For people making payroll, by people making payroll
For people making payroll, by people making payroll
November 22nd, 2009
“Successful entrepreneurs are those who have a passion for their business and the money to survive their mistakes. I’ve occasionally seen success happen without sufficient funding, but I’ve never once seen it happen without passion.” – Roy H. Williams, Secret Formulas of the Wizard of Ads
When I first read this I thought “Right on Roy! Passion, yeah baby!”
But you know, it isn’t enough. The successful businesses I’ve started were the ones that I not only had a passion for, but fit my personality.
I used to believe that the business didn’t matter to me. I felt I would be happy running any business because it was the process I loved; making things work, the down and dirty details. I suspect I felt that way because I really do enjoy those things. But while you do have to like the business, maybe even love it, it has to “be you” – it has to fit your personality.
You may be a restaurateur, a baker, a consultant, or a writer. Or maybe part of all of them. But I doubt you are really great at more than one of them. You may be smart and hard working, and maybe passionate about all of them but is your personality such that you can successfully build a business out of more than one of them?
Ryan and I started this business at the end of some serious soul searching about what we really wanted to do with the rest of our lives. It became clear to me when I thought about the some recent experiences giving talks to potential small business owners. And talking with them afterward about their ideas and plans and giving them the benefit of my experience.
I’ve found that I love writing this blog. I love sitting across the table from someone and showing them how they can do this and be more effective or that and save some money. I walk out of most of those meetings nearly floating. It is incredible!
I think I feel that way because I’ve found the one thing I’m really good at; better at by far than anything else I do. Because it “fits”. People tell me “yeah, I can see how you’d be good at that.” They never said that about most of the businesses I’ve had in the past.
Popularity: 25% [?]
Tags: entrepreneurs, passion
Posted in Business Owner | Comments Off
November 15th, 2009
A friend of Keith’s is trying to find a job. Keith spent an hour advising him on how to fix his (really poor) resume to get more opportunities. Unfortunately, he declined to do any of it, saying “that’s just basic stuff”.
He’s right that it was mostly “basic stuff”, but he’s still not doing it. It’s “basic stuff” for a reason: while it seems really simple and obvious, he still needs to do it to be successful.
I was reminded of the Biblical story of Naaman the leper. When told what he needed to do to cure his awful disease, at first he refused because it sounded too simple for a great man like himself. (It’s a great story, btw).
Look, success is rarely easy. But sometimes we make it harder than it needs to be by overlooking the “obvious” things. Sometimes we’re trying to install a complicated triangle offense in a pickup basketball game with 2nd-graders. They don’t know how to dribble the ball, much less run the triple post.
You have to start with the basics, and keep working on just those things until you’ve got them down. Then worry about the complicated stuff. Details, details, details.
The great thing is that most people seem to make this same mistake. They try to fly before they can crawl. So if you get the fundamentals down, you’ll easily beat out other people — some of whom may even be more qualified than you — who are running around trying to launch some grand, complicated plan without “wasting time” on that piddly basic stuff. Without a foundation, they have very little chance of succeeding, no matter how talented they are.
Don’t get ahead of yourself. Don’t worry about what the other guy claims he’s going to do. Don’t worry about how good the competition could be if they just did the “basic stuff”.
You just make sure you’re doing all the basics right, and worry about the rest when there are no more “basic” things to master.
Popularity: 27% [?]
Posted in Business Owner, Entrepreneur, Productivity | Comments Off
July 2nd, 2009
Andrew Warner (@andrewwarner) has a great piece called How I Spent a Million Bucks and Ended Up With These Two Chairs. It’s not very long, and there’s a handy video at the top where he’ll just tell you what happened so you can be doing something else and just listen if you want.
But pay attention, because Andrew’s telling you something profound but simple: spending money is your enemy. Plain and simple, there it is. You spend too much, you die. And what qualifies as “too much” can be shockingly low.
Even with a small business, it can be a little overwhelming to us as owners how much money is floating around the office. It’s easy to be seduced by your total sales numbers into thinking that your company is “bigger”, and therefore can afford to be more lavish with spending.
Don’t fall for it; that’s the siren song of failure, trying to lure you onto the rocks and drown you in the sea of bankruptcy.
Perhaps this will make it easier: Your business never buys anything.
Seriously, it’s too cheap to buy anything, ever. Instead, every single dollar that you spend on anything comes directly out of your pocket.
Think about it. If you spend $1,500 on a new laptop, where does the money come from? It comes from the net profit you’d made from everything else you do. I mean, today it might come from a credit card, but that credit has to be paid off someday, and it’s going to either be paid out of profits or out of your pocket after you shut down the business. Either way: your pocket.
But if you spend $500 on a used laptop, who keeps the $1,000? You do.
So remember that next time you want to go on a shopping spree for new office furniture. You’re the one paying the bill, not your business.
Popularity: 40% [?]
Posted in Business Owner, Finances | Comments Off
