Small Business Growth: It Can Kill Your Business

That's right! Growth can kill your business. As a self-employed business owner, entrepreneur or solo professional most of you are compelled to seek small growth business.
Small Business Growth: Does The Growth Fit?
In my personal business coaching practice one of the roles I take on for many businesses is that of a marketing business coach. As a marketing business coach I look at how we can promote the business and where to promote it.

If small business growth is not consistent with your core expertise you can be setting yourself up to fail. For example, there was a business that was exceptional at house cleaning. Running a business had been very successful for the owner. One of his customers happened to be an executive with a large grocery store chain.
As the relationship developed the executive wanted the home cleaning business to bid on cleaning and buffing the floors of large grocery stores. Talk about small business growth. To the owner this was the opportunity of a lifetime.

The owner went ahead and successfully bid on the floors for the grocery store chain. Unfortunately, he didn't have the cleaning expertise and organization to do a good job. The grocery store floors took him away from his core business. Within a year he was out of business.
When you are looking at business growth the first question you must ask is does is fit with what I am already doing? The grass and the money may look greener on the other side. But, getting to the other side may force you into an abyss that you will never crawl out of.

Small Business Growth: Is It Profitable?
As a marketing business coach we must look for a level of profit that will sustain the current small growth business as well as any future growth.
Back in the 1980's there was a company poised for small business success that came up with a retractable battery cable box. If you were starting your own business this looked like a sure fire idea for business success. For those of us who have used battery cables we know how it seems virtually impossible to put them back in a nice, neat format.
This was an ideal product for small business growth. If small business growth can fulfill a need that no one else is, then the growth can be exponential. In starting your own business there is nothing better than a product that excites a lot of people and is something they want.

This company had it all except their marketing business plan was flawed. It cost them $14.00 to make and deliver the product. They knew to recoup their costs and to have the correct profit margin that they would need to need to have a wholesale price to retailers of $24.00.
They had only one marketing strategy. They wanted to be in Walmart. They figured that if they had distribution from Walmart that they could become wealthy quickly. They went to Walmart and Walmart loved their product.
There was only one problem. All Walmart was willing to pay them was $16.00. If you have ever worked with large chains, unless you have built a demand before you go in, they will tell you what they are going to pay.
This company accepted Walmart's terms and figured that somehow they could make it work. Running a small business and seeking small business growth on a hope and prayer doesn't work.
The company got its original shipment to Walmart. It sold well. The problem was that they weren't making enough profit to sustain their business. Within six months they were out of business.

Small Business Growth: Grow With Care
As a small business coach my most successful clients have grown with care. They have a marketing business plan that makes sense. They have grown in alignment with their core business.
They have a profit structure that will enable them to grow and survive. And, they refuse, no matter how enticing the prospect of small growth business, to be seduced into compromising their profit principles.
Small business growth is desirable. But small business growth is like planting and tending a garden. You must plant and grow with care. Always know your marketing business plan and your profit goals and your small business growth will take you where you want to go.

More detailed information can be found at http://www.businesskeystosuccess.com. Created by Steve Scott. The definitive guide to a better business and a better you for entrepreneurs, solo professionals and self-employed individuals striving to reach the top and who are serious about their success.

Take A Vacation To Grow You And Your Business

Vacation sets the table for greater personal and business success. It allows the self-employed business owner, entrepreneur, solo professional to step outside themselves.
When you step outside yourself you become an observer of your business and life. Only when you become an observer, instead of a daily participant, can you begin to see clearly what you do, how you do it and your results.

Vacation-Become An Observer
Vacation makes you an observer because it forces you to step outside your normal routine. If you are seeking greater personal or small business growth then take the vacation break.
Just as a muscle cannot develop when it is always worked, neither can you have the personal development and small business success that you seek unless you get away and become an observer.
Being a business performance coach is similar in many ways to being an athletic coach. You engage in routines that will build performance. You tweak them. And at some point you rest. Then at some point you take an extended break. Look at your top athletes and all of them take an extended break. It is called the off season.
During the off season they stay in shape but they do something more important. They study films and look for ways to improve their techniques and performance. They become observers.

Vacation Is The Rest That Strengthens You
A muscle needs a break and rest in order to grow and develop. And the small business owner, whether you are running a small business or starting your own business needs to schedule, needs to take a break and rest in order for him and his business to grow.
Even in nature, virtually nothing grows all the time. There are times where plants and animals take a break from growth. Only when you take a break can you grow. Unlike the plants and animals which have no choice, we as human beings have been given the dignity of choice.
We can choose an extended rest or not. Choose a vacation and you will increase the odds of your personal growth and small business growth.

Vacation-A Change In Attitude
As a small business coach one of the most important benefits from a vacation can be a change in attitude. This becomes apparent when the self-employed business owner returns.
Vacation allows you to heal up. You become very sensitive to pain. The nice calmness that vacation brings over you can turn to turbulence very quickly.
And with this increased sensitivity it is easier to see where changes need to be made. When we are in the middle it is harder for us to see and act. I have observed that some of the greatest progress in small business occurs when the owner returns from vacation.
Where there was tolerance of things that weren't quite right or processes that were irritating, vacation and the clear perspective it brings creates the impetus for positive action.
After all, you are feeling good and calm after vacation and you want to retain that feeling as long as you can. You can more clearly see what is getting in your way and creating turbulence and discord. Your attitude becomes one of eliminating the discord.

This is called progress. Taking a vacation is about progress. Take a vacation and become an observer. Take a vacation and have the rest to build strength. And, take a vacation have the attitude on your return to make changes to improve your business and life.

More detailed information can be found at http://www.businesskeystosuccess.com. Created by Steve Scott. The definitive guide to a better business and a better you for entrepreneurs, solo professionals and self-employed individuals striving to reach the top and who are serious about their success.

Humor-Morality, Choice And Sarcasm

In the last post we looked at some of the positive aspects of humor. Most importantly as you seek business growth and greater personal development it can make you and your business lighter to lift.
But, there is humor that many employ that can do just the opposite. This type of humor can take you down and distance you from others.



Humor And Morality
Unless you absolutely know your audience and the depth of their beliefs it is best to stay away from moral issues. This is nothing new.
But there is a larger point. Whether I am engaged in business growth coaching, business performance coaching or as a personal growth coach one of the keys to success is to always know who you are talking to. This applies to your business as well as your personal life.

Humor Is Your Choice
I have observed many times how the humor of morality, given with good intentions, can explode like a hand grenade and damage not only the person receiving the humor but the person who is giving it.
Amazingly, a bad joke or poor humor can have a shelf life that will last a life time. You can offend people or disappoint them and they may still do business with you or hang around. Tell a joke or have a sense of humor that offends their morality and very often that becomes the tipping point to drive them away.
When you are running a small business or starting up your own business I have seen the wrong humor have devastating consequences. Small business success is about winning friends and influencing people.
Whether you are a self-employed business owner, entrepreneur, solo professional or an individual working in a company remember that the humor you show is your choice. Choose wisely.

Humor And Sarcasm
There are times when sarcasm can be humorous. In my personal business coaching practice I encourage my clients to stay away from sarcasm. How come?
All of us have anger. Anger is not the problem. How we manage it can be. When you use sarcasm it is reflecting your anger about something. And very often, sarcasm isn't anger about something but anger at someone.
Your anger is valid. But expressing it to others in the form of sarcasm actually will drive people away from you. You may say that you are only expressing disappointment. That's fine. Remember that disappointment is a mild form of anger.
If you are seeking small business growth and personal success make your use of sarcasm extremely limited. Be certain that when it is used that you are with someone who is totally supportive of you. Even then, use it sparingly.
I see people who are sarcastic in many of their remarks and all they are doing is reflecting their own unhappiness for everyone to see and to feel. Anger and unhappiness in business may be short term attractors but in the long run they will drive people and business away from you.
As a business owner or individual sarcasm can put you in isolation. You may have a good business but you will never be the leader you can be or have a well functioning team, which leads to peace, satisfaction and happiness if you are using sarcasm as a primary method of communicating your feelings.
You can't trust someone who is angry. And without trust you will create team dysfunction.

Humor-Make It Good Humor
Humor is great. Good humor makes you laugh for five seconds and think for ten minutes. Self-deprecating humor about you and your actions can be endearing. But, humor that takes a bite out of someone else, such as sarcasm, may taste good at the moment but over time it will become increasingly difficult to digest.

Let me take you under the hood to discover how the engine of success in business and life works and more importantly, how you can make it perform better for you. Please visit- http://www.businesskeystosuccess.com/

Vacation: Is It One Of Your Disciplines?

When I am with clients as a business performance coach one of the things I want them to do is take a vacation. Although most people would think it is a simple decision to take a vacation, it is not that easy for the self-employed business owner, entrepreneur or solo professional. And for my clients with larger companies, at times, because of corporate demands taking a vacation can be a challenge.

Vacation Is A Discipline
A discipline is the bridge between a thought and an action. You think about many things. Many self-employed business owners think about vacation but never take one. What is holding them back?

Yes, there can be many things and I understand that. But, in many instances taking a vacation is about overcoming a challenge in their thinking.
The first challenge is; do they have the discipline to break their routine? They can have the thought about a vacation. The question is: Are they going to create the discipline to make it a reality?
Business performance coaching is about taking care of the most important asset, you. That takes discipline. If you understand the value of vacation you will put the things in place, the disciplines, to make it happen.

Vacation Is About Courage
Taking a vacation takes courage. It is challenging you to step away from your normal routine. Running a small business is a huge challenge. It takes courage to trust others to handle your business while you are gone. Have the courage to take care of yourself. Take a vacation.
This last one, taking care of yourself, can be the most frightening. As a small business coach, I find that one of the biggest challenges for the business owner is that he or she, in running a small business has forgotten how to play. With the right approach, small business success can be about playing your way to success.
If you have lost your vision of what is or can be fun, you will shy away from vacation. I cannot emphasize how important it is to know how to have fun. Knowing how to have fun or rediscovering it on vacation will have a positive influence in your business and your life.
Take a vacation. Have the courage to face yourself and discover what is fun and what will renew you. To start create a vision of what you would like your vacation to look like. This is the courageous first step.

Vacation Is About Self-Care
When you are starting up your own business all your time and energy are focused on the business. As part of personal development coaching I encourage the owner to schedule a vacation as he or she is starting the business.
Initially there is a great deal of resistance. But, the self-employed owner is usually the most important asset in the business. True self-care which brings happiness to the owner, his employees and clients cannot be achieved without a healthy perspective.

It is difficult to have a happy and healthy perspective when you feel that you are in bondage to the very thing you have created that is supposed to give you greater freedom and abundance.
Practice self-care and take a vacation. Clarity can only be achieved when we walk away from our daily routines and being in the middle of the action. Vacation brings clarity because you have time to reflect and evaluate, instead of react, to what is going on in your business and life.
And, when you come back from vacation your priorities will be in place. Vacation is good! Take you and your business to the next level by making taking a vacation one of your disciplines.

Let me take you under the hood to discover how the engine of keys to success in business and life works and more importantly, how you can make it perform better for you. Please visit- http://www.businesskeystosuccess.com/

Keys To Success: Working On Your Business

Michael Gerber in The E Myth Revisited shows the path to small business success is, in the long run, working on your business, not working in your business. For most of us self-employed business owners, entrepreneurs and solo professionals we start out by working in our business.

Working in your business is about being the technician. Or, it can be about being the manager. You create or produce the product or service from start to finish. You are also the manager of all the work. That's the way most of us start. We are both the manager and the technician. Yet, to have true success you must move from primarily working in your business to a mode where you are working on your business.

Working On Your Business Working on your business as opposed to working in your business occurs when you are able to step back and do the following:

1. Recapture and refine your entrepreneurial vision
2. Create plans, such as a small business marketing plan for future growth
3. Define your vision of the future and set goals where you will measure yourself and your progress.

Working on your business is about you being the leader. It is not about you always being led by circumstances and things. Working in your business is about reacting to whatever comes up. Working on your business is planning for what is to come and how you want to respond to it.

Working On Your Business-Create Processes One of the first steps to having more freedom and growth is to create the processes for future growth. It is impossible to work on your business if you have to be involved in every facet.

Start the process of working on your business by writing down the processes. I know this sounds tedious. But, if you want freedom someday to work on your business you must do this.

Your processes are your foundation. Also, your business processes are the template that others can follow as you grow. And that takes us to the next step.

Working On Your Business-The First Employee With your processes in place you are positioned to hire your first employee. This can be a tough hurdle emotionally and mentally for many small business owners. Having a written process, even for the simplest things, is the first step to creating a job description. A process also provides the most critical aspect to hiring keys to success, accountability.

With accountability you have control. You have control to where you have check points in the process and can step away from the process and be working on your business.

As a personal business coach I see the first employee as a right of passage to working on your business. I also see it fail, more often than not. Why? The small business owner feels overwhelmed and the response is to hire someone to relieve the load.

Unfortunately, there are no written processes and the job description is general. In other words, there are too many gaps. Too much is left up to the creativity, or lack thereof, of the person you hire. And the results, more often than not are not good.

Work On Your Business-Be Specific Whether you are running a small business or starting your own business the simple fact is that there are numerable times where you will feel overwhelmed. This is normal. It comes from working exclusively in your business.

In business performance coaching to put clients in a position to work on their business I want them to be very specific. Generalities don't work. They leave too much room for error.

Imagine if someone hired you to do the pole vault. They hire you because you have athletic ability. They give you a pole. You have a bar in front of you. They have given you the tools and now they expect you to jump over the bar.

In personal development coaching I have seen most people fail in this situation because of lack of specific techniques to achieve what is desired.

This is the way most small businesses hire. They want an employee. But when it comes to specifically how the employee is going to achieve the desired result the directions are missing. As a result, in small business hiring there is huge turnover and a loss of productivity for the business.

Start working on your business today. Refine the vision that first captured your imagination. Create the processes to fulfill your vision. Be specific in what you want and do. When you start working on your business you move from being a wandering generality to a meaningful specific and to greater growth and success.

Keys To Success: Vacation

When you are looking at the keys to success and small business success one of the most overlooked is the vacation. And, for the self-employed business owner, entrepreneur, solo professional or an individual who is extremely focused, the act of taking a vacation can be a challenge in itself. Let's take a look at the word "vacation". It comes from the word "vacate" which means in an everyday sense, to leave an area. Legally, vacate means to annul or void a legal decision.

Regardless when you go on vacation you are leaving or vacating your comfort zone. Vacation is a decision to chuck your familiar routine and to get recharged by focusing your mind and energy on a new routine for the time you are away.

Vacation Is About Success

In business growth coaching one of the keys is to expand your business. Running a small business or starting up your own business demands a lot of your focus and energy. But, at some point you must step away to evaluate everything. If you stay in the middle for a long period of time you become desensitized to your business, your processes and most importantly yourself.

I ask my clients to take a look around at people they consider to be successful. I would say that most of the time the people that they mention have one thing in common. They all take regular vacations.

One of the first keys to success is to make vacation a part of your business routine.

Vacation Is About Letting Go

Most self-employed business owners, who don't take vacation once they are established, may run successful businesses but they are not full of enthusiasm and progress. A large part of my personal business coaching practice has to do with being a personal growth coach.

The only way a business can grow is for the owner to let go of an old idea. Personal growth coaching, which is a part of business coaching is about vacating old ideas and ways of doing things. After all, the business will get no bigger or better than the owner's personal growth in his thoughts and actions.

Only when the old idea is gone, may a new idea enter and become part of the process. When the owner goes on vacation he is letting go of his routine and more importantly, trusting his employees to run his business.

This creates excitement for his employees. How come? There is nothing better for an employee to have an elevated level of trust. Trust is the foundation of teamwork. If you want to have a better team, go on vacation. Watch your employees rise to the occasion. Usually the greatest fear is that somehow the business can't survive without you. If it can't then you need to rethink what you are doing and how you are doing it. Why? You have created a job, not a business.

Vacation Improves The Process

As a personal business coach a major focus is on building a process in the small business. This is a process that is written down to where it makes it easier to train people and hold them accountable. When you have a process you can start working more on your business and less in your business. And, you are now in a position to take a vacation. Make it your goal to take a vacation. When you do, an amazing thing happens. You will accelerate the improvement in your processes and your business. For the owner, vacation creates a sense of urgency to get everything in order. Set a definite date for your vacation and punching your ticket to greater freedom and abundance.

Here's the last way vacation improves the process. As a business success guide when you take a vacation you are modeling behavior for your employees and customers that says, " I am important. I am going to take care of myself."

For your employees they will believe in you and your leadership even more. They will see that you believe there is a balance to life. And, when you take a vacation you should be sending a message to them that they too, will have a vacation, a break from the routine and to have a reward for their work.