When Vendor Services Fall Short
I have to admit: I had a hard time deciding what to title this article. What isn’t hard to do is actually write the article, at least knowing where to start comes easy. Like many businesses, all too often—despite doing the homework of checking out vendors and getting...
When No One Answers
Everyone has experienced it. Someone calls you prospecting for business. You get a message on your voicemail, you get a card or letter in the mail, and sometimes it is something you are interested in getting more information about. So you return the card, send an...
What Are Your Employees Saying About Your Business?
The only way you can avoid employees talking about the good, the bad, and the ugly in your business is to not have employees. Whether you like it or not, employees will talk about what happens at work from the lack of sales, to the lack of management, to the affairs...
What Are Friends For – Not Free Services and Products?
As our organizations get started and grow, our circle of friends grows. As business relationships evolve to include personal friendships, the line between what is business and what is personal can blur. This seems to be particularly true for professional service firms...
Walls and Bridges
More walls than bridges are built in the world. It seems that it is much easier to build walls. Buildings, after all, are made of walls, so we are used to making structures that consist of walls. Walls are used to contain things; walls are used as boundaries, to show...
Visionary Capability: Get Practical Pursuing the Dream
The Chaos of Unbounded Vision Disregarding Boundaries Over the years, there have been several instances in which people have been doing business with a cheerful and/or blatant disregard for boundaries. These individuals cheerfully and often recklessly bound forward...
Validating Your Business Concept
To know whether or not you have a viable business concept, you have to comprehensively define (on paper) your thoughts, ideas, and vision. You also need to gather information related to those ideas: market size, competitors, pricing, and so on. With that information...
Vision, Strategy, Structure, and Results
The successful organization – one that is both productive currently and viable long term – has integrated the vision, strategy, and structure of the organization to enable financial success. The ability of an organization to achieve every iota of success it is capable of delivering depends first upon the organization’s clarity of vision, second on its to select the appropriate strategy (or strategies) to accomplish the vision, and ultimately on the structure the organization puts in place to deliver the “goods” to the customer.
Tough Lessons: Failed Business Relationships
One of the hardest lessons a business owner can experience is the failure of a business relationship - whether with a vendor, a business partner, or a client. Regardless of how carefully you screen any of these people or how formal your agreements with them, when the...
Tools Required – Capability Imperative
Every task requires the right tools. Building a successful business is a task like no other. It requires a comprehensive set of tools which fit the task. Using one tool when another is required often leads to unanticipated consequences. Having the right tool isn't...