If you’ve been in business any length of time, no doubt you’ve had some tough days. Here are just a few scenarios that just come to mind. One of your employees didn’t show up for a client, and you find out when the client calls you furious. Your assistant booked your travel to the wrong city. A customer promised the check was in the mail, and you were counting on the cash flow to make payroll that week. You had a major proposal due, and your team didn’t get it done in time causing you to scramble at the last minute and pull an all-nighter to get it completed. You had to skip your last paycheck to pay a vendor bill. Have I struck any pain yet?
When you take on the title of business owner, you immediately have at least 10 jobs, and let’s face – it this work can be exhausting. And after a few years of this, you might have started thinking, “Why did I start this business?” But don’t go there yet. Help is on the way. You deserve to enjoy running your business. In this, the first of a three-part series, I’ll share how to get back in control of your business. It’s a sneak peak of my new book, Fix Your Business; 90-day Plan to Get Back Your Life and Reduce Chaos in Your Business. In it, you’ll learn my 12 Ps of Running a Successful Business along with how to develop your 90-day plan to go from struggling to thriving in your business. You don’t live to work. You work to live your dream life. Here’s Part I of How to Fix Your Business.
#1 Preparation: Get Ready to Reinvent. This is all about developing a plan and setting the stage for what you want to have happen differently in your business. It’s about your big picture goal setting and identifying the top issues that you will tackle in your 90-day turn around plan. It will provide a framework to create a strategy to make real change in your business. If you are tired of the constant fires in your business, this is where you need to start.
#2 Purpose: Develop Your Leadership Mindset. 50% of all business problems are not so well hidden personal problems. You must grow yourself to grow your business. Clarifying your purpose is about developing your new vision for your future; how you are going to channel the energy, passion and courage to fix your business. You must take stock of your attitude and approach and look for ways to improve. It’s time to revisit your “Why” story. It’s important to remember why you started your business. When your business gets rough, and starts beating you down. Sometimes, you can feel a bit lost. But that is when you need to step away and think things through carefully. Consider questions such as, Why does it make sense to stay in business? Why does the world need your business? What kind of life do you want your business to provide for you? What are you willing to do as a leader to make your dreams happen? The change you seek starts with you.
#3 People: Getting the Right Team and Advisors. If you have people there is a potential for problems, but you must FIX Your People issues. There are three kinds of people problems in a small business. First, when you don’t have any staff, and you need a worker or two to grow, so you can stop overworking and spending your time on tasks that you should outsource or automate. Second, when you have the wrong employees or people in the positions where they are not executing well, thus not utilizing their full potential. Or you are not brave enough to cut a problem child lose. Third, when your people lack proper training. You can’t get upset with your team if they don’t deliver, if you didn’t take the time to show them how it’s done. If you have no standards, everyone is just going to wing it. You must train your people how to get things done your way.
#4 Profit: Minding Your Money. Profit is how we keep score in business. You need to make sure that your business is making a profit with every sale. It’s also critical to use up-to-date financial statements to make business decisions. Don’t let your fear of math be the reason why you don’t know what is going on in your business. Have enough confidence to charge enough so that you can pay yourself regularly and cover all of the expenses of the business. And do everything you can to cut unnecessary expenses.
If you haven’t already preordered your copy of Fix Your Business, you’ll get a special gift if you do it before the launch date. The book will officially be released March 6, 2018. Next week, we’ll tackle the next 4 of SmallBizLady’s 12 Ps of Running a Successful Business. Stay tuned…
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