bizRichard

 A recent survey of more than 1,000 senior executives, done by Bank of Scotland Business Banking, has found that the amount of time UK business owners spend at work has increased further during the past 12 months,

On average, those who responded were spending 50 hours a week at work - up by almost three hours (6.3%) a week compared to a year earlier. And, for some, the situation is expected to get worse as 26% of those asked said they expected to be working even longer hours as a result of the current economic downturn.

Small businesses in Scotland put in the most time at work - almost 52 hours a week - while those in the south-east clocked up 47 hours a week.

Critically too, the rise in working hours has had a knock-on effect on personal health.  71% of respondents claimed that they now felt stressed running their businesses, compared with only 54% a year earlier.

My point in highlighting this survey is – do you recognise this behaviour in yourself?

Hands up - are you working longer hours?  And if so, why?

Is it part of our ethos that when faced with uncertainty we double our efforts and work longer? What leads us to this philosophy? Does it suggest a lack of confidence, or is it the need to ‘prove’ commitment to our team, our suppliers and our customers?  Is it a ‘natural’ behaviour or do we ‘learn or copy’ this behaviour from our peers or forebears?

Or is it simply that we don’t understand our options when under perceived pressure - it is easier to work harder than it is to think things through.

If so, let me suggest to you another, methodical, approach.

It involves, firstly, taking the time out - to understand the issues and then to set priorities.

By asking ourselves (or our teams) the right questions about “what happens if . . . ?” we can identify the truly critical issues in our business, spend proper time on these, and thus ignore those annoyingly ‘loud’ but irrelevant matters.

Once you’ve assessed the critical issues, take time to generate the right solutions – and never just one solution but many different solutions.  Write these down, and don’t stop until you have 5, 10, or more possible tactics. Consider the ‘outcomes’ that you want and the result that each of your possible approaches might bring. Then rank them in order of effectiveness and feasibility.

Next, the critical stage, do something - take real and positive action.

Choose your best (highest ranked) option and implement immediately.

But, please, not by doing it all yourself – we’ve been through this one before. Take into account the resources available, and try to delegate elements of the action plan to others where possible.  Trust your team and your professionals to work in your best interests. Brief them, with absolute clarity, and monitor progress, without interfering, to ensure things advance the way you want them to.

And if your initial ideas aren’t working, don’t be ‘pig-headed and stick to them - be prepared to change tack.

Never panic - decisions made in haste are often regretted later and usually have limited effectiveness. But, as described above, by taking time to assess properly all the options available to you, delegating some of the tasks, and monitoring the results, you stand to multiply, many fold, your chances of success.

So, get out there and make effective changes to your business for optimal profits.

Richard C

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The first Gold wheelbarrow award goes, without a doubt, to Karin H. of Wood You Like for perseverance and doing what she says she’s going to do. Her wheelbarrow hasn’t stood still for more than a second - to see her impressive list of achievements see her own post.

Starting from scratch is hard at the best of times, but Karin’s determination to try new ideas and approaches to business efficiency and customer acquisition has seen her double turnover and triple profits every year.

A true entrepreneur. A worthy holder of the Gold Wheelbarrow award, I’m sure you will agree.

By way of outline, this site has been set up to help you in the growth and development of your business through the richness of exchanging ideas and experiences with one another. You know the saying “If I give you a penny and you give me a penny, we each still have one penny – but if you give me an idea and I give you an idea, we each have TWO ideas”.

So that’s where I’m coming from!

First up however is – ‘FTI’.

This is something we definitely need to get clear in our heads before we start.

There are literally thousands of books published and articles written that expound the many things you can do in your business to increase either the revenue, or the profits, or both, or improve the cash flow, and more. And I’m sure you too have a number of these books on your shelves - some people have dozens. And the chances are that you will have read most of these. But how much do you remember of the contents?

And more importantly, how many of these ideas have you systematically and ruthlessly implemented in your business? My guess is ‘very few’.

Many of you will come to me with numerous different problems in your business, numerous theories of what you think went wrong, and numerous suggestions as to what you think should be done. You’ve read your books and know the answers.

But, the point I need you to get clear in your head is that it is –

you, yourself, that is responsible for everything in your business

It is only you who can, and needs to, implement the necessary actions to take the business in the direction you want it to go.

The entrepreneur in you will, more than likely, learn something new every day and make decisions everyday. And, if you are like so many business managers I come across, seldom do you actually introduce or implement those wonderful ideas and decisions into your business.

Why?

The phrase ‘FTI’ comes to mind. FTI is the acronym for

“failure to implement”

This ‘in-action’ has been coined in the business world to embrace a critical weakness in our managerial skills. FTI is nothing short of an extreme dose of procrastination (about which I will write at a later date).

Here’s an example.

Imagine, in your garden, you have a wheelbarrow. It is sitting there, in the middle of your lawn. You know it needs moving. But that wheelbarrow will never move UNLESS you do something about it - unless you physically pick it up and push it.

And the same goes for your business also. It will never do anything,

unless you pick it up and push it

Entrepreneurial success comes from determination, organisation and working smart. And the passion and the drive to succeed must come from within you.

And the reason I have chosen this subject for this initial blog article is that, no matter how much valuable and priceless information and ideas I or anyone else provides for you, not a single one is worth anything unless ‘you pick it up and use it’. Used properly, the ideas that we will share with you over the coming months could be priceless —

these ideas could make you many many thousands of pounds

In fact, so keen am I to ensure that you, my readers, implement the ideas we discuss, I’m going to introduce an award for those of you whom I believe have picked up and acted on the available ‘gems’ of information from these pages. This award will be called the

“wheelbarrow award”

Why the ‘wheelbarrow award’ – because, with reference to what I’ve written above, it will be given out only to those that have actually ‘picked up and pushed’, in their business, an idea from this blog.

How it will work is this –

You tell me you’ve done something about implementing, in your business, an idea received from this blog and you will get a ‘green’ wheelbarrow award.

Tell me again when the idea is working for your business (providing some interesting results) and you will get a ‘bronze’ wheelbarrow award.

Do it three times and you will get ‘silver’ wheelbarrow award

Repeat it seven times and you get a ‘gold’ wheelbarrow award.

(see the list of companies awarded the Wheelbarrow below)

After that you will become so ‘addicted’ to implementing good ideas that you won’t need any more support, incentives, awards or encouragement from me! Not only that, you will be driving your business towards more efficiency, higher revenues, greater profits and stronger cash flow – accelerating, in fact, ahead of your competitors to the very top of your field.

Listed below those companies/businesses awarded the green wheelbarrow:

Listed below those companies/businesses awarded the bronze wheelbarrow:

Listed below those companies/businesses awarded the silver wheelbarrow:

Listed below those companies/businesses awarded the gold wheelbarrow:

20.07.07: Karin H of Wood You Like Ltd (Charing - Kent - UK)

Comments are always much appreciated, but please allow me time to
reply - I am busy Company Doctor, spending most of my time with my
clients.