“We don’t have time to do it that way.” How many times have you heard that said or said it yourself? How about the alternative “If you don’t have time to do it right, when are you going to find the time to redo it right?”

What is it going to cost you if you have to do things twice? What is it going to cost you in the eyes of your audience, your customer, your image if something is delivered incorrectly or with poor quality? What if the product is defective and does damage? What opportunities do you miss while you are redoing things?

Typo and Consequences

Say you are putting together an event. You are looking for sponsors, so you put together a sponsor information package with pricing, deadlines, and features, telling what each package contains for the price. You distribute the package electronically to, let’s say, 100 potential sponsors without having anyone in your organization proofread the package.

You get an overwhelming response within 24 hours to the package. The forms are faxed back to you signed with the Platinum and Gold level packages selected. You are so excited. You go into your spreadsheet and start recording the sponsors and calculating the revenues you generated and your commissions! The things you are going to buy! Oh happy day!

A week goes buy…You get a call from accounting. The checks are coming in. They ask if you extended some kind of deposit deal with the sponsors. You are puzzled. No. You don’t know anything about a deposit. Why? Every check received so far is for 10% of the total amount of the sponsored package, so accounting thought there must be special terms. Uh oh… Check the flyer…you dropped zero! Instead of $5,000.00 it said $500.00 instead of $2,500.00 it says $250.00. Typo? or an offer made and accepted?

Ring the Bell and Make Your Case

Need a million dollars to fund your business and take your technology or product to market? You start knocking on doors and talking to people about what you need to do. You commit to getting together the business plan and related items such as financial information needed to tell your story to potential investors. You make a commitment to get those documents to the people who can facilitate the introductions by a certain date…and you don’t. Next! Opportunities are knocking on the doors of investors every moment of every day. You knocked, they answered, and you weren’t there. If you’re a kid and it’s Halloween you can ring the doorbell and run away laughing. When it’s business and you ring the bell, you better be there ready, willing, and able to present your story and make your case!

Time Runs One Way – Out Before You Know It

Time is a limited resource. You can acquire more production hours by hiring more people. You cannot get more than 24 hours in a day, 365 days in year (okay yeah! There is leap year, so I’ll give you one extra day every four years!). A deadline, a timeline, a commitment is just that. Taking the time and making the time to do things well and “right” is an investment that more often that not pays off. Perfection? May be. May be not. Quality? Every time.

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Copyright ©2007 Lea A. Strickland,  F.O.C.U.S. Resource, Inc.

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