Develop Strategic Business Units The strategic business unit concept revolutionized multi-product or multi-service businesses; each of products is grouped with similar products or services in different ways. The starting point of implementation is to have someone specifically responsible for operations and results of unit. To make this work, you begin by drawing up a complete business plan that would include sales revenue, costs and profitability.

Sell More Effectively The fact is that 80 percent of your markets have not yet been approached by your salespeople. No one has told them about you. Your business could be probably being selling twice as much if you could just find out how to sell it to them.

Eliminate Bottlenecks There are two important steps that you need to take. First, decide on your specific business goals; make them clear, measurable and time-bounded. The next step is asking question: “why am not in that goal already?”

Reengineer Your Company To simplify and streamline your operations so that it is more efficient, faster and more effective and therefore more profitable, you have to reduce number of steps in each process. You have to simplify processes and make faster and better decision.

Pump Up Your Profits Conduct a complete profit analysis on every product. You must also remember that labor has a real “opportunity” cost along with other use of other resources especially in a multi-product or multi-services business.

Focus on Results All your customers care about is results. They do not care much about your problems with your people, products, processes or any other aspects of your business.

There are four questions that customers answer before buying product or service. These are:

What does it cost? What do I get for money? How fast do I get benefits you promise? How sure can I be that I will get those benefits?

Seven Steps to Personal Performance

Step 1: Set clear, specific, written goals for each important area of your business. Make them measurable and time-bound. Step 2: Make a list of activities before you begin a day, put it on paper. The best time to do this is before you go to bed so subconscious mind can work on your list as you sleep. Step 3: Set priorities on list you made. Apply 80/20 rule and select top 20 percent of your tasks to work on. Step 4: Practice creative procrastination. Since there are only 24 hours in a day, decide in advance which of those tasks have little value or importance can you do away with. Step 5: Select one most important job and have discipline to accomplish that first thing. Step 6: Practice single-handling with most important task you have identified. Resolve to work on it until it is resolved. Step 7: Develop a sense of urgency. The faster you move, more work you get done and better you feel. This will create momentum.

By: Regine P. Azurin and Yvette Pantilla http://www.bizsum.com "A Lot Of Great Books....Too Little Time To Read" Free Book Summaries Of Latest Bestsellers for Busy Executives and Entrepreneurs

Mailto: mailto:freearticle@bizsum.com BusinessSummaries is a BusinessSummaries.com service. (c) Copyright 2001- 2005 ,BusinessSummaries.com - Wisdom In A Nutshell

Regine Azurin is the President of BusinessSummaries.com, a company that provides business book summaries of the latest bestsellers for busy executives and entrepreneurs.

(Now there's an opportun'ity if I ever saw one!)

Most businesses fail because they fail to use a proven system. Conversely, most businesses that use a proven system succeed.

============================================================ Whether you're an employee or an owner, will your business be 1 in 20 that survives? ============================================================

The way for a company to survive is to create a system, a "recipe," for making business work.

But wait! A recipe is more than ingredients. A good recipe includes right process!

"If you can't describe what you are doing as a process, you don't know what you're doing." W. Edwards Deming (1900 - 1993)

Here is an overview of basic 7-step process (actually a loop) that I discussed in PVT 5. Let's review:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 1. Assess current conditions (what does incoming communications tell you n0w?)

2. Communicate your intentions (promote your purposes and delegate downward)

3. Organize resources for producing your product

4. Produce your product

5. Qualify your product (does it pass muster?)

6. Distribute (deliver) your product

7. (Return to step 1.) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

People make a big mistake starting in Step 4. They think that their product is COMMODITY (chocolate cake).

Thus, they omit most important products that make long-term success possible. The most important products are their proprietary recipes and processes - and company itself!

These products must be developed refined, proven, and kept up-to-date. (Unfortunately, most people don't realize company is a product.)

To achieve this, you must include your proprietary recipes and processes - and company itself in all 7 steps! If you don't, your focus will remain on COMMODITY and technical work. And you can kiss your Entrepreneurial Dream goodbye!

My critical message is this:

According to research, most businesses fail because of "management incompetence" and solution is for management to build success into your business processes.

If what I've said is true for a business, what is true for individual employees? I will discuss that issue in next week's PVT. Don't miss it!

Success is no accident. Success leaves clues. You can create success on purpose.

You decide.

What did you learn today that you found most beneficial? How will you apply what you have learned at work? Comments are welcome. mailto:Mike@SeniorManagementServices.com

Until next week...

Best Regards,

Mike Hayden, Principal/Consultant Your partner in streamlining business.

PS. If you're not on our P V T Roster, sign up (fr#e) at: http://www.SeniorManagementServices.com

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

(c) 2005 Mike Hayden, All rights reserved. You may use material from Profitable Venture Tactics eZine in whole or in part, as long as you include complete attribution, including live website links and email link.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *