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This article was first published in The Small Business Advocate NEWSLETTER, Volume II, Issue 45, September 17, 2001, the first edition following the terrorist attacks of 9-11.

The NEWSLETTER is different this week from past editions. This week is different from past weeks. 

For days now, I’ve wanted to talk with you. I considered a mid-week edition. Uncharacteristically, I just couldn’t get the words down.

Only once before did my normal prosaic method fail me. Not being a poet – not wishing to be a poet – at first I didn’t understand that my thoughts would only come out in verse. But the return key proved stronger than the word wrap. At last I gave in to the meter, and a poem was born.

This week, again, the prose came with difficulty. But this time I recognized the pull of the return key and another poem was written with less struggle.

I have no small business thoughts for you this week. Nor do I claim to have inspiration for you. I don’t feel inspired. I feel numb. I feel angry. I feel frustrated. I can only tell you about my feelings. Perhaps you will recognize them. [Continue Reading]

Here’s an ancient marketplace maxim: Selling is a numbers game.

A maxim is a generally accepted truth and this is one because of two realities:

1. There are hundreds – if not thousands – of things that can cause a fully qualified prospect to not complete a transaction, at least not on your time parameters.

2. Regardless of how many bumps you encounter on the path to a signed contract, it’s still your job to produce enough gross profit from sales revenue to stay in business.

Enter the sales pipeline: a planning concept that helps managers and salespeople forecast sales for any given period – week, month, quarter, or year. Think of your sales pipeline as overhead plumbing with faucets positioned at the time intervals your operation requires. And from these faucets, you draw the mother’s milk of any business – sales revenue.

But there’s one pesky thing about sales pipeline faucets: they all come with screens that only allow sales from qualified prospects to pass through, while poorly developed prospects are blocked. So, if you’re counting on revenue pouring out of a faucet when you turn the handle on the day you need sales, you must load only qualified prospects into your pipeline to begin with. [Continue Reading]

When a partnership works, it’s a beautiful thing. When it doesn’t, it defines ugly.

Once, during a conversation with a mentor about partnerships, he made this declaration: “Partners are only good for two things: sex and dancing.”

My mentor’s personal experience led him to make that indictment. My experience has led me to be more thoughtful, but I still advise anyone planning a business partnership to consider his rude but worldly comment as a handy caution to purge their plans of naivete.

A business partnership should be entered into with a healthy dose of reality about the human element involved. My friend, David Gage brings sunlight to this reality in his book, The Partnership Charter, wherein he writes, “Business people are experts in what they do, but they’re not in how to be partners.” Boy, howdy, is that true!

If you’re considering a partnership structure for your business, Gage recommends asking yourself, and your potential partner, the three questions below, which are followed by my thoughts.[Continue Reading]

The classic financial benefits derived from small business ownership typically fall under two categories: 

1. Earned income: salary and bonuses reported on a W2 each year.

2. Unearned (investment) income: distribution of profits from the operation and/or sale of the business.

But there are other small business ownership advantages that I call “stealth benefits,” because they’re not as evident as operating opportunities. Arguably the most dramatic stealth benefit, which often has the most wealth creation potential, is for the business owner to also personally own the real estate in which that business operates.[Continue Reading]

Few contemporary prophecies have stood the test of time better than this one by John Naisbitt, from his 1982 watershed book, Megatrends: “The more high-tech, the more high-touch.” I’ve named that jewel, “Naisbitt’s Razor.”

The reason for Naisbitt’s accuracy is simple: High tech, by definition, means digital. But you and I are not the least bit digital; we’re 100% analog. And our analog nature manifests as a desire to connect with – or as Naisbitt says, “touch” – other humans. So the value of touch increases proportionally with the increase in the velocity of our lives.

Digital is fast; analog is not. We may transport ourselves virtually at the speed of digital, but once there, we touch –eye, ear, hand – at the speed of analog. So how do we reconcile the fact that as high-tech consumers who desire and eagerly adopt each new generation of digital, we’re still, and will always be analog beings? One word: trust.[Continue Reading]

Author’s note: I wrote the sentiments below a long time ago and have offered them to you every four years on behalf of these two subjects. Of course, small business owners haven’t changed much over the years: each one still – increasingly – deserves your fullest admiration. And in truth, for most Olympians, the same is true. Unfortunately, our world has become so politicized and narcissistic that now the audience’s Olympic experience has been diminished.

Every four years, you can watch special people participate in a noble cause – the Olympics.

These heroes commit countless hours over many years to achieve a level of excellence that might somehow qualify them to represent their country in the Olympic Games.

Notice no mention of winning, medals or glory. Most Olympians find neither. And yet they train and compete.

Watching an event, we’re at once self-conscious and grateful as the camera’s lens permits us to invade that private moment just prior to competition. Self-conscious because of the intrusion, but grateful to share the moment and benefit vicariously from the Herculean effort and sacrifice.

The TV camera moves in closer. We can see the color of their eyes – even imagine their thoughts.

The swimmer: “Twelve years of training and it all comes down to the next few seconds – must remember the fundamentals.”

The gymnast: “Today I will perform my personal best.”

Then the long lens captures the mouth. There’s a lick to fight the cottonmouth that only those who risk failure have tasted. The lips move ever so slightly as if to offer a short prayer or claim an affirmation.

Every day, you can watch another group of special people participate in a noble cause – small business.

Small business owners are a lot like Olympic athletes. They commit countless hours over many years, pushing mind and body to achieve a level of excellence that might somehow allow them to merely … make a living.

Notice no mention of winning, medals, or glory. Most small business owners find neither. And yet they show up, year after year, to work, compete, and contribute.

Like an Olympic race, sometimes the future of a small business’s success rides on how well the owner performs over a very short period of time. If the camera could take you in close, you might see an owner thinking: “All these years of work and risk could come down to how well I deliver this proposal in the next few minutes – must remember the fundamentals.”

The long lens would also capture the lick to lessen the cottonmouth that only those who risk failure have tasted. Then the lips move ever so slightly as if to offer a prayer or claim an affirmation.

Olympians and small business owners are dedicated to what they love. Both work hard in search of excellence and take great risks against all odds, usually at their own expense.

I’ll gladly spend my admiration on that kind of spirit.

Write this on a rock … Because of Olympians and small business owners, the world is a better place.