Increased sales, reduced costs, better quality, well-functioning business systems, better people, new computers, better customers, better suppliers, a new website, better marketing, and on and on and on – depending on who you are listening to (and what they are selling) all your problems will be solved with just one “Magic Bullet” solution. All lies – perhaps well-intentioned and sincere – but all lies. The truth: THERE IS NO MAGIC BULLET!
Somehow inside we already knew that but we still keep hoping and searching for it (and wasting lots of time, energy, and money doing so) until we are in danger of losing the most essential of all ingredients – hope for the future. When that is lost we are on the road to losing everything else. After all, Dante said the instruction to abandon all hope was written on the gates of hell (how’s that for a cheery thought!).
Of course, the reason there is no magic bullet is because businesses (even small businesses) are systems and a change in one part of a system effects everything else in the system. One of the beauties of a small business is these effects are easier and quicker to see. The downside of this agility is that it is quicker and easier to sink a small business so a mistake in balancing the systems can quickly drive a small business out of business.
This is where expert help is so important. If you are an expert in the “Business of the Business” or you already have one or more such experts on staff then you are ahead of the game but suppose you are not so lucky. What do you do then?
The answer is so simple that most people never do it. That is to find people with that expertise and hire them to help you. Seems simple enough but finding the right people is not always as easy as it sounds and then there is the issue of ego that keeps some business owners from admitting they don’t know everything. Another problem is fear – fear of high costs, fear of disclosure, fear of feeling foolish when asked about budgets and projections and plans that may not exist, etc. The real issue is not looking at things objectively enough. I always say, “Pay me now or pay me later with interest” and that’s the problem. The cost of delay is almost always more than the cost of acting now and, if that is not the case, an ethical advisor will tell you to wait and how long to wait. Just saying …..
Cevin's Corner 