You see the money doesn’t matter as much if you are not clear on your purpose and mission in life and business.
Because when you are clear with what you want – you know exactly how much and how long it is going to take to build up to a certain level.
Each level is different for each company and business owner.
Some people have big goals, while others do not.
Like I said, I don’t claim to be some billionaire or even multimillion dollar online marketing, business guru, life coach or anything like that.
But I UNDERSTAND what it takes from experience not just theory or academics.
I have my MBA and can honestly tell you that the fundamentals in business will take you as far as you want to go.
You don’t need to be super smart, good at math or over the top, extroverted, networking, sales type to be good at business.
In fact, oftentimes those people don’t do well in business.
Because they overthink or repeal people away.
You just need to get a solid understanding of the business basics or fundamentals and foundations.
Most people start a business and don’t know anything about business..
It is impossible and you will have to learn a lot as you go.
But there are some key areas of your business that you need to learn the basics to make all the difference and be good at.
Most of this kind of stuff I’m talking about right now is stuff they don’t teach you in school.
Of course, some of the information is taught in school, but they never really teach you how to apply the information in the real world or it’s simply outdated.
Most school systems are outdated because they are too rigid and everything has to go through a board of approval, which is important for things like medicine and law, but not good in the business world where things are constantly changing.
In school they teach you how to be a worker bee.
Not an entrepreneur.
In school they teach you through a theoretical point of view that is often too burdensome to do in the real world.
The only difference between me and you is that I know the information needed to build a multi-million dollar business and you do not and I don’t say that to be a dick.
I say that to let you know that I understand where you are and I can help you.
I know both the real world and academic side of business and that is my point.
You have to learn both ways of thinking because life is full of duality or polar opposites.
You have to be analytical and creative in your business as the owner or manager.
You have to have school smarts and street smarts.
You have to get financially educated and know the numbers and how to bring more people into your business.
Warren Buffett is well known for saying, ”accounting is the language of business”.
Yes, it is true, but accounting is only one aspect of your business.
Some may even argue the most important aspect.
But I neither disagree or agree.
It is like saying what’s more important than your head or your heart?
Without either your wouldn’t function properly or die.
However, if you didn’t go to school to learn about these things you are missing out on some of the details.
See, business school is good once business has gone big.
They have money to hire consultants, but when there are just starting out they need the right information, but don’t have the capital to buy the information they need.
And this is where Professors come into play.
Most business professors worked for some large corporation and few were successful starting their own hence why they teach.
I’m not dogging on professors by any means.
They serve their purpose, but when you are small and want to grow big you have to have strong foundation to support yourself.
Otherwise it’s like building a house on sand with no strong foundation.
The house will crumble and so will your business.
You see, you need a way to accelerate your business and get moving fast!
But if you’re just starting out (like everyone at one point) the details for starting your business correctly in the very beginning are often left out.
And that makes perfect sense because most business professors have never started a business.
I have my MBA.
In fact, I have been to 7 different universities.
All while in the military or working full time.
It made more sense to me to keep busy with my education and work full time to accelerate my learning.
I did take some time off for my Graduate School where I received my MBA, but that was short lived.
That is why I tell you – you don’t need a degree to do well in business.
You don’t learn how business works by earning more degrees.
You learn by doing it.
You only learn business from doing it and studying at the same time as you grow.
You must continue your education on your own.
At the end of the day business is business.
You are either selling a product or service and sometimes both.
All the other components of your business is pretty much the same.
These areas of business include but are limited to: accounting, finance, marketing, advertising, business law, HR, admin, strategy, training/education, R&D, sales, customer service, product delivery, logistics, management, etc.
It’s seems nearly impossible to know every component of these areas of a business, yet everyday business owners are going through their lives not knowing this type of information and making poor decisions while trying to run their business.
It’s been my observation that most businesses end up failing because they lack in one or more of these areas of their business.
Which are often equally as important and some times more as the products or services you provide to your customers.
Even if you are just starting or have been in business for over 20 years.
Most business owners are caught scrambling, “putting out fires” trying to make it work and going in too many directions and don’t know what to focus on or who to trust.
Nowadays there is so much misinformation on the internet it’s hard to know what is important to focus on in your life and business and what to avoid.
You see, Here is the most fundamental secret to business: you don’t need to try and solve everything for your customers, you just need to solve one thing really good. You need to have your finger on the pulse of your customer’s wants, needs and desires and then provide a solution to one of their problems.
At a more fundamental level – you got to know your numbers, make strategic decisions and execute, then iterate and repeat.
The bar should always be raised.
If you did good one month, analyze what happened from a financial standpoint and then try to emulate what occured in the second month and so on with the goal of constantly getting better.
For most businesses that goal will be to earn more revenue.
But if you were a non profit that could be impact more people’s lives.
It just depends on your business and like people, every business is both unique and similar at the same time.
Just like our human bodies.
Just like normal human beings bodies have a head, eyes, legs, arms, hands, feet, belly, spinal cord, skin, etc., with each serving a different function.
So does your business.
Your business has different departments that serve different functions even if it is a sole proprietor.
That is why most businesses fail because they are trying to treat their business like it is not this.
They try to treat their business like its all just one thing, and they do this with their personal life too.
The goal at first for most people is to figure out how to earn more money.
The problem preventing them from achieving this goal is somewhere located in a different department of their business that is needing attention.
You have to learn how to analyze information and then make strategic decisions.
The truth is no one can do that for you!
Just like going to the doctor, it’s good to get a second opinion, but in the end, only the patient knows if the pain is gone.
Just like you as the business owner only knows if the business is running at the caliber you think it could.
Not some business consultant, accountant or lawyer.
I think that is what makes me different from other business advisor out there.
I focus on the life/work balance.
You see, I have come to realize that there is no such thing of life/work balance – there is only life.
Work is part of life and you must embrace it instead of trying to balance it.
There is a saying out there which I have found to be useful in understanding this concept of work/life balance and it goes like this, “people don’t have business problems they have personal problems showing up in their business”.
I have learned the boring things in business, gone through business school, and I’ll be the first to tell you that you don’t need an MBA to become successful in business.
But here is the thing.
If you want to be really good at business you’re going to have to start learning some of the boring things in business.
Keep reading and I’ll show you how.
But here is a major contradiction for a lot of people.
You need to become successful in life, not just business.
And you do this by becoming the best version of yourself.
And in order to do that you have to put in the work.
There is no shortcut.
You do need to know the fundamentals of business if you want to be good at it.
In my experience the difference between someone who knows a little bit about business and someone who doesn’t is about $5 million per year in revenue.
The people who don’t know that much about business can easily do $1.2 million a year in revenue.
The owner that knows a little can do $5 million to $20 million.
The person who masters business can do upwards $100 million to billions a year in revenue.
Which level are you stuck at?
I know this by working with people in each revenue range mentioned above and having conversations with business entrepreneurs.
Not some theoretical mumbo jumbo.
The hard truth is people in your life are counting on you to be successful. If you can’t be successful then who will take care of your family and community?
I think more people could run more successful businesses if they just knew how to focus their mind, body, energy and had the right strategy.
Sure, there will be many mistakes and failures along the way, but those are learning experiences.
I do believe that as a business owner it is your obligation to learn from others and avoid crippling mistakes others have already made.
For the most part everything you want to accomplish in this life has already been done.
Someone else has already gone through the pain and learned the lessons for you.
Which is awesome because you can accelerate your growth tremendously by learning from their successes and failures.
There is a joke that says, “you can tell the Pioneers because they are the ones lying there with the arrows in their back”.
You don’t need to be a pioneer to be successful.
You just need to know where you are wanting to go with more clarity.
My intention for you is to learn as much about the things that will make you successful and avoid common pitfalls.
I mean look at the weight loss industry for example.
Everyone knows they have to eat healthier and work out consistently, yet it’s such a big problem for so many people.
Why?
Because it takes hard work at first.
Once you get going and build the right habits it becomes easier and even fun.
Just like owning a successful business is hard work, but it can be very rewarding and fun once you get it running right.
In business if you want to be the best you have to become an expert and master business.
You have to become a student of business.
The truth is that you must create daily habits for yourself that are in alignment with your goals.
Even if you want to do mediocre and just live a good life you still have to work 2x smarter and harder than you originally may of imagined.
And you only have so much energy and brain capacity in a day.
So you have to do things that creates more energy and gives you focus all the while running your life and business.
It’s important to know that the main reasons most businesses fail is because they don’t know what they are doing and because of that there is no action in the right direction.
They lack business fundamentals and foundations, they have a poor mindset or lack money and relationships.
Again, “people don’t have business problems they have personal problems showing up in their business”.
How you do one thing is how you do everything and the world runs off of the universal laws.
You must learn about the universal laws.
In other words, you reap what you sow.
You can’t reap the rewards unless you put in the work.
The question then becomes are you working on the right thing?
How do you know?
I can help you get more clarity on that.
Not in some hokey pokey new age way – not that there’s anything wrong with that, but in a real world down to earth kind of way that actually gets results.
Ultimately, for most small businesses the problem is figuring out how to get more customers or increase profit.
But for the customer that could be fixing a toothache, finding the right home, or satisfying a particular need or desire.
Whatever the specific problem your customer may have it is your job to help them get to their desired state.
You see, as a business owner your main objective is to solve a specific problem for your customer.
It’s not about you, it’s always about the person paying you.
You have to become customer obsessed.
Because at the end of the day they are the true shareholders of your company.
Even though you may be self employed or your own boss the people who pay you are really your boss at the end of the day.
It’s sort of true, people really do vote with their dollars.
So, as the business owner your job is to focus on the problem and solution for your customer.
Everything we buy in life has to do with our state of mind.
You buy a Ferrari for example for how you think the car will make you feel – not the fuel economy or because it’s a smooth ride (it’s actually really bumpy!).
Why people don’t buy from you is because they don’t know about you or because they are uncertain of what you have to offer will truly solve their problem.
So you either have to make your solution better or get more customers.
It’s that simple, but of course there is always more to it.
If you want to learn more
Dan Emery is a husband, father, business professional and USAF veteran. He has a Bachelor’s degree in Organizational Management and a Master’s degree in Business Administration (MBA). Dan lives in Portland, Oregon with his beautiful wife and son. Dan enjoys researching and working with entrepreneurs and small business owners. If you are interested in learning more or working with Dan – let’s jump on a free strategy session. Click here to get started for free.