Browse Blog Categories
- General (90)
- Business (94)
- Business Coaching (71)
- Business Management (97)
- Business Systems (25)
- Entrepreneur (71)
- Executive Coaching (34)
- Family Business (83)
- Leadership (99)
- Management (91)
- Marketing (16)
- Profitability (19)
- Sales (18)
- Speaking Topics (5)
- Success In Business (97)
- Team Building (41)
- Time Management (3)
Janna's Blog
Growing and running a successful small business sometimes means admitting that you need help from someone with more knowledge or experience, but many business owners hold back.Don’t make this mistake. Here are five “thinking traps” that could be preventing you from getting the assistance you need—and why you need to avoid them.
-
Ego – “I can do it; I don’t need help.” Guess what? Everyone needs help. In fact, the most profitable, most well-run businesses are run by owners who constantly ask questions and seek help.
- Shame – “I don’t want anyone to know the hole I have dug for myself and my family.” It will come out at some point, and as John Maxwell states in his book Failing Forward, “Success is measured by your perception of and response to failure. Every person fails. Every business owner fails at some point. It is only with failure that you can truly be a success. This may sound harsh, but get over it, figure out how big the hole is, what can be done about it, LEARN from it and move on.
- Fear – “I don’t want to know what trouble I am really in.” A business was owned by a mother and daughter. They provided childcare to the community and accomplished their service in an extraordinary way. Unfortunately, the relationship between mother and daughter was often confrontational so the mother eventually ended up firing her daughter and running the business herself. While the business started to grow, the mother knew she was behind in paying bills so she stopped checking her voicemail. Her fear of what the messages would say was so great that she was unable to listen even to gather voicemails from new families seeking her services. The end result was a closed and bankrupt business, employees out of work, and another business not fulfilling its potential. Her fear was people calling for payment of late bills. The reality was that her voicemail included those very families that could have taken care of the creditors and kept the business afloat. What are your fears?
- Didn’t Know – “I did not realize there were resources out there to help me.” If you are going to own your own business, you must read, be aware, listen and not stick your head in the sand. In this age of computers and the Internet, there are many resources to help you. Not knowing is not acceptable. The challenge is to ask better questions when you do seek out help so you get the answers you need, not the answers you want. There will always be things you don’t know, didn’t understand, didn’t consider. As a business owner, try to minimize the effects of not knowing by creating a plan for learning.
-
MBA Know-It-All -- This is my favorite: “I don’t need help; I have an MBA.” Sorry, but having an MBA doesn’t guarantee you won’t go out of business. It may prepare you for a job at a company that wants what is taught at business school, but it seldom prepares you for handling the real-world aspects of running a business, especially a small family business. I have encountered many family business owners who don’t believe they need help because they have an MBA and know how to do the business thing. I have also encountered just as many business owners who have been humbled by losing their business because they thought they learned it all while earning their MBA. This statement may not be popular with business schools, but I will stand behind it.
Don’t fall into these traps. Understand that the more you know, the more you have to learn, and you’ll probably need help learning it as quickly as possible.
This is an excerpt from The Family Business by Janna Hoiberg.
Rope is a very versatile tool. With rope, you can hang a bear bag, rescue a friend who fell off a cliff, help someone climb up to a new ledge, tie down your tent in high winds. Simply put, a rope is critical on the trail. It is insurance that protects you if you need it.Insurance for your business is similar. You hope and pray you don’t need it, but it is invaluable if you do. There are several types of insurance your business might need: property, casualty, auto, errors and omission, and key-man life insurance. The specific list is determined by the business and the individual. Most businesses have insurance; the challenge is to understand what insurance is needed and what is covered.
In Colorado, after years of drought and wildfires, we faced times of extreme rain. These events highlighted for both individuals and family business owners how good (or in many cases, how bad) their insurance coverage really was. In one year (actually in about a four-month period) we used our car insurance (my husband was hit by a drunk driver and the car was totaled), our property insurance (a tree fell on our house), our boat insurance (the same storm that caused the tree to fall created waves that sunk our boat), and our health insurance. The only insurance we didn’t use that year was life insurance—thankfully.
One additional note on insurance: Understanding the fine print is critical. Weather happens, and one day we had over eight inches of hail in about one hour. At one office building, the rain blocked the drain pipes that lead water off the roof, and about three inches of water flowed into the top floor. Water was flowing out of electrical outlets, ceilings, and any place it could go. However, since the roof didn’t “fail” the insurance company was denying the claim for one of the tenants. Each of the other insurance companies paid, but not that one. The fine print in the policy indicated that it didn’t cover water if there was no damage to the roof.
Yes, there are many horror stories about insurance companies. Some of these can be avoided by reading the policies, asking questions, and not making assumptions about coverage. Insurance is essentially like the bear bag we use when hiking. We don’t anticipate running into that bear, and they are usually as afraid of us as we are of them. However, things can happen. We bear bag our food—all of it. Insurance offers the same kind of protection for your business.
Excerpted from The Backpacker's Guide To Business Success by Janna Hoiberg.
Have you ever seen a dog follow a rabbit trail? The dog endlessly sniffs around in circles, never getting anywhere. And it seldom catches the rabbit!A rabbit trail in business is that path you go down that wasn’t on your meeting agenda or your plan for the day. These rabbit trails can jeopardize a project’s completion, a business’s success, and an employee’s ability to get things done.
Meetings often take us down a rabbit trail when participants discuss anything but the scheduled agenda. On the other hand, some rabbit trails create the best ideas for the organization! The challenge is determining which rabbit trails are productive and which are not.
Below are recommendations for handling rabbit trails without losing the value the trail might provide for your family business.
1. Always have an agenda for meetings, even if the agenda is created as the meeting begins. What is the objective? How long should the meeting take? How will new topics be handled? Who will keep the meeting on track? These are foundational questions that should be considered prior to every meeting.
2. Always bring the discussion back to the topic at hand. Utilize the concept of a parking lot. As discussions unfold, you “park” items not on the agenda that might need to be addressed, but not in this meeting.
3. Set clear and intentional priorities.
- If you are running the meeting, keep it focused on the task at hand. This doesn’t mean you don’t give team members new projects; it just means you may (depending on the individual) need to help them prioritize their activities.
- If you are an employee and the boss suggests a new idea, ask where it ranks among the goals already set for the company and the priorities she set for you earlier in the week (or earlier in the day). Ask questions, and get clarification.
- Understand the old Mark Twain concept of “eat a frog for breakfast.” Essentially, focus on the most difficult thing you need to do first thing in the morning. Then you will have accomplished the hardest thing early and the rest of the day is available for all other activities— including rabbit trails if they can’t be avoided.
Once you know that a rabbit trail can provide value, you can take the time to explore all that it has to offer.
Excerpted from The Backpacker's Guide To Business Success by Janna Hoiberg.
Ready to get started
Call or contact Janna Hoiberg online to schedule a free, initial consultation.
There is no obligation and you're guaranteed to learn a few new things about your business.