Air Date: 4-1-2011|Episode 203
Are you managing your business or is your business managing you? We explore how to answer this question and much more with Chuck Violand of Violand Management Associates...
Full Description:
Are you managing your business or is your business managing you? We explore how to answer this question and much more with Chuck Violand of Violand Management Associates. Chuck Violand understands the unique challenges of small businesses, having owned a commercial cleaning and water damage mitigation company for 26 years. He founded Violand Management Associates (VMA) in 1988 as a consulting, teaching, and training resource for owners of small businesses. Chuck is also known to many for the no-nonsense business building advice that he regularly presents in trade publications, speaking engagements, and his weekly management e-zine “Monday Morning Notes”. This week we plan to ask Chuck for advice and tips that any entrepreneur can use to achieve long-term business and personal success. We plan on discussing the peak performance, business planning, project management , management development, estimating, sales and marketing and more.
Z-Man’s Blog:
Better Business
Eliyahu Goldratt said “An expert is not someone who gives you the answer, it is someone that asks you the right question.” Business consultant Chuck Violand uses questions as a tool for development of mission statements- what get’s you up in the morning?, what keeps you awake at night? and what are you doing about it? Chuck advises that writing these things down, can relieve some of the stress, get matters out of the mind and onto paper and can slow down the mind so you can focus.
Nuggets mined from today’s episode:
Hardworking, creative and confident are valuable entrepreneur traits at business start-up time. Confidence can be beneficial while arrogance and hubris are detrimental.
Outgrowing the owner’s skill set is the most common business problem he encounters.
“Focus is easiest when your back is up against the wall you’ll look straight ahead.”
“Entrepreneurs are more likely to run into business problems when they have extra time and extra money.”
An entrepreneur’s high energy can have either positive or negative consequences on the business.
The entrepreneurs’ ego becomes a problem when the entrepreneur is unwilling to objectively look at himself in the mirror.
“Good leaders instinctively know and understand what they are good at and what they aren’t good at.”
“Entrepreneurs can simply blow steam or harness steam to power a locomotive.
Many entrepreneurs have Attention Deficit Disorder. Like a dog chasing cars, they chase the newest, latest and greatest and don’t know why. The dog doesn’t know what to do when it catches a car. Good ideas often need time to mature.
Covey stuff- the importance of prioritization, first things first.
When an entrepreneurs’ role changes in the they may default and go to their comfortable behaviors.
Book recommendation: “What got you here won’t get you there” by Marshall Goldsmith
Project Management – Take command of the chaos through organization, decision making, prioritizing with a process map. (Gantt Chart- bar chart illustrating a project schedule and important elements.)
The art of being awarded the project- includes thorough takeoff, presentation of proposals and negotiating skills.
4 P’s of Marketing- Position, Place, Promotion and Publicity.
Hiring high caliber people. What’s the most the employee can get out of the owner as a business leader.
The “Rug Chick” Lisa Wagner chipped in with 2 great comments: 1) “entrepreneurs with ADD have the business plan in their head and in their DNA, not on paper.” 2) “Friends pay retail. Being too nice in business can may you go broke.
The highlight for me was Chuck’s response to Dieter’s comments on his overdue accounts receivable: “Entrepreneurs often consider accounts receivable money in the bank, too often the money is in the wrong bank.”
Comments and interaction during the show validated our decision to periodically delve into subject matter of a nontechnical nature.
Today’s music: “Business Time” by Flight of the Concords & “Taking care of Business” Bachman-Turner Overdrive
Z-Man Signing Off
