PUFF The 'Magic Dragon'

PUFF Will Work 24/7 

Prop up your business leadership.

Under-Estimate your contribution to success.

Find the ideas that work well.

Fix the ones that produce poor results.

P.U.F.F.  PUFF the 'magic dragon' should live by your business model.  Every single day you should have this 'magic dragon' employed full time working on everything from crackling background noises on your telephones to an old curled up floor mat on the floor showing its wear as its frayed edges begin to trip those who walk by.  Your daily maintenance actions will become a process that will work like invisible magic.  This kind of dragon is a serious dragon to employ.  You need him at work every single day.  He does not need to take any vacations.  He is encouraged to work overtime.  If you do not have this dragon on your staff, go find him.  He will do the most magical things to help your model perform better.  You can live without him, just fine in most cases.  However, you can perform much better with him circling your business model like a silent policeman on a magical mission.  PUFF can become a big part of your X-Factor competitive edge.  He can become your best non-paid employee.

You begin to put PUFF to work in one single way.  He is easy to hire.  He will cost you nothing in employment costs, in fact, you are already paying for his presence.  Every time you make out your payroll checks to your staff and yourself, you pay him.  The only difference between his presence or absence is whether or not you and your staff allow him to become part of your daily routine at work.  You are already paying him to be there.  He is either working or not.  You are the leader.  You decide whether he works or not.  It is strictly your decision to employ him to sit around and do nothing or get busy at working his magic.

You are the leader who begins his magical work.  PUFF shows up when you show up.

It is extremely rare to find PUFF at work in your business model if you do not put him to work on a daily basis.  It is almost non-existent.  PUFF does not magically appear until you bring him out.  He only magically performs after you make him appear.  He is unique in his employment habits.  He works when you work him and rests when you ignore him.  The magic of his results will only come from the stuff he does when he is working.  He produces no magical results while he is not working.  PUFF is the 'magic dragon.'

How do we put PUFF to work?  Since he is already there and we already pay him, how do we get him to do his magical work?  We start by getting out of the 'positional' leadership role and begin to practice leadership by 'example.'  PUFF does not appear on his own.  The leader must begin his working world by setting the 'example.'  PUFF only appears when the 'example' is set by the business leader.  If the business leader does not set the example, PUFF gets paid for doing nothing.  PUFF gets to show up every single day and earn his keep by sitting around being invisible.  A lot of business models have invisible PUFF's sitting around getting paid and doing nothing.  I do not even need to be a part of those models and I see it clearly when I do business with some of them.  PUFF is getting paid and nothing is getting done.  It is amazing how invisible PUFF can become to those who lead their business models.  They have not learned how magical PUFF can be.  Their leadership operates in the dark.  They cannot see PUFF getting paid by doing no work.  His magic is void.

How do we put PUFF to work?

Do You Wave Or Hit The Brakes When You See A Patrol Car?

Control Is A Funny Game Of Survival

What is your first reaction?  Do you wave at the cop parked on the side of the road or do you hit the brakes when you notice him there?  Be straight up, which one do you do?

I am not a fan of surprises.  I do not like to come around a freeway bend in the road and see a patrol car parked on the side of the road, especially one that is parked perpendicular, nose facing out.  That kind of park job looks like a cat ready to pounce.  I wave at them.  Actually, I give them a casual peace sign from one of my hands on the steering wheel when I go by them.  Very few respond.  I still wave at them.  They seem uninterested in making friends.  Rarely do I see them respond in the same fashion.

Most of the drivers who flew by my vehicle on the freeway hit the brakes when they spot a cop.  There might be three vehicles ahead of me, all three sets of brake lights will go on.  Every time.  It is a subconscious knee-jerk reaction.  People hit the brakes when they spot a cop.  Nobody wants a ticket.  Nobody wants to get caught.  It is an amazing scenario.

I think it is more than the money.  Nobody wants to pay a fine for driving too fast but I think the issue is bigger than the money.  I think the issue is a powerful process that works much like a serious game of control.  People dislike being told what to do.  When they see a posted speed sign, they dislike being told how fast they can't drive.  We want to do just a little bit more than what we are told we cannot do.  It is a control thing.  We do not want to get caught getting away with doing just a little bit more, but we feel in control if we can get away with it.  It becomes a subconscious game we play with ourselves.  We will actually risk losing hard earned money and give it to a senseless fine for speeding and think nothing of it.  Yet we will drive from store to store trying to save five dollars on three grocery items.  It has nothing to do with money.  It has all to do with control.  We tend to play a mental game of control in our minds.  That is exactly why we hit the brakes when we see a cop.  We do not want to get caught.  We want to win.    

Theft is a funny process.  It amazes me how little thieves get when they practice their game.  Outside of the drug driven desires, theft is usually a game of control.  There is never enough money taken to set the person free from the drudgery of life costs.  It is not an issue of money and its amount.  It is an issue of control.

Your brake lights come on when you see a cop.  I see it all of the time.  We hate rules and regulations.  We feel like we lose control when the rules govern how we should behave.  Rules are made to be broken becomes our belief.  We feel we need to get our control back by pushing the limit of how much we can inch beyond the line drawn to get away with breaking the rules.  We test those limits.  It becomes a game.

We do not want to get caught breaking the rules.  That means we lost.  It is not about how much we will have to pay for the loss, it is more about getting caught.  We know the speed limit sign said 65 miles per hour.  We do not want to follow that regulation.  We want to drive 75 if we can get away with it.  The moment we see a cop, we hit the brakes.  It is a knee jerk reaction.  We push the limits and play the game so we drive above the speed limit.  We do it enough that we do not consider it 'breaking the rules.'  We consider it a game we play instead of a law we are breaking.  We do not consider ourselves law breakers.  We do not consider ourselves as criminals.  We think it is a game.  We are not criminals.  Criminals break the laws, we are busy playing a game.  That is how we think.

You employ these very same people.  You may be one of them.  We see so many other drivers going faster than the speed limit that we tend to feel like we should be doing the same thing.  We do not want to be left out. We have a high need to be included.  We want to play the same game.  You employ these very same people.  Think about it.

Some of us do not carry enough personal strength to follow the posted regulation for the speed limits we see.  Since everyone is doing it, it is not against the rules...it is not breaking the law.  It is a game we can play.  In due time, we play it enough that it becomes our pattern of habit.  We eventually bend the rules in favor of our winning ways.  We do not consider it wrong.  You employ some of these people.  It is not just a driving affliction.  It is a life process that takes control of a lot of

Personalize Your Special Marketing Events

Starbucks.Com

The Starbucks Coffee Company has a leader that understands marketing very well.  If you want to glean some good ideas, check out the work this leader instills into the process of Starbucks marketing.  There is some fabulous work being done here.

Recently the leader of Starbucks held a press conference regarding his views about political campaign contributions.  He shared that it was his practice to contribute political campaign funds to leaders and programs that support his beliefs and causes.  In his press conference he made a public announcement that he was withdrawing all of his contribution funds, temporarily, until the law makers of our country clean up their act on balancing the federal budget.  He did not make this move quietly.  He processed it as a part of a public announcement.  It was designed, managed and cleverly arranged as an extension to the Starbucks marketing program.  That company leader fully understands how the mass population feels about the sentiment it holds towards the financial ills in Washington D.C.  He is doing a 'good thing' with his encouragement to refrain from offering any more money to the pockets of law making leadership until they get their 'business act' together.  He made the announcement as a motion to encourage other leaders to do the same.  Leaders lead.  Leaders market their wares very well.  I would be interested to see if a sales spike of increase occurred at Starbucks as a result.  It would not surprise me to see an increase in sales.

Keep in mind, this is not the first step of a good social marketing attempt for this company.  They practice this kind of social marketing.  Do not for goodness sake take this one event and try to duplicate it for your own marketing program and expect it to produce great results until you have successfully established this pattern as part of what your company customarily does.  Starbucks already practices this kind of marketing in its normal policies.  It does not appear strange, weird or over-the-top.  Because it is customary to Starbucks, it will be easily accepted.  Get the depth of your marketing plans completely understood before you wander off in some wild direction.  If you paint your home barn red and put up a sign in the front yard that says 'farm style home for sale' make sure it does not look like a European contemporary flat.  Be smart.

I especially like the gravity of the message and how Starbucks used its leader as the message maker.  It personalized the attempt very well.  Most people who witnessed the news about his press conference release will believe he was solely doing it for the public policy only.  Hogwash, its business.  Campaign contributions are business.  Removing campaign contributions for a public cause is also business.  It is business.  I happen to believe it was genius business.  It is simple, doable and effective.  It did not take a whole lot of marketing dollars to accomplish.  I like the ones that come so easily with little drain on the company finances.  It was a master move made by one of the business worlds' master marketers.  Learn from this stuff.  This exhibit is just one example of many that are happening out in the business world.  Pay attention if you lead a business.

Marketing can be a complicated game if you do not have a lot of good experience to rely upon.  Do not neglect getting more help if you struggle in this area.  Marketing your business is a major key to how well you will succeed in the model you are trying to build.  Get very good at marketing where you want to be.  Look around at other successful models and glean some knowledge from how they do what they do.  Pay attention to the details that come with the depth of their planning.  The good ones include a lot of thought into the process.  Go ahead, give it a lot of thought.  They do.

Good Business, Bad Dog

Working in an environment filled with clutter, stress and dis-functionalism can become an unhealthy thing.  Corners of work responsibilities are left incomplete, done gets undone and routine work constantly becomes duplicated.  It is a very costly affair.  Hard earned revenues slip away magically and there appears to be a vacuum siphoning off the narrow margins of profit.  It is a bad dog day when the staff and their leader collide on occasion in an environment designed to manage through this kind of business mold.  Good business models can easily get caught up in a very disorganized fashion.  Personal collisions become routine.  I have witnessed many business models run their business race with strides that represent this kind of running.  They end up as a good business, bad dog affair.

You may be the leader of one of those unorganized business models.  You may be the cause of the stressful environment.  Shame on you.  Grow up and get out of the way.  Get some help.

Leaders are the backbone to business success.  Leaders are also the backbone to business failure.  If your model is failing, guess what?  I hope you are not the one that is in the way.  If you are the one that is in the way, change what you are doing or get out of the way.  Be courageous enough to admit it to yourself and begin becoming a better leader.  Find someone in your model that is willing to lead better and delegate to them the key functions you are messing up.  Get your hands off the wheel and find a different driver.  You have become so involved with yourself you are forgetting about the needs of your business model.  Your model is number one, not you, not your ideas, not your philosophies nor your personal gains.  None of them are yours.  They all belong to your business model.  Get over it and allow your business model to do what it is supposed to do.

'Damn the torpedoes, full steam ahead' is a rotten concept.  It suggests that you will wreck the ship at any cost.  A lot of business owners and their business leaders do exactly that.  They get hair brain ideas and forge them forward without good consciousness and in the push to do what should not be done they destroy perfectly good business results.  They, too, will easily blame the economy.  It is such a lame process to witness.  I see this kind of poor leadership a lot.  It is disturbing how evident it is to see by the staff and patrons of the business model yet how blind it is to the leader who does not recognize its presence.  Denial is a very sick and disturbing process.  Certainly there are not enough mirrors in the halls of leadership.  The security cameras may actually be aimed in the wrong direction.

If you are one of those leaders who is working harder on protecting what you are doing, you are one of those leaders who is disturbed in performing what you should be doing.  In your heart you know this is true.  I am here to help you find your way out of this mess and begin turning your career around and so you can perform more successfully.  I have done what you are doing and I am here to tell you it will only work to serve you miserably.  We need to change how we approach our leadership.  Our first step is to forget about the business model for a little while and begin the work on improving our leadership skills.  The business will do exactly what we have been forcing it to do.  The staff will keep it alive.  We can get out of the way for a little while and allow the staff to fill in where they will.  Trust me, they will fill in just fine.

The second step we need to do is get a great piece of literature on leadership to read.  I do not recommend that you ignore this step.  If you skip this step you have already given up.  You have not even started and you are throwing in the towel.  You are more disturbed than you are willing to admit.  Your business future is truly at risk.  Maybe you are done with it.  Maybe you are so tired of it that you want out anyway.  Then get out.  When your will is done fighting, you are cooked.  Get out of the oven.  You are just burning everyone else in the process of sticking around.  This is not about you.  You have chosen your fate and you need to move on.  Get out of the way.  You have become the bad dog.  Get out of their yard.

Sizzling Hot Business Ideas Come With New Socks

I rarely sleep in.  Then again, I rarely see midnight.  In fact, I am a sound sleeper who falls asleep the minute my head hits the pillow.  When I am done for the day, I am done.  There may be a million and five things left to do on my list but my day is done.  It is over.  I filled all of it up as much as I could.  Time to get some rest and restore.

Today is a brand new day.  I get to release all of my energy all over again.  I have stored up a night's worth of energy and today I am releasing it somewhere.  Learn how to treat your business in the same fashion.  Even though I own a business that never goes to sleep, treat it as if it does go to sleep every night.  Pretend your business turns off its lights and begins to restore itself every night.  When it wakes up in the morning it has a whole bunch of new energy waiting to be released for the day.  Learn how to 'pretend' this effect.

Your business model will improve if you learn how to make it fresh every day.  Each day is a new day with new opportunities.  Even though you operate with consistency and excellent routine, you still need to remain fresh and ready every single day for new and exciting things to occur.  If you wake up grumpy in the morning and head to your business model with a small chip on your shoulder, how well do you think magical and wonderful opportunities will arrive?  Not.  Abraham Lincoln was recognized for some famous philosophies.  One of my favorites he professed was that people make themselves just about as happy as they want to be.  In other words, happiness is a learned process.  It is not an accident or a chance occurrence.  Happiness is a planned event.  Happiness and success are the results of something you plan to reach.  They both require you to perform them in order for them to appear.  They are not happenstance favors.

If you walk into your business each day with a happy walk your chance to find a new worthwhile opportunity today are much better than if you walk into your business model with a chip on your shoulder.  It really comes down to the fact that you need to determine how badly you want to respect the responsibility to control your happiness.  Your business cannot sizzle with a bad attitude.  It can go up in flames, but it cannot sizzle.  The first idea you need to work on in order to help your business sizzle is to approach it each day with a healthy walk.  Hit the road running with energy and make sure that energy is ready and willing to produce some fun.  Your perspective has everything to do with that effect.  Clean up what you see and how you see it.  Quit looking for the garbage littered around the edges of your business model.  We all have garbage somewhere.  Refrain from placing your 'F's' on the refrigerator.  Start your day rested, fresh and willing to release a ton of positive energy.  Teach yourself how to become good at it.  Make yourself just about as happy as you want to be.  This is step one to producing sizzling hot ideas.  Get your mind right.

More On Exclusivity

We Love Glamour

I used to try to find suppliers that would sell products to me but nobody else in my marketplace.  I wanted my stores to be exclusive.  I still try to do that kind of thing once in awhile.  There is something about that thinking that will not go away.  I guess we have this need to believe that if we are the only ones who carry a particular brand of product in our marketplace we would benefit from having no competition.  I have learned to think differently over the years.

Once I penciled out the real cost versus profitable return patterns of my exclusive rights buying requirements to protect my exclusive brands from drifting into my competitors stores I discovered how low my margin of profit came out.  I was not making a lot of money trying to discount the amount of product I was required to purchase and make sure I did not get stuck with too much brand inventory.  In order to sell the huge amounts I was required to buy to protect the line, I found I was discounting the items more than I should have been doing to protect the health in my profit.  Offering exclusivity on brand name products is a wonderful idea, just not a profitable one.

When I look back in my retail history and honestly evaluate the dollar benefit of the buying requirements to maintain the exclusive relationships I discovered how much revenue I had to forfeit for the benefit of promoting "their" brand even more.  Looking at the idea with a more pragmatic approach helped me to realize how much it truly was not necessary to approach marketing from an exclusivity slant.  I got trapped like many into believing it was the 'right thing to do.'  Since I killed my efforts to work extra hard on exclusivity, my volume and profits have improved.  I now allow my dollars to do the talking, not my heart's desires.  I can also promise every retailer that this will be one of those hard things for them to give up.  My recommendation, give up working over time on it.  You may be "killing down" your profitability and you do not even know it.

I have helped others to make this kind of mental switch in their marketing efforts and they have had a noticeable improvement in their bottom line.  I have seen it work to the favor of the business models that have made this change in their marketing efforts.  They realized how much gross margin they were forfeiting to maintain the volumes required to secure the brand line they were trying so hard to protect.  Many of those same retailers also found bits and pieces of their exclusive brand products scattered about in their marketplace in very creative ways.  One greeting card company described how they provided a 'one-time-only' unique birthday card promotion that was designed for all comers during a specific time period.  That may be the truth but now every single retailer in your area has at least this name brand in their little retail box for the customers to see.  Your unique efforts have now been violated.  You have been buying a ton more inventory than all of your neighboring competitors to maintain the exclusive rights agreement that was not really an exclusive rights agreement.  How cool is that?  Give it up.  Your bottom line will love you for it.     

The only reason I might recommend exclusivity is if you are trying to market part of your 'product mix' as being unique.  Sometimes having a few unique items scattered about can actually work in your favor.  It can give your presentation a fresh look that does not shine the same in your competitors business models.  If you are not truly an exclusive high-class business by design, you have little reason to work over time on finding exclusive rights to support your product mix.  Do not waste a whole bunch of valuable time on the effort.  If a brand line came across your model with an exclusive offer to 'initially get in' make sure you get it spelled out in writing before you commit to some high dollar purchase requirements.  Do not get too excited until you see the language in print.  Even then you are not protected very much.  Be aware that they are aware of your intrigue to 'fall for' the exclusive marketing idea as being a benefit.  It is usually not a great benefit.  We just want to believe it is.  They know that.  It becomes part of their marketing plan to exploit that truth.  Do not fall in love with exclusivity as your key marketing efforts.  If you are my neighboring competitor, I hope you fully misunderstand this truth.  It will help my bottom line more than yours.  I do not consider that kind of thinking a very good strategy to support.  Believe what you want to believe, but I will still outrun you on bank deposits.  Go ahead, make my day...give your competitor this advantage.

Sour Grapes Stay On The Business Vine

Figure It Out

Your customers believe your business makes a lot of money.  It is a natural assumption.  Get over it.  They believe you mark your products up way too much.  They believe you make a lot of money.  They believe you have a lot of free time.  They believe you can write everything off and get a benefit.  They believe you need more inventory.  They believe you need more free services.  Your customers can smell sour grapes on your business vine a mile away.

I once had an employee work for me who was over-educated for the position he was hired to perform.  He was not my favorite choice for that particular position.  The business model I was hired to manage was one that was failing badly while it was involved in four separate legal disputes, all at the same time.  That business model was littered with sour grape smells on its business vine.  The over-educated employee that was hired was placed in that position by the owner of the troubled business model.  They were friends.  The owner was helping out a friend who was changing his career direction.  The over-educated employee was a physical therapist who no longer enjoyed doing that kind of work.  The business owner offered him a job managing his auto glass warehouse program.  It was not a good match.

I remember listening to many sour grape conversations the over-educated employee shared during his 'stay' with this company.  I was the General Manger, I listened to his sour grape perspectives on life.  He was so sour in his life perspectives he once ate a tin foil wrapped pizza another employee brought to work for lunch and did not think anything was wrong about it.  He unwrapped it, microwaved it and took it to the warehouse to have it for lunch.  When the employee who brought the pizza to work was able to go to lunch, the pizza was gone.  She finally figured out who ate it.  She was mad the rest of the day.  She was the head bookkeeper of the company.  That afternoon she was so disturbed about the stolen lunch she made everyone else have a bad day.  Sour grapes were hanging on that business vine.  The main office of that business was a call center.  The negative energy in that office became very sour.  At least four lines every moment were busy with customers in that office during the open hours.  The negative energy in that office that day was likely felt by some of those customers.  Sour grapes stay on your business vine.  Your customers can feel it.

The over-educated warehouse manager did not care about how mad the bookkeeper got when he ate her lunch without permission.  Guess who was given the assignment to go resolve that issue?  The General Manager, why of course.  GM's are adult day care providers, did you not know that?  Ask a professional sports franchise GM about adult day care, you will get an intriguing education about under-educated multi-millionaire players.  It will amaze you how they think.  Sour grapes come in all sizes, all shapes and all cultures.  They hang on your business vine.  When they get real strong, the customers can smell them.  Sports fans are customers.  Insurance agents are customers.  Auto body shops are customers.  When sour grapes spill out of the lives of your employees, your business vine has them attached for your customers to taste.  Sometimes their life problems become your business vine experiences.

Your customers may have to put up with the sour grapes your employees carry to your business vine.  It happens.  What's more, in some cases you do not have a legal right to get involved with the personal sour grapes your employees bring to work, as they carelessly hang them on your business vine.  Do you have a clear set of personnel policies?  Written?  Does every employee have a printed copy?  If you do not, why not?  Sour grapes from the home of your employees will eventually land on the vine of your business model.  Your customers will eventually smell or taste those sour grapes.  Why should your business model pay for that effect?  Some of your best employees will truly believe that your business model owes them the right to behave like sour grapes when they are not happy at home.  Some of your most educated employees will believe they have the right to eat the lunch of another staff member without permission and never consider it inappropriate.  I clearly remember the conversation I had with that warehouse manager.  It was her fault for not properly marking that tin foil in the lunch room refrigerator.  He said he has thrown away a lot of old left over food in that refrigerator in the past.  Too many people leave old stinky food behind.  He said he is always the one who cleans it up.  He was serious and firm about his position for stealing another employees food.  He justified the theft.  He knew full well it was not his.  He never apologized to her, nor thanked her.  Sour grapes.

He also wanted to know why I, as General Manager of the company, would spend my valuable time getting involved with such a minor issue of non-importance.  He was serious.  By the way, do you hire close friends and family to be a part of your business model?  If you do, how is that working out for you?  Any sour grapes in the pile?

Go Ahead, Repeat What Works Well.

We Plant Every Seed Exactly The Same Way When They Grow Well.

Is anything in your business model working well right now?  If it is, do not stop doing it.

You have heard the phrase...if it ain't broken, don't fix it.  That usually means it is not a good idea to change something that is working well.  If for some reason you discover a method of operation that works well the chances are good that if you change how you do that method you may actually interrupt the good results it was producing.  Do not alter what is working well.  Do not tinker with changing the way something is performing well.  Leave well enough alone.  Let it do what it does well.  Do not try to improve improvements.  These recommendations are all good ideas.  If it ain't broken, don't fix it.

However, when you find something that works well in your business model learn how to do a lot of it.  That is a lot different than trying to fix it.  Sometimes we discover something that works well and we drift away from doing it more often.  We are so busy trying to discover new ways of doing things that work well we can easily walk right by one of them that produces well.  We actually will stop doing what works well.  I have watched businesses set up a wonderful customer appreciation day with a parking lot barbecue, door prizes, specials and gifts.  I watch them set volume records with such an event and for two weeks they discuss how well that event performed.  Then for eleven in a half months they quit doing that kind of stuff and produce the second annual customer appreciation event, when the next year rolls around.  Seriously.  Somehow they have come to believe they can only succeed with this kind of event once per year.  It puzzles me.  Why do well just once per year?  Maybe every weekend is too much to make it happen consistently.  However, what is wrong with twice per year, or three times or even quarterly?  I would take four record weekends over one per year any time.  Go ahead, repeat what works!

What Kind Of Body Language Does Your Business Send?

Does Your Business Bloom Beautifully?

A couple of years ago my wife and I flew back home from a trip to Hawaii.  We had a great trip.  We have visited enough to know that we can now experience new things on the Islands.  This last trip we rented a Harley Davidson Motorcycle and rode around Oahu checking out the botanical gardens.  We stopped at some of the off-the-beat-and-trail local eateries and enjoyed a lot of the places the locals hang out.  We went where the tourists don't usually go.  It was a fabulous trip.

A trip like this takes some planning.  My wife was the event coordinator on this one.  She did a great job researching everything and laying out the plan of events.  It was one of the best and most enjoyable vacations we have ever taken.  We were able to see parts of the life in Hawaii tourist never really see.  We felt much like two local hippies doing our thing.  We did not get treated like tourists, except for the bike rental shop.  The rest of the time we kind of looked like we lived there.  Our body language smelled local.  We did not travel to the popular tourist sights, we did not wear matching Hawaiian shirts and we did not see places where tourists were standing in line.  We decided to make this trip to Hawaii different than the others.  We wanted to see and do different things.

We did ride our Harley to the southeast side of the island.  We took the Harley to where the road actually ends.  There was a beat up old school that still was in operation near the end of that road.  We could see homes that resembled 'stick built huts' in and about the dirt roads and driveways tucked into the trees.  We watched the locals on the southeast side of the island come out of their tents, which were their real homes lined along the miles of rough looking beaches.  We smelled the food barbecuing along those beaches and watched many of the men cooking and fishing to provide their sustenance.  There were no fancy hotels with lines of tourist buses scooting around in this place.  It was local and local only.  There was, however, a McDonald's burger joint in town.  We ate there and it was packed with local families.  It was a strange experience.  Some of the people in the restaurant picked up that we did not belong there.  Body language.

When we returned the rental bike we described where we spent that day.  The owner of the rental shop mentioned that we were not supposed to go to that part of the island.  It is known to be a dangerous part of the island for tourists.  We did not see a tourist bus nor any tourists in the whole area when we spent the day there.  Those folks do not like the idea of how much the tourists have taken over on the other sides of the island.  The folks that live in these parts want to pull away from the rest of the business and politics of the other sides.  The want to live their local life undisturbed.  He was amazed that we did not have trouble travelling to this part of the island.  Just enough body language to get us by.  We looked and acted just like the locals and did not glow "tourists!"  Body language.

Back to the flight home.  We had just settled down into our jet plane seats to return home from one of the best vacations we have ever taken.  We were filled and satisfied.  We were content and happy.  Then out of the blue, while others were still coming aboard to take their seats on the jet ride home, a lady bent over to tell us we had taken her seats.  She had her boarding tickets in hand and began to describe how my wife and I were sitting in her and her husbands seats.  She was very intense and not very polite.  My wife and I were very accommodating and very polite.  Body language.  We had had a great trip and it showed.  They had not had a great trip, and it showed.

After some comparison of both sets of boarding passes, her husband discovered she was wrong.  She was reading the isle markings on the seats incorrectly.  She did not apologize.  He was embarrassed.  Body language.  My wife and I shared 'looks' with each other that represented the idea of "Ah oh, somebody is not happy."  We shared no words, just body language.  We must have been afraid that the 'witch' might hear us.  Body language.

We have heard how you are supposed to do as the Romans do..."when in Rome do as the Romans do."  Make your adjustments and move on.  To this day, my wife and I still use that experience on our flight home from Hawaii as one of the best experiences we had on that trip.  It was an extreme lesson on the effects of body language.  The stewards on that trip became our entertainment laboratory while they tried hard to interact well with this couple.  Eventually, the stewards became frustrated, too.  It was a wonderful piece of laboratory experiment in human body language.  Body language won the war between all of them.  Words completely disappeared.  When the drinks came down the isle on the carts, the stewards would lean over in front of the couple with a can of soda in their hand and look to the lady with their facial expressions raised up with high eyebrows, as if to say, "Want anything to drink?"  It was comical to witness.  No words, just body language.  It was amazing.

We felt fortunate to be the only people they spoke to the entire trip on the flight.  My wife told me to be nice because I was going to offer them one of the books I happened to have in my bag.  It was the classic piece written by Dale Carnegie, "How To Win Friends And Influence People."  I still have to go back to that book once in awhile.  I backslide easily.  My wife kept me from backsliding again on that flight.  We had a full flight of real entertainment of our own right across the isle.  Layers and layers of body language.  One silly little flight.  So many levels of body language.  It was unbelievable.

By the way, how is the body language of your business doing?  Did you know your business has body language?  It does.  You may not know it, but the people outside your business doors are just like my wife and I who were watching this couple from across the isle.  They are checking out your business body language and they are doing it in stealth.  They will talk about your business much like we are still talking about that couple.  The only difference in the two examples is that we do not know that couples name, your customers know your business name.  How is the body language of your business doing?

They Will Not Notice You Washed Your Windows

Some Bully's Are The Little Tasks You Are Avoiding To Do.

They will not notice you washed your windows.  They will however, notice they have not been washed for a very long time.

They will not notice you have toilet paper on the dispenser.  They will notice you are out of toilet paper.

They will not notice you have filled the display racks with plenty of products on sale.  They will notice you are out of the products on sale.

They will not notice you had everything printed correctly in your newspaper advertisement.  They will notice your misprint on the ad you ran in the paper.

They will not notice how accurately your floor pricing matches the same one in the computer for the products you sell.  They will notice when the computer rings up a different price than the one on the product in the floor display.

They will not notice how safe your walking areas are protected.  They will notice when someone left a small box on the floor of an isle that trips them when they go around the corner while they are looking the other way.

They will not notice how your store lighting is always fresh and bright.  They will notice how dark an area is when the bulbs that are burned out are not replaced.

They will not notice how fresh you keep up your website with current notices, messages, specials and dates of interest.  They will notice how you forgot to remove an outdated message about an up-coming event that has long since been held.

They will not notice how much effort you place on keeping your business clean everywhere.  They will notice a small spill on the floor that reminds them of something they would just as soon not see.

They will not notice how strong your personal hygiene policies are for your employees.  They will notice any employee who does not respect personal appearance.

They will not notice how well your employees speak with clarity and friendliness.  They will notice when one of your employees uses vulgar language with another employee.

They will not notice how many times you deliver their products on time.  They will notice when you do not arrive when you promised you would make their delivery.

They will not notice how you never need to describe an excuse for something your business failed to perform.  They will not notice that stuff.  They will, however, notice you need an excuse to explain how you did something wrong.

They will not notice how often you correctly count their change back when they are at your cash register.  They will notice when you fail to give them their change back properly.

Your business mistakes will glow brighter than the things you do well.  Just about every time.  Every mistake you make will jump off the page as if the mistake is made in an altogether different color.  Customers see mistakes much brighter than the things you do well.  Customers will more than likely glow with the little mistakes your business model makes.  Customers will not glow with the millions of things you do well.  Most of the things you do well will not be noticed.  There is usually no fanfare for making sure toilet paper is on the dispenser at all times.  Nobody gets a badge of honor for that kind of great work.  However, someone was given that responsibility and is expected to make sure it gets done correctly.  It is a little detail that means a lot to the customers you serve.  I know we live in a more accepting day and age, but I still meet customers who will not go back to a business because the person behind the cash register has multiple tattoos and body piercings.  If that is the case, I make sure I do not place someone with those limitations on my registers.  It is simple math.

My business model is never an extension of my personal, political or social agendas.  My business model is not designed to be a forum function for my beliefs.  It is a business and a business only.  My business models are only designed to produce a reasonable rate of return, one that delivers profit.  I make sure I do not get confused about that role.  I do not wake up each morning wondering about how many customers I offend during the day.  I work harder on making sure none are offended.  None.  It is an absolute.

Be A Performer, Deliver Excellent Work

Excellence Is A Continuum

Get a plan in place how you will personally do your daily work.

You have developed habits to do things every day that consumer your time.  Those things you have included in your daily habits are a direct link to how well your day will be completed.  If you sluff off on your work responsibilities, your day will end up undone in many areas.  If you sluff off enough, you will have a lot of days that are left undone.  This kind of approach to your work will lead to poor maintenance and a lot of missed opportunities.  Poor maintenance habits will lead to high cost replacement expenses which will unfairly eat into your profit structure.  Missed opportunities will shorten up your revenue streams.  Running a business with higher  expenses and lower revenues is not a very good combination to manage.  Quit it.

Get a plan in place how you will personally do your daily work.

Your plan should included finishing what you started.  Do not develop the habit of leaving your tasks before they are finished.  Complete them.  Become a completer, not a starter.  Starting is easy work.  Completing is usually difficult work.  Become good at doing the difficult stuff.  Complete the tasks you start.

Good performers complete what they started.  They do not walk off the stage in the middle of the show.  They finish their performance.  Once you learn how to finish a project you started, you will eventually learn how to do them very well.  Doing excellent work takes time and a good mind will learn how to start a project, do it excellently and make sure it sees an end that provides an excellent show.  Once you get this habit down well your work performance will improve tremendously and your business profit picture will begin to improve.

My wife handles two small business affairs.  She does not take them lightly.  I watch her make sure she does excellent work.  Her habits have become so serious about doing good work she will not take on any other project until those duties are completely finished.  Period.  She has developed the habit of doing excellent work and completing her tasks that she starts.  On those two subjects, she does not skip a beat.  She finishes what she starts and she does excellent work on the tasks she starts.  It has become her trademark for her operations.  Here is the reward...she continually makes a profit on both business models.  She always wins.

Winning is a habit force.  It has nothing to do with luck.  It requires hard work, consistent work, serious attention and high levels of single-minded focus.  My wife does all of these duties very well.  It helps her to win the games of business she performs.  If something she was doing gets interrupted and takes her off her 'project point' she will be bothered by that until she gets back to completing what she started.  It is as if a reminder list is flying around her face like an irritating fly.  An undone project will bug her until it gets finished.  She is a completer.  It has helped her to become very profitable in what she manages.  Her small business models make money.  They always win.  She sees to it that they always win.  She is a performer and makes sure she performs excellent work.  She will clearly protect that habit pattern.  If you work for her, you will immediately notice how serious this stuff is to her.  Her demand for excellence in her work habits is not a secret.

I love to listen to Dave Ramsey speak.  He is a celebrity evangelical business adviser.  He has a radio program I catch once in awhile.  On one program he described my wife perfectly.  He said he expects everyone to work as hard as he does.  He said he has about 310 employees in his business models and the work they perform will appear as if he employs 700 people.  My wife and I are two people that do the work of 10.  We are not strangers to performing a lot of work every day.  I can relate to Dave Ramsey's performance descriptions.  My wife is a good model for what he professes is necessary for success.  Maybe that is why she is continually successful in her small business models.  She does the right work, in the right amount of time and exceeds her performance goals continually as a habit force.  It has become the same as breathing to her.

Dave Ramsey said if you work for him, you better get yourself ready to work hard every single day.  He expects no less.  He will not tolerate less.  He does not care to employ people who want to sluff off.  They can go work for someone else.  He said there are plenty of other bosses that will tolerate that kind of approach.  He is not one of them.  Do not apply for work with his organizations if you plan to sluff off at work.  It will only lead to a day when he will can your fanny.  Dave said he has no problem firing people who do not work hard.  He said he is tired of people asking why he fired them when they made no mistakes at work.  He said when you do not work hard all day long, you made the biggest mistake there is to make.  You failed to work hard all of the time.  I like Dave's philosophy.  I notice my wife could work for Dave.  Profit is a planned event.  You have to make it happen.  Profit is the by-product of doing a lot of things well, completing what you started and making sure you stay at it every moment you are in its area.  Profit is a lot like Dave Ramsey, it will can your fanny if you sluff off.

I have terminated many workers in my life of business leadership.  I have had conversations with some of those workers I fired that sounded like I was suggesting that they go work for someone else.  I have told some of the ones I fired that they are nice people but their work habits are under par.  The position I needed them to fill did not require it to be filled by nice people.  It required them to do some consistent hard work.  I practice what I call one, two, three.  When I notice an employee not performing well in an area, I give them number one.  Number one is they apparently did not know what was expected.  I give them number one, I describe what is expected, again.  I tell them, that is number one.  Number two is when I suspend them to go think about their future working with my business models.  Some have never come back.  A lot of times number two has done the trick.  Number two also protects my liability.  I am giving them an official chance to correct how they work.  It is very difficult for anyone to cry bloody murder or mistreatment when they are given a second chance to mend how they work in my models.  When I give out number two I usually suggest they consider coming up to speed or consider working for someone else who is a lot softer.

Whomever Takes Credit, Takes Nothing.

I like a good cup of coffee.  I am a coffee junkie.  I am not particular about my coffee until I have a really good cup.  Then all of the sudden, it catches my attention.  If someone makes a good cup of coffee, I usually ask them what brand and variety they used.  I am interested in knowing the type of bean that made that good cup.  It is a funny thing, however, sometimes it is the technique of the brewer that makes the good cup happen.  Yet I really never ask what specific techniques in the process they used to brew the cup.  I have my favorite coffee shops and in each of them I have my favorite brewers.  I know there is a difference.  I can taste it.

Sometimes I will arrive to my favorite coffee shop expecting to get a great cup of coffee and I do not see my favorite brewer on schedule.  Subconsciously I say to myself, "Not today."  So I usually cover for the rest of the brewers and ask for my cup to be extra 'hot' so I can experience a fairly good cup of coffee, just in case.  It is as if I want to win even if the cards are stacked against me.

We all have habits and some brewers just do not change how they make their coffee.  They make their coffee pretty much the same way every time.  Who gets the credit when the cup is really good?  The coffee shop?  The type of coffee bean?  The brew master?  I have met people for a cup of coffee when I am doing business with them.  I will ask them where they want to go for a cup of coffee.  A lot of them will describe their favorite coffee shop.  So we meet where they want to go.  Some will pick a shop that carries a certain brand of coffee bean.  They will tell me why they like that coffee shop, it has the 'right' bean...StumpTown, or some other particular brand.  Never once has someone said they wanted to go to a particular coffee shop because 'Kevin' is there and he makes the best cup.  Never once has anyone ever mentioned the brewers name as their favorite.  It is usually the shop or the bean that gets the credit.  The brewer takes nothing.

We are funny creatures when it comes to being customers.  We develop interesting patterns that we use to support how we buy what we purchase and where we go to buy the items we buy.  We have interesting patterns we develop that support our buying habits.  We buy toilet paper just as methodically as we buy good cups of coffee.  The habit of buying stuff is very important to us.  We take the credit when our choices turn out very good.  We blame the shops when our choices are not so good.  We are very protective of the patterns we use to choose where we go to do our business.  We refuse to be recognized as crappy shoppers.  Blame is usually laid on something other than ourselves.  We take the credit when it is a good choice.  We are the ones who found the good deal.  We will actually call someone else to tell them about a great deal "WE" discovered.  We take credit for finding it and want them to know all about what "WE" found.  It is like receiving the great shopping badge!

If you own a business pay close attention to this process.  Shopping successfully is very important stuff to the consumer.  They want to be recognized for the great shopping discoveries they find.  They want to be pleasantly surprised and will immediately share their discoveries with others.  Do the things that will encourage them to feel like they can receive credit for discovering the good things you do.  The 'tell a friend' campaigns you have seen with many large organizations in history have worked very well for those organizations.  State Farm Insurance, Safeway, AT & T and many more have run successful campaigns describing how you can be recognized for telling a friend about what you have found.  State Farm Insurance, Safeway and AT & T did not take the credit in those campaigns, they gave the credit to the consumer.  They 'told' the consumer this is where you can take the credit, tell your friends and family where you made this discovery.    

Your business model should remain humble in its successes.  You want your customers to feel at ease for what they discover, not because you show off to them how well you are doing.  Customers do not like arrogant kinds of marketing.  They feel 'pushed' when you keep taking the credit.  Campaigns that describe how you are number one will eventually ensure that you will slip below the number one spot.  Whomever takes credit, takes nothing.  The consumer will eventually quit trading with an arrogant operation.  That arrogant operation will eventually take nothing.  Once they recognize your organizations arrogance, there will not be much to take anymore.  Be careful.  Remember, customers are very fickle.  They will flash and disappear very quickly.  Learn how to help them 'discover' your good things and make it easy for them to take the credit.  Your check book will love you for it.

How do we do this stuff?  How do we encourage our customers to take credit for what they discover?