LIVING THE NIGHTMARE: A DAY IN HELL
So that was the dream scenario some entrepreneurs enjoy. The goal is for you to make that dream scenario come true for you as well. The sad reality, however, is that many entrepreneurs are living a nightmare, the other end of the spectrum. As I share this scenario with you, please realize that this is strictly a cautionary tale. The nightmare scenario is entirely avoidable, and the objective here is to help you avoid it.
THE NIGHTMARE
Here’s the nightmare scenario.
Your people aren’t engaged, passionate, or concerned about your customers. They show up for their paychecks and can’t wait to go home. You spend your time avoiding them, interacting only when absolutely necessary. You meet with your leadership team rarely, and only when there’s a crisis to solve. Roles and responsibilities are unclear, and people trip over each other trying to complete projects. When someone says they’re going to carry out a task, most of the time they don’t.
Your customers and clients are frustrated but stay with you because you offer the lowest price in town. As a result, you barely make a profit, so you’re frustrated. Tension is always simmering between you and your customers, and as soon as a better price comes along, they leave without notice. You can only pay yourself enough to survive, and there are no profit distributions.
Since you don’t have people you can count on, you’re doing half their work, and that means you’re forced to work from morning to night and on weekends. You rarely take a vacation and have little to no time for family or friends. Your family is getting fed up because you’re never around. When you are, you’re always exhausted and frustrated. The stress leads to bad decisions and poor health. You have high turnover, and you have to constantly train new employees. They don’t respect you, and they might steal from you, treat your clients poorly, and ultimately damage your brand. These businesses struggle until their founders ultimately burn out and the business dies or is acquired by a competitor for pennies on the dollar.
Sound like fun?
This nightmare can be avoided. I help entrepreneurs do it every day.
EIGHT CRITICAL MISTAKES THAT CREATE THE NIGHTMARE SCENARIO
What are the mistakes to avoid if you want to live the dream rather than the nightmare? First off, you have to assume that you’ll make mistakes. Everyone does. Here’s a list of the crucial ones, so you’ll burn them in your subconscious. That way you can take steps to avoid them.
1. Not Having a Vision
It’s vital to have a crystal clear vision of where the company is going and to share that vision with your people often so that they see the vision as clearly as you do.
2. Hiring the Wrong People
When hiring anyone, you must confirm that they have your company’s core values. Hire slowly. If, unfortunately, you hire the wrong person, you have to be willing to fire quickly. Whenever you hire, always think long term. Don’t hire to solve a short-term problem.
3. Not Spending Time with Your People
It’s critical that you stay in sync with your people. This means meeting with them weekly, quarterly, and annually. Keep them in the loop about everything that’s going on. Give them feedback on how they’re doing, and make sure they know they can give you feedback on how you’re doing as well. Solve interpersonal issues quickly so everyone is rowing in the same direction.
4. Not Knowing Who Your Customer Is
As early in the process of taking your entrepreneurial leap as possible, you should determine the exact demographics and psychographics of your ideal customer. This is knowing exactly who they are, where they are, and what they are. You’ll then avoid taking a buckshot approach to marketing and falling into the trap of trying to please everyone. You want to make sure you clearly know your customer so that you can speak their language in all of your marketing and sales efforts.
5. Not Charging Enough
It’s extremely common for companies not to charge enough for their product or service. Most of the time, what lies at the root of this is fear. I’ve lost count of the times I’ve urged clients to raise their fees. Whenever they do, they never skip a beat. Dan Sullivan has a great rule of thumb when choosing your pricing. He suggests that you think about the number that scares you and then add 20 percent.
6. Not Staying True to Your Core
Every business has a core focus. Your job is to clearly figure out what yours is as soon as possible. Your business’s core is a combination of what you’re great at doing and what you’re absolutely passionate about. Your job is to make sure that every system, person, and process in your business is designed and aligned to drive that core focus with absolute consistency. And to not get distracted by all the shiny stuff that could inevitably pull you away from your core, diluting focus, and creating chaos and complexity.
7. Not Knowing Your Numbers
One of the most important things you, as an entrepreneur, need to do is make sure you’re generating a profit as soon as possible. To do so, you must have a pulse on your numbers. A few simple disciplines for achieving this are for you to (1) review your financials every month; (2) manage a monthly expense budget; and (3) track the five to fifteen most critical numbers for your business every week (e.g., visitors, followers, leads, appointments, proposals, sales, revenue, errors, customer satisfaction, cash balance, accounts payable, accounts receivable). The numbers and data never lie.
8. Not Crystallizing Roles and Responsibilities
To avoid people tripping over each other and creating chaos, each one of your people—including yourself—must know exactly what they’re accountable for. That means having a coherent organization chart in place (even if you only have one employee), so that the right hand always knows what the left hand is doing. You must make it abundantly clear to each of your people exactly what you expect of them.
SUMMARY
Now that you’ve seen the nightmare scenario and the eight critical mistakes, it’s important to understand they can be avoided.
This concludes Part II: Glimpse. The objective was to show you what businesses are available to you, share success stories, and show you the dream and nightmare scenarios entrepreneurs live. It’s now time to move on to show you the path to taking your leap. But before going on to part III, please take a few minutes to jot down your thoughts from this chapter. What mistakes do you want to avoid? What are your three biggest takeaways or a-has?
WORKSHEET
What actions can you take in the next seven days to make sure you avoid the nightmare scenario?
You can download all worksheets and tools at e-leap.com.