Suppose for a moment that there are 2 of you: Boss You and Employee You.
Boss You walks into Employee You's office. What do You think about Your desk? Would you hire you to work for you? Is Employee You neat and organized or a perpetual slob with papers piled up, falling off the edges of the desk? Does Employee You waste 20 minutes every morning and afternoon looking for an important paper that got lost somewhere when it's usually been left in the copier or fallen under the desk last week and is now dusty and has a shoe-print on it? If Employee You worked for anyone else, You would have been fired long ago.
NOW...Would You WORK For You?
What does Employee You really think about Boss You? Does Boss You make good decisions in a timely manner or does Boss You let things just happen, even if those things happen slowly, badly, and cost both of you money?
Does Boss You continue to rely on "friends" in the business just because they are friends, even if they don't deliver on time, or make excuses, and once again, waste time and money?
Is Boss You more interested in having an important job title than in actually setting progressive goals to promote more business? If you worked for you, would you take yourself seriously as the head of a business?
Does Boss You put the customers first and keep striving to be the best and offer the best? Does Employee You take your job seriously?
NOW...if you started your own business TODAY, would you be running it the way you have been running it up until now? Seriously think about what you need to change, and make those changes this minute, not next Monday, not tomorrow, NOW.
If you're sloppy, organize your paperwork, the top of your desk, the drawers of your desk, and file your papers into folders and label them. Keep accurate records of your customers, when you last had contact with them, what they ordered, how much they spent. Did you send them a confirmation letter with another offer enclosed? That's what you should always do.
If you were truly the boss...if you keep doing business with companies or any service people who don't deliver in a timely manner, (such as printers, typesetters) find new ones to handle your business. Time is money. The companies you cease relationships with WILL notice, and they will know if they lost one customer, they may lose more, then they'll have no choice but to improve.
You need to improve as a boss and an employee, and you should only want to do business with people who take you seriously, so you need to BE serious.
|