know where you stand, write it down, otherwise it is just hot air.
You need to hire someone? Write the role down.
You need to bring on a partner? Write it down.
You need to have a tough conversation? First, write it down.
You need to praise someone? Write it down.
Finally, we resist writing because it is hard. To spend time writing this right now means that I have elected to not sleep, text, email, or eat ice cream (although I’m still in debate). Writing this means that I have chosen to forego the easy work of responding to fires and instead invest in the hard work of writing it down, so now it exists allowing you to think through how you bring things into existence.
Write your vision, write your mission, write your values, write your systems, write your process, write thank you notes, write your thoughts and then repeat them over and over and over and over so we can read them and RUN!
Put in the hard work of writing and watch the reality of what Kelly McGonigal wrote play out in real time, it will “show benefits months or even years later.” How? Just start writing.
Oh yeah, I failed my 9th grade English class, so no excuses.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose, author of Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. Scott also hosts The Business On Purpose Podcast and can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
The headline landed this past week that so many thought might be coming…
Since 2008 virtually every business owner has thought, “when will the next recession come and how bad will it be?”
Yours truly has wrestled with the same question during moments of emotional and mental weakness in my well-documented struggle with fear.
Recently though I have wondered, “could I approach a market dip with enthusiasm and expectation rather than doom and gloom?”
I believe so, here is what I mean.
The lowcountry of South Carolina, where our family lives, has been on the receiving end of active hurricanes each of the past three years. It is nice to believe that we can hurricane-proof our home. The reality though is that the best we can possibly work towards is a thoughtfully hurricane-reinforced home.
My neighbor Fred actually owns a small hurricane-shutter business allowing homes and businesses to provide reinforcement in nasty weather. But if that hurricane barrels in as a direct Category 5, not even Fred’s storm panels will do much to assist in the event the entire house was blown from its foundation.
Even some well run businesses were knocked off of their foundations during the Great Recession. But in most cases, the businesses that were recession-reinforced were able to withstand.
Here are a few non-negotiables to reinforce your business so that if a market dip comes you can go into the storm with expectation and anticipation instead of doom and gloom. These are in no particular order.
First, your Vision story is even more important than cash.
Liquidity (accessible cash) is a delightful tool that we would all love to have in excess, but what is more crucial is vision.
In a market-storm debris usually gets thrown around and if your perspective is lost your course can get easily thrown off.
Ed Sheeran says in his song Lego House, “I think the braces are breaking…” In a storm braces have a chance to break and equilibrium thrown for a bit. While the storm is raging, and when the storm is complete it is both refreshing, comforting, and re-centering to know and have confidence in your heading. Ship captains and airplane pilots would surely agree.
The only way you can lead a team to run is to write the vision down (literally...write it down) and communicate it with incredible repetition.
Second, cash will offer buoyancy and give you options.
In a typical room full of business owners if I had everyone raise their hand who could make it through three months of business with no revenue...not many would be able to respond.
The hurricanes here in the lowcountry exposed some businesses to the reality that they could not even survive one week of zero revenue generation let alone a few months of market correction.
We recommend that businesses have an accessible reserve of three to six months of cash reserve to live on under the assumption that no new revenue was generated. This is not a move based on fear, but instead on wisdom.
A decision based on fear (or greed) is to have two years of cash built up (unless maybe you are a farmer:). Hoarding is not healthy either.
The likelihood of zero revenue is not very high in most industries. If you have cash, you have options.
One option is to float the entire business with no reduction of overhead, personnel, etc.
Another option is to thoughtfully trim the business expense in line with the new revenue. Obviously this is easier to do with a team of subcontractors verses a team of full time employees.
The most exciting option is to have cash available to purchase other businesses at a discount. Remember all of those hands in the room that would not go up? Many of those represent good products that are simply poorly managed and can be revived by your leadership. You may be able to purchase their business (assets, people, contracts, relationships, etc.) at a discount during a stormy market. You cannot do that though if you do not have cash.
The smoothest way to build cash that we have seen and exposed hundreds of business owners to is found in Mike Michalowicz’ simple book Profit First. Read it and do it. No excuses.
Third, team meetings will ensure that the right things will be communicated in the right way.
Having endured the geographical displacement of a few hurricanes now has helped train us on the importance of predictable communication channels.
Obviously our family is together so we are able to communicate in real time and with frequency.
Our mayor did a great job of communicating certain times where she would communicate to displaced citizens using Facebook Live.
Our local Sheriff would also hold regularly scheduled updates accessible to anyone anywhere.
If you do not have a regular method and frequency of communication (i.e. - agenda driven, leader led, regularly set team meetings), then a market-storm will further exacerbate the irregularity, frustration, and unpredictability of a communication-challenged culture. Don’t wait for a market storm to communicate using team meetings, build that habit now.
If you have clarity of knowing where your business is going, cash to keep you afloat, and a reliable method of predictable communication then your braces are less-likely to break and Ed Sheeran will be a musical companion during an opportunity rather than a prophet of doom through a storm.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose, author of Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. Scott also hosts The Business On Purpose Podcast and can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
“Wig”, as most call him, sat in front of me over the simplicity of a Subway sandwich shop table and motioned his arm with a fist up and down saying thoughtfully and slowly, “it’s about wisdom.”
Wisdom.
Last week I was with a group of Cross Country athletes from our local High School and had them answer this question, “What is wisdom?”
Their answers were thoughtful and aware-- sincere and slow.
These student-athletes were genuinely thinking about the question. It was not a case of “let me just spit out an answer so this guy can move on and we can go do anything other than this!”
Wisdom forces us to slow down and listen closely.
Wisdom invites us to lean in and fine tune our ears to hear.
Wisdom speaks in truth, prudence, good judgement, plain-terms, knowledge, discernment, insight, strength, service, eagerness, right-ness, experience, longevity, instruction, joy, and life.
Business Owners are invited daily to walk away from Wisdom and instead to go down the wide, inviting, luxurious path of deception, feeling-above-truth, injustice, confusion, apathy, gossip, and near-term assumption. Of course it never feels or seems that way in the moment.
There are two reasons why Wisdom must be the primary value that hovers above all other published values in your business (and everywhere else).
First, Wisdom was around long before you were.
The personification of wisdom is well written and documented in the Jewish Proverbs.
“Rulers lead with my (Wisdom’s) help…”
“I (Wisdom) have riches and honor, as well as enduring wealth and justice.”
“My (Wisdom’s) gifts are better than gold, even the purest gold, my wages better than sterling silver.”
As you read through you begin to uncover the game-changing option you have in embracing Wisdom.
Those values and benefits are within Wisdom in part because of how long Wisdom has existed. “The Lord formed me (Wisdom) from the beginning, before he created anything else. I was appointed in ages past, at the very first, before the earth began. I was born before the oceans were created, before the springs bubbled their waters…”
Working through a recent parenting challenge I reached out to a mentor who is older and more experienced than I am. He walked me through a similar challenge their family experienced which gave me loads of confidence and courage to walk through in our family.
The majority of insight you receive will likely be categorized as opinion, the minority of insight you receive is Wisdom.
He had been there before, and his challenge instilled bravery in me.
Wisdom has been there before, which is why the secret to wisdom is simply, “Go get wisdom!” (Prov 4:7)
Second, Wisdom’s foundation is solid when everything else is flimsy.
All that time spent strategizing, marketing, thinking, and wondering can make our businesses feel like a house of cards.
Most businesses are built as a house of cards, fancy exteriors with very little substructure underneath. We see it all of the time and appreciate when a business owner takes time to become aware and admit it. Only then can transformation begin.
When we are fragile and in chaos we will do anything possible not to have our flimsiness exposed. Fingers crossed and arms clutched we hope that “everything will just work out.” Or we believe the consequence of the “everything will just work out” mentality won’t be as bad as the pain of putting in the work on the front end.
Wisdom says “put in the work while no one is looking and reap the reward on the back end.” The opposite of wisdom is “everything will just work out.”
Here are a few helpful ways to “go get wisdom”.
Once you begin the long discipline of procuring wisdom you will then be able to deploy wisdom. Once you deploy wisdom be ready for counter punches which you will then combat with…
Wisdom.
Everything else moves, shifts, and fades out. Wisdom endures.
I was exhausted and standing in front of a Customs Official in the Lagos airport. “Where is your yellow immunization card?”
My face turned yellow I’m sure as my eyes darted through my passport. I was no stranger to the Nigerian customs process and was usually well thought out and on my game. Not this trip.
It was a situation where I literally grinned, looked at this powerful lady and said, “E’karo Mommy, se’ dada ni’?”
She laughed cautiously and then asked again in a playfully inquisitive tone, “your yellow card?” I said with a thoughtful smile, “I will find it.” She waved me through with my passport, visa, and a yellow card I was committed to find. I eventually did find it.
It was a situation where I sat their metaphorically naked and hoping for the best with noticeable perspiration.
That is the typical posture when hiring a team member, hoping for the best with noticeable perspiration.
As business owners we are constantly working to maximize profit, cash flow and a host of other metrics and deliverables. Yet when it comes to hiring we look like middle schoolers out on a first date, awkward and out of place.
Two things that you can install into your business right now to help you mature the process for how you bring in that powerfully important asset and relationship of people into your business.
First, a written hiring process. An actual process that you will follow no matter how desperate you are for employees nor how well you may know said-candidate.
Important elements of a hiring process combine a mix of subjective (how you feel) and objective (what the data says) points.
Subjectively, having an initial phone call followed by a series of live meetings. A live-discussion sequence that we recommend looks like this:
“But can’t we do it faster?” If you want to be less informed and hasty then yes you can. Part of the value of multiple steps is to intentionally slow down the process so everyone can process all of the information.
Objectively, here are some elements of the process that will give you hard metrics to look at.
All three of the objective opportunities are severely underutilized primarily because they take time and effort.
Embrace the time and effort. See it as a gift allowing you to make an incredibly powerful decision. It’s romantic to think, “I was at a gas station pumping gas and a guy walked up to me and I hired him on the spot and he’s been the best employee I’ve ever had.”
That may work for your Grandmother’s dating game 70 years ago...but not for hiring.
Secondly, you need an Onboarding Process.
Day one is no longer day one. The first day for your new team member is actually the start of their warm up period which should be about 3 months.
A healthy Onboarding Process will include a simple layout of what the new team member will learn, according to their role, week by week over the first twelve weeks.
Weekly, the new team member will sit with their direct report and walk through a few crucial and well positioned questions and statements…
Spend 10 minutes reviewing that list of questions each week with your new team member and your investment will begin returning in a major way. A simple, implemented onboarding process is one of the simplest ways to ensure your hiring investment.
As Owners, let’s commit to stop just crossing our fingers and hoping for the best and let’s work the process.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose and the host of The Business On Purpose Podcast. He can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
We stopped about 38 minutes through our coaching time and one of the Owners asked, “could you help us just sell our business?”
He was frustrated with his construction company because construction is hard. With all of the lead hunting, bidding, questioning, job costing, crew recruiting, scheduling, material ordering, monitoring other people’s schedules, weather delays, and market variations...construction is hard.
Instead of selling your business out of frustration (not usually a good idea), what if you proactively designed your business to sell and then stuck with it?
If you want a business that could sell here is a roadmap that is easy to follow and requires loads of vision, discipline, and repetition to implement.
Put in the work now, and you will see the returns later.
Here are a few items that are non-negotiables in order to lead a business that you can sell...
First, you must write your vision story.
The wisdom is true, if you do not have a written vision you (and others) will scatter. There are seven categories to think through when writing your vision:
Second, you must write and constantly repeat your mission and unique core values.
Whereas your vision story is a detailed, multi-page description of the future of your business, a mission statement is distilled from your vision and should pack a massive punch!
A mission in the well documented writings and talks of Simon Sinek is simply “your why”. It is a short on sentence phrase, less than 10-15 words telling us exactly why you got out of bed this morning.
For Business On Purpose we liberate business owners from chaos. That’s it. Our vision is four pages long and takes a longer time to reveal. If you are not interested or impacted by our mission, if it does not grab you then you will likely not be interested in our vision story.
By distilling our vision into a short, punchy mission we have been gracious and saved you time so you can either go deeper with us or move on to something else.
Your unique core values are the guardrails of decision making in your business. When we make a decision at Business On Purpose we run each of those decisions through our vision, our mission, and then five unique core values (unique values are not integrity, responsibility, and excellence...we should ALL value those).
Here our five unique values:
You will make haphazard, confusing decisions that violate your vision if you are not constantly reviewing and repeating your mission and values.
Third, you must have a documented set of repeatable and trainable systems and processes.
This is typically where most owners begin to really nod their head in agreement and internally battle because they know that the intention to build systems and processes does not equal the actual work it takes to build them.
Some of the systems and processes that must exist and be used regularly are items like…
Fourth, you will be well served to have a team of professionals around you (all can be engaged by contract or retainer and are worth their weight in gold), whether you sell or not.
A Business Coach will be the Bill Belichick you need to keep you locked in and focused on what’s next and what’s now. A great coach studies, gameplans, encourages, motivates, designs, and holds you accountable to maximize your capacity. Your coach will also help facilitate discussions between you and your team (you know, those tough conversations you don’t want to have:), as well as the other contract professionals on your team.
A Business Attorney will allow position you to make sure your “i’s” are dotted and “t’s” crossed with agreements, contracts, wills, trusts, liability (see an Insurance Pro to help), power-of-attorneys, and overall legal plans.
A CPA and/or virtual CFO will make sure that you are budgeting, projecting, tracking, monitoring, maximizing profit, paying your taxes, and retaining cash to fund the future.
A Valuation Specialist has the skillset to walk into your business and determine how much the business is worth to the market. Again, your goal may not be to actually sell the business, but instead to offer ownership to others who can help you grow.
Fifth, you must be willing to grind for a while.
The more you build your business to sell, you will actually end up building a business where people thrive. Sure, you can throw a bunch of borrowed cash at a business and flip it, and that is fine if that is what you are into. Our business is our platform to serve people.
Mod Pizza’s mission is brilliant, “we make pizza so we can serve people.”
YES!
A business with great vision, mission, values, systems, processes, and professional support will require a heavy volume of fuel for a while. That fuel is your time, care, and expertise. Be cautious about buying into the “scale-quick” mantra. Again, it may work for some, but likely if you are following the Business On Purpose values...we actually like working.
When you build a sell-able business, over time you will find that you will likely want to hang on to it and share the wealth!
If you want to begin building your Business On Purpose go get my book Let Your Business Burn: Stop Putting Out Fires, Discover Purpose, And Build A Business That Matters. It is a step by step approach to building a business that you could sell...or hang on to.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose and the host of The Business On Purpose Podcast. He can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
“I see the new building, and the delivery trucks and all of the promotions she is running around town, she must be killing it with her business!”
You and I have both said it at some point.
We declare, “they are making money hand over fist!” when we see that promotion or branding somewhere in town.
It all looks so easy...just show up, money rolls in, people love working there and all is perfect.
That is rarely true.
Chaos is more consistently the norm for most business owners who are swimming in decisions, directions, confusion, and success swings just trying to hold it together while keeping a pristine, branded exterior.
Certainly there is a lot to continually think through day to day so here are three things that are important to monitor on a regular basis in your business, in fact we monitor them weekly in our business.
We call them the ABC’s and they make up the “Level Two Dashboard”. You may ask, “what is the Level One Dashboard?” It is actually just the “A” of the ABC’s I am about to share.
Here are the ABC’s of what you can be monitoring weekly or every-other-weekly in your business.
Darryl Lyons (author of Small Business Big Pressure) and I were having a conversation about financial elements in every business that must be tracked regularly and he surprised me with the simplicity of one of his points-- watch your cash accounts.
Darryl mentioned that he reviews his cash accounts once per week.
Eyeballs on your cash weekly will allow you to watch it barometrically, checking for any major spikes or dips. It’s not a line by line drill down on isolated spending on things like $4.22 smoothie purchases, but instead a high level look to see the overall flow of your cash.
You need to see how the cash actually flows. Minor shifts are expected, but when the numbers climb or fall at a serious grade, that is when you know it is time to dig. Was there a big bill due? Did a massive check come in? Is money leaking?
One business owner we met with years ago was completely (and I mean completely) in the dark as to the amount of cash in his business accounts. His rationale, “they will tell me when it gets to low.” Not a good strategy.
Once per week or every other week, take a look at your cash accounts (yep, plural, “accounts”...go read Mike Michalowicz’ Profit First and IMPLEMENT).
Most businesses have some form of payables (what you owe) and receivables (what you are owed).
Once per week or every other week it is good to know what these are. For some of you it is easy to pinpoint how much you owe through a statement or a spreadsheet, for others it is more difficult. Either way, you have no excuse to not know payables like monthly subscriptions, vendor and subcontractor payments, facilities payments, payroll, and others.
Knowing this general payout will allow you to know what will be coming out of those accounts that you have already taken a look at over the coming weeks.
So instead of your account having $10,458...it actually has that PLUS whatever will be coming in over the coming weeks MINUS what will be going out over the coming weeks.
A simple “Aging” or “Receivables” report within your bookkeeping software will allow you to see what should be coming in by way of payments to the business.
On a basic spreadsheet you can a section showing all of your account balances, and then a section showing what you owe and what receivables you have outstanding.
We actually run this calculation every week:
Total Cash in our Accounts
+Receivables
-Payables
-Tax Account
= What the real time cash position IF we collected ALL receivables and PAID all payables
It’s just a number that is nice to know.
Finally, it is crucial to monitor your customer engagement with
This is where you track important metrics around marketing, engagement, and communication.
An Attorney may monitor:
A Contractor may monitor:
Whatever metrics are important for your particular business is what you will track. For Business On Purpose we track things like Podcast Downloads, Book Sales, 1-on-1 phone calls, and Coaching Hours among other items.
Is it possible to know every nook and cranny of your business? It is a challenge because business is dynamic, constantly changing and flowing. Monitor the ABC’s of your business-- Accounts, Bookkeeping, and Customers and review them weekly and you will begin to punch chaos in the mouth.
THAT is when you know you are “killing it”.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose and the host of The Business On Purpose Podcast. He can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.
He bragged, “I don’t have to market my business, it markets itself.”
It was one of those statements where publically I responded with a polite and affirming chuckle but privately my mind was on the spectrum between confused and shamed.
“Is that true?” I thought.
If a product or a business is created and nobody knows about it then how are others positioned to benefit from its existence?
Is it possible to have a business without marketing? Governments market their services even though they are not directly “selling” something.
Seth Godin defines marketing as “the act of making change happen.” He continues, “Making is insufficient. You haven’t made an impact until you’ve changed someone.”
Sam Calagione, founder of Dogfish Head, provides sobering insight into the “normal-ness” of marketing. Not the Madison Avenue, mass-media-buying, algorithmic version of marketing that we all feel pressure to measure up to, but instead focusing on what you have, what you could make and simply sharing that with your world.
Calagione relieves the marketing pressure that business owners feel by warning us, “you’re ideal customer probably wouldn’t believe your advertising even if you could afford to get it in front of them...they are too smart.”
Mass-market marketing is targeted to the average of humanity-- what Godin calls “average stuff for average people.”
That is not what we are in the business of.
Business On Purpose is laboring to liberate business owners from the chaos of working IN their business. You are laboring equally as hard to deliver and live out your mission-- not “average stuff for average people.”
All businesses must “market” if marketing really is what Godin goes on to say that it is; “the generous act of helping someone solve their problem.”
THAT is a compelling definition of marketing. Replay the naive business owners statement, “I don’t have to market my business, it markets itself.”
For years I have shared with my Mastermind group my disdain for marketing. It made me feel selfish and gross, not to mention I have never really felt like I am very good at it.
I can easily design a process for marketing, that is second nature for me. But to do the actual ideation, capturing, creation, polishing, distribution, tracking, and follow up of marketing...that has been tough and exhausting, but doable. It’s the guessing, the thinking “will this work?” that is most taxing.
Calagione walks through some of the powerful, non-pressure filled few channels they have used making marketing feel more natural...more serve-like.
As a community of business owners we will be well served psychologically to see marketing as not a system to be gamed, but a channel to serve.
May you serve well and liberated from the chaos of working your business.
Be liberated from business chaos at freedom.mybusinessonpurpose.com.
Scott Beebe is the founder of Business On Purpose and the host of The Business On Purpose Podcast. He can be found at mybusinessonpurpose.com.