We are now are at the heart of designing your business to serve your life.
You’ve been seized with an entrepreneurial impulse and captivated by the vision of owning your own business.
If you’re just starting a new business, or own and run one and know it should be better, I want to first say to you:
Congratulations! It’s my opinion that you now have more in common with GE’s Jack Welch that you have with any of The Donald’s apprentices. The only difference between you and Jack is just a matter of zeros in the columns.
You are now the head and heart of your business. It’s on you.
You’ve done all the obvious steps: formed the idea of the business, got the required financing together, decided on the legal structure, established where you are going to conduct business, set up the office, created a logo, built a web site and got it on line, initiated an accounting system, perhaps set up an e-mail marketing campaign, maybe ordered promotional items, started advertising, listened to several insurance proposals, maybe some financial planners have called, set up suppliers, listened to new-business sales pitches, joined the Chamber of Commerce, maybe hired some employees, and looked to the future with confidence and maybe a little anxiety.
It’s an exciting ride, but STOP A MINUTE.
Ask yourself “Am I on top of this process, or am I riding the tiger?”
Is your business structured to serve your life or is your life now and for the foreseeable future in servitude to the business?
As the business grows will you be working longer and harder to meet its demands?
Are things now set up in such a way that you are, or will be, working too hard in your business to work on your business, or even enjoy the success of your business?
Have you established an overall working structure that will guide the development of the business to the point where you prosper, where you live as you want, where your life is spent accomplishing your personal goals more than the business’s goals, where your family life is enriched by your business operation, where your business is an accomplishment and not a burden?
There is a system that will put your business in order and on a path to prosperity.
It’s the one system I recommend.
It’s ridiculously inexpensive. It is, though, demanding of you.
It is proven by 30 years of guiding small businesses to undreamed of heights of success. It was developed for the small business owner, has worked for the small business owner, and is still focused on the small business owner.
It incorporates all the individual functions of a business and integrates them into a coherent and coordinating symphony of success.
It may take some mental adjustment to grasp its truth because we are not going to talk about what you do, sell, or produce.
We want to get to the point where you see that your business operation is your product.
Let me give you a quick example of this.
My son and I for several years owned a commercial painting company in the Twin Cities, Absolute Painters.
Technically we were very good. We mastered the art and science of painting.
Managerially we ran a good crew and developed a book of repeat customers.
Entrepreneurially we planned for the next level of commercial painting operation as defined by Benjamin Moore painting company. My son became allergic to paint, of all things, and it wouldn’t be any fun without him so we sold the business.
At the time I wasn’t as aware as I am now that we weren’t about painting.
We were about a process, about doing things consistently, about procedures, about consistently getting new customers, about delivering a predictable service, about cash flow management, not about things we do but about how we do things.
My son and I were fortunate in having inexpensive expert guidance through the process of getting the business up and going.
This expert guidance is available to you for a ridiculously low cost.
The process of starting, organizing, and designing your business may proceed with fits and starts but it should be in essence an integrated whole.
- You need a clear concept of your business as you see it develop over the years
- before you can develop an effective logo and brand announcing who you are.
- Your accounting system will be integrated with your office organization.
- Your daily planning will interact with every operational function as you go through the day.
- Marketing will announce product and service.
- The quality of the service and product will validate the marketing .
- Relationships, within and without the organization, will be developed as the business develops and grows.
- You are the force around which this all swirls.
- Your life will be out of balance for a while.
With this proven system, however, you can design your small business for guaranteed success and to have your business serve your life.
You want to establish an overall working structure that will guide the development of the business to the point where you prosper, where you live as you want, where your life is spent accomplishing your personal goals more than the business’s goals, where your family life is enriched by your business operation, where your business is an accomplishment and not a burden?
You want ultimately a prosperous and balanced life.
There is one system I recommend.
It incorporates all the individual functions of a business and integrates them into a coherent and coordinating symphony of success.
My recommendation is The E-Myth System:
www.e-myth.com/
Go to this site and get the book The E Myth Revisited.
Get the book and implement the system. It’s all there. You will prosper.
The Dust Covered Business Plan
You will find that in implementing the steps in the book you will be developing a “business plan that always works.” It’s a catchy slogan and a dynamite model.
If you’ve been around long enough you can guess that most business plan models are developed by academic types who probably never started a business, or by some bank affiliated financial annalist. They serve the academic’s need for order and structure and the annalist’s need for quick financial summation.
The goal of most business plans is to get money, from investors or from the bank.
Once it’s served that purpose, or not, it goes on the shelf to collect dust until next it’s needed.
The E-Myth Business Plan
I can give you no better reason to adopt the E-Myth model than it will guide you in the development of a “business plan that always works.”
What this means is that when following the E-Myth system your business plan will naturally develop from implementing the system and it will integrate all the functions of the business as they relate to one another.
Marketing leads to lead generation, which leads sales, which leads to service or product fulfillment, which leads to client satisfaction and retention, with all functions greased by proper financial integration in all operations, and all of which are monitored and measured by management.
The E-Myth business plan presents a system for integrating all the business functions and measuring their performance on a daily basis.
The E-Myth business plan is always working, and it always works.
There are many good systems.
You only need one – The E-Myth System
If you’d like to read a brief summary of the E-Myth System from the E-Myth people please go to:
http://webconnect.myob.co.nz/f/p1473/133607/200709BW_-_Emyth_Point_of_View.pdf
One last note. The system requires your time and thought to implement. Perhaps the more time and thought it requires is an indication of how much more you really need to give it.
Please keep me informed of your success in my blog or contact page. I’d really like to hear your story.
To your success,
Marty