What needs fixing?

Newsweek magazine on November 17, 2003 featured an excerpt from a new book former Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin. One of Mr. Rubin's quotes that caught my attention was "Nobody likes government 'spending.' Yet those programs command wide public support."

Very true. You don't have to go any further than a group of seniors to hear complaints about taxes (especially a while back when social security became partially taxable), giveaways to the undeserving or living on a fixed income. However, mess with their Medicare? Don't even think of it.

The funny thing is, since life expectancies have increased so dramatically in the last 50+ years since Social Security started, very few recipients of retirement benefits or Medicare contributed anywhere near what they've received. Remember, in the 1930's and 40's, the average life expectancy for a 65-year old male was something like 68. (I am not trying to offend anyone, my point is that things change and that all programs have big support groups that make it hard to alter any program.)

Do you have any of these programs in your company?

We all have scared cows. Within companies there are programs like I described above, sacrosanct and precious to a choice few. It may be the way we deal with processes, employees or even ourselves. The new year is always a time for reflection. I've talked to numerous people this month who have told me how they are planning for next year. Niches to target, marketing strategies to implement, systems to put in place and more.

Let the new year also be the time to deal with some of the issues you know need to be dealt with, but you just haven't got around to it. Even if handle only one (maybe you have only one), you'll have made progress. It could be something you're doing or not doing or it could be in one of the three main areas of your business. 

Operations, marketing or financial - take your pick

The three big areas in any company are operations, marketing and financial. To many business owners, marketing heads the list of things they should do better, more of or more consistently. It might be a good place to start. Pick an area of business you'd like to expand, put your resources together, if you need it, get some outside expertise and go for it.

I have an area of business I would like to see expand next year. I have a plan including goals, a marketing attack, someone to help me implement it and on January 5 we kick it into gear. There are weekly activities, some of which I don't need to pay attention to other than get a report that they were done.

Perhaps marketing is not where you need to concentrate. Based on talking to hundreds of business owners every year, I would say a good next choice is something on the financial side. There are just too many businesses where the owner doesn't have a handle on the financial side, have accurate financial statements or realize how important the numbers are to understanding how to grow (and grow faster and safer). I'm willing to bet that it would only take a few minutes to find something in this area to deal with in almost any business.

Finally, what is there on the operations side that bothers you? It could be production related, but so many owners are industry people who really concentrate on this area that it's more likely something to do with people or non-production systems. Consider dealing with annoying employee issues that everyone knows are there but are allowed to linger (perhaps fester is a better word). Also, perhaps it's as simple as sharing your vision for the company with the employees. Letting them know where you'd like it to go and how they can help. Recently a manager told me what a breath of fresh air the new owner was. His vision for growth and new markets excited her and the other key employees and got them motivated and more productive.

The bottom line is, you can have big plans, but if you don't take care of the little things (and especially the little things that are bothersome) you won't realize your goals and objectives.

© Copyright John Martinka 2003. All rights reserved.