Tag: Business leader

Top 3 Uses for Procedures that will Make Running Your Business Easier

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I’m a big believer in process. I know that successful businesses and successful people do not “wing it”. Recently I was speaking at a 175th Anniversary and afterwards I had numerous people come up to me and say, ‘Wow you were amazing. I don’t know how you can just stand up there and wing it and do such an amazing job!” I let them know that it is because I have a process for preparing for my talks, seminars, and speeches and I had practiced.

You should have a process for every aspect of your business. This does not mean that you script your every move and take away the spontaneity and ability to create and change, it means you create steps that allow you to recreate the things that add to your clients experience and avoid the things that make running a business difficult.

Here are 3 places where having a procedure will help make running your business easier and add to your client’s overall buying experience.

1. Training Employees

Businesspeople training on LaptopIf you want to offload your work to a VA (virtual assistant) or have staff run your business there needs to be procedures that help people follow the process that creates the best outcome for the business and for your client. From sales, to clean-up, bookkeeping to invoicing, every task within your business has a process that needs to be identified. Ask your assistant to write down the steps it took to perform the task she does routinely for you, record your steps in a project so you can reproduce the best parts over and over again for other clients, get video of you performing your business, create procedures to capture the steps taken to make it happen. Procedures for your business are like recipes in cooking. If you don’t follow the recipe and the meal can be ruined.

2. Help with Sales

To be successful at sales you need to have a reproducible process. At some point when you are growing your company you will want to hire someone else to help you. This will not be successful if that new person makes up their own marketing language, steps to the sales, or promises things you cannot do, etc. Again, record the steps you go through that produced your best clients, write down your sales script so that certain, important facts and language are always used, and make sure people not only get training on how to use it, but ongoing support in implementing and improving your sales process.

I have a client that is a sales professional. One business he worked for had a great process but no ongoing support. They gave it to him and told him to, ‘go, do sales’. It was a short-lived relationship because he never felt great about the support the company might give to the customer. The company he is with now would bring him in regularly to talk about the process, what did and did not work for him, why he felt like he did. That step in their training made him their highest sales producer in less than a month. Their sales process worked and they knew it. They had to be sure their training process worked too or their sales people would not know their sales process.

3. Create New Products

It is surprising how easy it can be to create a produce out of the process you are already using. I have a client that does business videos. People are interested but the purchase of a video is not easily understood. By writing down her entire creation process she created a base video production product she can more easily market. By knowing exactly what was in her base product she could then create tiers of her offering by adding bonuses, like day-long shoots.

Now when she is hired to do a project her entire process is mapped out for her. She can also make the process partially automated by having auto-responders send out instructions for booking and preparing for the shoot. It saves her time and she actually makes more money on each projects.

Two Other Uses

Businesswoman Wearing Headset at ComputerThere are two other uses I would recommend evaluating your processes for: 1. Customer Service and Customer Support, 2. Automate all or part of a process. Don’t stop with these five uses though, think of everything that you do in your business as being more time efficient and more money making if you don’t have to reproduce your actions every time.

Where have you used procedures that have improved your business operations or your client’s experience? Share your ideas below.

 

2012 revisit to ‘SMARTAR’ Goals

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Last year in December 2010 I found a book I had started with my goals for 2009. I had since transferred that information to a bound book and then had forgotten about this notepad. What I found then was that my 2009 goals were still the same, but the time line for some has come and past. Sometimes we have to stumble on your intentions to take note of them. That is when I set my new goals for 2011.

Now I am setting my 2012 goals, but first I’m starting with an accomplishment list from 2011 and I want this for you. I want you to take inventory of not only the goals that you met, but all the things you accomplished over the year. It is always surprising to me when I review my daily accomplishment journal to see all the successes, completed tasks, and new implementations that I’ve been able to achieve. Many of them are only stepping stones to a single goal but are huge accomplishments in themselves.

Daily Accomplishments Journal exampleIf you do not already keep a daily accomplishment journal then start one. Here is an example of what I use. My mentor Fabienne Fredrickson suggested writing down 5 accomplishments each day. You can start with the numbers down the side of each page to capture these items. This should be easily completed daily, but if it is a slow day then, as a last resort, I suggest writing the steps of an accomplishment as its own accomplishment. You should always have at least 5 accomplishments on this page.

I also have added five things to the top of my list to check off as I go through my day (or at the end of my day) as things that I want to accomplish every day. Drinking water, eating well, and exercise is important to my health. Talking with potential clients, mentors or peers is important to my business growth and constantly learning is important to my personal growth. All of these are important to my ability to do my business and live a happy life. By the end of the day I like to see at least 8 checks beside the water and 2 beside the salad. Set your own important daily task check list. Don’t make it too long or too difficult. It should be something that you need to accomplish every day.

Take a look back at my past two blog posts from 2010 on ‘SMARTAR’ goals to help you prepare for 2012

What is your biggest goal for 2012 and what are your quarterly, monthly, weekly, and daily steps you are going to take to make it happen?

Relationships Are Like Soundwaves

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In the physics of soundwave interference there is something known as ‘Constructive and Destructive Interference’. This occurs when two (or more) waves interact with each other. The amplitude of both waves are changed by the other. Specifically, the amplitude (which refers to the height of the wave) can be increased or decreased by the positive or negative height of the other wave at the time they interact.

Wave Interference

Relationships are like this. Your positive energy can be increased or decreased by the positive or negative energy of the people you interact with. If you have ever had a friend that is typically negative, you know that it takes a lot of your energy to support your relationship.

For example:

I have a close friend (let’s call her Jane) that has just come to realize that one of her best friends fits this description. They are very close, but Jane has never been able to explain why she feels exhausted after spending time with her friend. During a conversation with Jane about the energy of our relationships, Jane had an epiphany; the things that she is passionate about and can spend hours speaking to, without effort, are not the things her best friend finds interesting.

In fact, her friend will not accept the ideas and will often nay-say the topic. The result is that Jane will only bring topics to their conversations that they can both speak to and share interest in. Unfortunately these topics are not Jane’s passion.  To hold a sustained focus on something that is not your driving passion requires more energy. So for Jane, her friend’s negative response to and lack of acceptance for her highly-positive passion requires Jane to actively engage in conversations that require more of her energy to focus on and thus is not as positive experience for her.

Relationships in Business

We have all heard that we are the combination of the success of the five people we spend the most amount of time with. That is that we can only achieve the level of success that is a result of the highest level of success of our closest support and peers. If we are more successful than all the people we spend most of our time with, we are then seen as a mentor to all and that requires energy and stops us from growing.

Ken Robinson, in his book ‘The Element‘, refers to this as our ‘tribe’. We choose our tribe for how they make us feel and how easy it is for us to communicate within the tribe. The people in the tribe understand us and make it easy for us to be understood. We are usually supported for the way we think and encouraged to reach goals that are seen as achievable.

This is why, when we want to change our level of wealth or health or other, it is important that we reach out to others that have done it or are going through the same thing. So, in business you want to reach out to the others in your support system that can increase your positive energy by easily understanding what you are doing and support your goals. Their positive support should match the energy of your passion so that you can reach the greatest level of success as possible.

If you have a negative friend, don’t dump them, just spend more time with the people that will really help you with your vision and make it easier for you to achieve it.

 

Who Are Our Next CEO’s?

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I was reading an article from C Level Strategies, “The CEO’s Most Pressing People Challenges” asking CEO’s what they foresee as the most pressing people challenges for the next 10 years. One of the responses by Craig Juengling he got me to thinking not just about the employee challenges but management and C-Level challenges for the future.

As the current management of Baby Boomers retires it may be the expectation that the Gen-Xer’s get to take over the positions, but there is a lot of indication that our bosses will be younger than us. Gen-Xer’s were brought up the same way as the Baby Boomers except we were told that we probably would not have a pension when we retired, like our parents. We were still told that getting a good education would reward us with a good job.

My friends that have had a good job for many years are now finding themselves out of work, highly educated (in fact at one point we were described as the most educated generation in history) and unemployable. When I tell people I stopped counting after my 23rd position I used to feel unworthy of a good position, but now I know I have the skills to be valuable to not only my own two companies but many other companies as well. I am marketable because of my diversity and so are the younger generations.

The younger generations are not as likely to be told that they will have a job for life. With effective globalization, outsourcing, and automation many of the jobs we thought our children could get as a job do not exist or will not exist when they graduate. They are brought up in a world of whirl-wind change and accept change as a norm. They are more willing, by nature, to accept change, to create progress because they know that progress without change is impossible.

I feel that the Gen-Xer’s will fail to step into their Baby Boomer roles because these roles will not exist and they will not be as willing to accept the acceleration of change required to succeed in this new economy.

So what does this mean for your business? You will need a different mindset around business growth to be competitive in today’s market. Continue to learn, read books like “A Whole New Mind” by Daniel Pink or “The Element” by Ken Robinson to find your passion and hone your right-brain skills so that you will be on the top of your CEO game.

Our next CEO’s will be individuals willing to think critically and creatively and not necessary those with the longest serving record or the most credentials. And my prediction is, with the trend of women starting new business, CEO’s are likely to be women in their 30’s and 40’s.

 

Do it Now or Later: Perfection Paralysis Revealed

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Have you ever felt that your list of things to do keeps getting longer as you get closer to the time you need to launch something? Often we will set ourselves soft-release dates because we know that it is difficult to make hard-deadlines.

When you continually put off completing something because it never feels quite ready we referred to as ‘perfection paralysis’. This is the paralysis of the growth of business due to the inability to make some piece of the business perfect enough to share it with others. Business just does not work like that.

I have worked many years in manufacturing. The clients that I have had that are really successful meet their deadlines. They do this by defining their specifications (what they expect to create) and then they make it. They don’t add extra touches, because the client would like it, during this round of development. For every change they could add it would change the deadline. The problem with making changes during development is that the deadline date often does not change with it and it is then missed or it keeps getting pushed out arbitrarily. It has the side effect of making the people working on the project weary and frustrated because they feel ineffectual.

This could happen to you too. If you set a deadline and deliver on that date, you have achieved a goal and you will be keen to continue to create. If you continually develop, missing deadlines or, even worse, not setting deadlines you will feel like you can never close. Do yourself a favour, follow these three tips to give yourself and your business the reward of accomplishing great things and then continue to create.

3 Tips to Overcome this Debilitating Syndrome

1. Set a deadline that cannot be missed.

To make your deadline more concrete, invite people to be a witness to the unveiling. For instance, if I want to start a new program, I host a free introduction and in that introduction I announce the upcoming date for my new program. This way, people are expecting it at a specific time and I will be required to be ready on that date.

Tell people you have a new service, even if you don’t have a name for it. Announce your opening, even if the location is not ready. Advertise your new product, even if it is not complete. What is the worst that can happen? You will have to postpone. But I guarantee you won’t want to do that and you will be much more likely to be ready, even if it is not exactly the way you perceived it to be when complete.

2. Think to yourself, “just get started”.

The sooner you get started the sooner you can start making money with it. Make sure the key components are in place (the brand language is used, the clients can purchase it, it works as expected). If it is a good product you will have time to continually make it better, which is what you should be doing anyway.

3. Act ‘as if’

Act as if it is exactly what you wanted – then continue to improve as you grow the business. I guarantee that it will never be perfect and even if it is, within weeks of launching, something will be revealed that can make it even more perfect. Everything you create will be like a work of art in production. To create a business that grows, you will always need to be evaluating the value of your products and service and your client needs. Don’t think you can create something, launch it, and that is it.

So don’t waste excessive time making it perfect for that launch. Get the pieces in place to make the business work and your clients happy, launch, and then improve.

Check Out this Book

A great book to help you with this mindset is Linchpin: Are You Indispensable?, by Seth Godin, which spends some time on what he calls ‘shipping’.

The ‘Give’ That Will Give Back

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We have all heard the statement “If you give you will get back” and sometimes that is appended with “in spades”. It starts in grade school with the teaching of ‘The Golden Rule’ (do onto others as you would have them do unto you). There are several businesses that base their foundation on this idea, like  BNI whose philosophy is “Givers Gain” and eWomen Network which uses “Give First”. But what some people sometimes feel is they give and give and never see anything back (or at least not what they have put into it.) Here are some tips to make your ‘gives’ really meaningful so that others will truly see you as a giver and will give back.

Give without Expectation

This one is hard because we have been told to expect reciprocation, or that is what many of us read into the statements above, but it is not necessarily reciprocation. When we give we should not be expecting for something in return.

I worked with someone that would give all the time and then spend much of her time in tears because these people where betraying her by not giving back. Maybe she was giving to the wrong people and expected something they were unable to give, but more likely it was that she always gave with the expectation that these people would become or continue to be ongoing clients.

What would have been a better way of looking at it would be to hope that these people had the ability to help someone else out. Then this person would have been seen as a true giver and people would have wanted to help her out instead of feeling indebted to her. Being in debt to someone is a crappy feeling and is a form of payment. Don’t make people feel this way. When you are in ‘the giving place’ the gifts come back to you, often from unexpected places.

Know People’s ‘What’

When you are talking with people don’t be listening for what you can get from them, but be thinking about what you can do for them. It will put you into a true giving place and will also make you a better listen. Great listeners are often thought of as great people. We all like to be heard, so put your listening ears on and focus on their ‘What’ or their need. It will be easier for you to help them if you can.

Make an Effort

Giving takes more time than most people allocate for it. You will need to make time to contact and connect the people you have promised to help. Sometimes I’ve had to make more than one attempt to connect with someone I know but the better I get at helping people the easier it is for me to reach people. When I make a concerted effort to help someone once, they are more likely to be available for me to connect them with someone else. Remember, this is also part of your marketing so you will have to put aside not only time to do the networking, make the connections, and follow up, but also set aside time to help others reach their goals. If you are not putting aside time for marketing each day then do it now. Start with 30-90 minutes a day, schedule it in, and follow through on focusing your efforts on your marketing and the people that you can help.

Share your Goals

People cannot help you if they do not know what you need. When they have put on their listening ears and are giving you the gift of their attention then use it wisely. Know what it is you are working towards and what you need to achieve it. Be specific so they can really make the connection between what you need and what they can do to help you.

Be Thankful and Genuine

People love to help because it is like giving a gift. When you give a gift it is not only given to the recipient but it is also a gift to the giver. We love the feeling of being able to give something that makes others happy. So, when someone gives you a gift (a referral, their time, their full attention, or more) remember that it is also a gift for them. Accept it graciously and say thank you. As simple as that sounds it is often hard for us to accept gifts. Here is an easy example to see where we go wrong.

Two friends meet each other in a store.

Patty, “Hi Sue, you look amazing. I love your hair”

Sue, “Thanks, I need to get to the gym more often plus I really need to get my hair coloured soon.”

Why don’t we just say “Thank you”,  accept the gift, and keep the negative talk for another time.

When you give, make it real. Give it and let it go. Don’t spend time or energy waiting for it to come back. Give for their benefit, not your own. Genuine gifts are the ones that create a person that others will want to be in a relationship of reciprocity with. Become that person.

Aside – My friend and colleague Jackie Ramler has a program in her business that supports her employees’ giving to charity. They each get to pick their own charity and then they get one day paid a month to volunteer for their charity. That gift has given her back the most incredible team to work with.

5 Important Business Skills You can Learn from Animals

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It is surprising to me where we can learn our lessons around how to behave, build,
and interact in life. I want to draw an analogy between the way animals live their lives and how business is run and I think you will appreciate the parallels between their success and yours as a business owner.

Safe Does Not Equal Growth

Have you ever been driving down the road and you see a squirrel start to cross. When it sees your car it has no idea if it is safer to continue across the road or go back. Unfortunately for many squirrels they can remember the safety of the place they just came from but they cannot perceive the value of the risk of completing the cross. Often they are closer to the other side and will still make a dash back to the side they know is safe with the result of running under a car.

In business we are sometimes like squirrels. We are more comfortable making decisions that will result in us staying in a mode we are familiar and comfortable with.  Taking risk sometimes means making a step towards the unknown. Once there, we may think, “why didn’t I do this sooner?”

Staying where it is safe will not get you change or growth, it will only get you more of what you have always had. To grow we have to look for that new path.  Unlike a squirrel we can more easily predict our future path.

Break it down to one road crossing at a time and then the entire trek to somewhere new will become much easier. Worded another way; “Break down your big goals into one step at a time.” Completing each step will be easier than trying to jump right to the end goal. You have to know how to get to your destination to ensure you take on as little risk as possible.

Evaluate Risk

OK, still on the road you see a crow standing in your path some yards in the distance. It has interest in whatever is on the road and has determined that it is safe enough to be where it is. Somehow the crow is able to judge the rate at which you are approaching in the car and without effort or anguish the crow steps to the side of the road so you can pass. They don’t even necessarily fly away. They know how to avoid your car by the minimum amount of distance as to reduce the amount of time they are away from their ‘road-treasure’.

In our businesses we need to know what types of risks we have. Doing and understanding your SWOT analysis will help you visualize the things that may occur in your business. Anticipating issues helps keep them in perspective so that you can avoid them with as little disruption to your business as possible.

Manage Change

Beaver manages changeWhile paddling across the water to enjoy the beauty of the Canadian Northern wilderness we came across beaver lodges. What was interesting was to see the holes that went into the lodge above the water level. Earlier in the season the water had been quite high and much of the area was flooded so the beavers had started their lodges at that level. But as the levels fell, so did the entrance to their homes. The lodge stretched down the bank until it was unreasonable to continue in the same lodge and then they would abandon it for a new location.

In business we often have to stretch our ideas, time, perseverance, attitude, and dollars to continue to do what needs to get done. At some point, after the change is too significant to continue with the same process we need to re-evaluate to determine if it is better to start over with something else or somewhere else.

Business is always changing. There is never a time when we should not be looking at what has to be done and where next to build. If a business is not growing it is dying.  You must be looking at growth and change just to maintain the same level of profit. That said, if you want a significant level of change in your profit you need to look at a significant level of change in your business.

 Competition can Change the Landscape

In Ontario we have recently seen a resurgence of a species of Cormorant that was nearly wiped out earlier in the 20th century. Given space the species has increased in numbers. Some would say too many, but others would applaud the gains they have made in their ancestors fishing grounds.  The reduction in pesticide use and the fact that they are protected is credited to their return.

If you have ever crossed the Burlington Bay- James N Allen Skyway into Hamilton you will have witnessed this change. Once an empty, industrial bay of dark water it now is home to thousands of cormorants sitting in the small trees and shrubs along the side of the water’s edge.  So many in fact, the trees look black.

What makes them so successful? They are experts as fishing in a way most other predators, besides humans, are capable of doing. So successful I’ve heard fishermen curse them because they are taking away their catch.  Fishermen and cormorants are competitors for resources. Being an expert and focusing on their niche expertise has given them an edge.

In business you need to keep your eye on what is changing so you can successfully compete. As laws and behaviours change so do the needs of your client. If you are not following these changes then someone else will come in and take away your clients by meeting their needs in this newly created market.

Find your Niche

Why do we find mosquitoes almost everywhere in the world? Why are they so successful? There are over 3500 species around the world and there are surprisingly few predators. The greatest predators to this pest of humans are animals that live or have part of their life cycle in the waters where the mosquito larvae grow.

There are two successes here; one is that the mosquito focuses its life cycle on places where it has a lot of warm, standing pools of water. The second is the predictors that focus their eating niche on the abundance of this one prey.

 

In business you need to know what your company has as its expertise and then you have to focus on the client it can best help. Once you know exactly who you are targeting you can determine where you are going to find your client in the most concentration. The more focused you are, the easier it is to get more clients.

Recently I wrote a blog describing four words I though people should be careful using. There is one word I forgot to mention. If I could banish one word from the business person’s vocabulary it would be “everyone”. No one company can focus on helping everyone. You need to hone your message and your intent down to your specific target market, set your path, know your risks, keep building, manage change, so when asked, “who is your target market” the answer will never be “everyone”.

How to Escape the Funk: A Positive Attitude Will Make You More Successful

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Happy Birthday CakeMy birthday was this past week and I must admit that it was a tough week for me. I had been in a funk all week. This is way out of character for me and everyone that knows me well could immediately tell something was not right. This is not a landmark birthday for me, but I think I was expecting to be doing something more. All I could do was think about what I had not accomplished.

Thankfully, my guest expert for the Entrepreneur Club this month said something that really resonated with me and set me straight again. To help him stay in his success mindset Mark Rhodes starts his days by first giving gratitude for what he has and then he envisions successfully reaching his goals, visualizing the details of living the actual success, whatever that might be.

Gratitude: A Daily Journal (Jack Canfield)I often end my days by writing in my gratitude journal and visualizing my future successes. I also keep an accomplishment journal that I write in each day. What I had been doing that week was waking up and immediately start thinking about what I had not accomplished, when I could get it done, what it  would take, and what it meant not to have accomplished it. But not what it meant to me, what it meant to everyone else. These were useless self-loathing thoughts. There was no positive energy in these – not for me and certainly not for others around me.

How to Escape the Funk

We can all slip into these emotional quagmires, but what is important to note is that you don’t have to stay there. Acknowledge it, let it go, and then move on.

On my birthday I woke early and started with my gratitude. I could immediately feel the difference in my attitude and my energy. I knew I was going to be much more productive today. Before I rose I envisioned one goal I wanted to accomplish and visualized me actually achieving it. The path to that goal is not difficult; I just needed to be focused on it.

I then decided to give myself a gift. I would make a list of 100 accomplishments I had done over the year. I did about 50 in less than 15 minutes. I was surprised to remember so many amazing accomplishments over this year, including being a contributing author in an Amazon #1 best seller, being asked to chair the Advisory Board of the International Business Program at Georgian College, creating a new business while running another, meeting one of my mentors, Fabienne Fredrickson, several times, and helping more than 40 people find more success and self confidence in their businesses! It has been an incredible year.

Use the Past, Present and Future

Past – Give gratitude for the things you have

Present – Acknowledge the things you are doing now

Future – Visualize achieving your future goals

Follow these 5 points to stay positive

1.       Start your day with Gratitude

2.       Visualize your goals

3.       Write down you accomplishments daily

4.       Keep a living list of life time accomplishments and revisit it regularly

5.       Don’t go to bed in a negative mood. Use Gratitude to find your positive emotions.

Why Does Being a Parent Give You an Advantage in Business?

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I wanted to reissue this post to add some additional information from John Warrillow. Check the link at the end of the article.

There is a truth to the thought that starting a business is a lot like having children:

  • There is never a perfect time to start
  • There is more to know then expected
  • You cannot guess how it will change your life

In Business, like having children, there is an overwhelming sense of love and satisfaction that comes when you have a business you are passionate about. Unlike having children you will have more control over how it operates when it is mature.

So why is being a parent an advantage to a business owner? Let’s take a look at the three items above that these two life courses have in common.

No Perfect Time to Start

Children

Before I had children, in a time when I knew I was going to have children, I spent a lot of time trying to define (with my husband Brian) how my life needed to be to be able to manage a life with kids. I needed a job with some flexibility. I wanted to be in our own home. I had to be finished my degree. We wanted to have a combined income of a certain level. We wanted to have traveled together. Well, as you can see I had a list.

I’m very good at implementing, so most of my list was complete when my first child was born. What I could not believe was how much time I must have had before children. I mean really, what did I do with all our extra time? I should have been able to finish two degrees.

Business

Before I started my first business I needed to know exactly how I was going to be paid, who was going to work with me, how I could get extra funding, and where my clients would come from. Everything I needed to know about business, or so I thought. There is so much to know about business that if you started down the learning path before you launched, you’d be in an MBA before you opened your doors and still you would not have enough information.

Somehow I was  able to take on an enormous amount of work I did not have before: Work that runs into family time or weekends and yet it still seems to fit into my life.

To completely understand your business you have to be in it – you have to start. Each business has its own personality (Brand) and friends (target market) and family (mentors and peers).

There is More to Know

Children

I could not have guessed I would have had to know so much about child psychology, conflict resolution, mentoring, leadership, delegation, and diplomacy as a parent. Dealing with kids, their friends and their friend’s families, teachers, schools, sports clubs, etc. has been a huge ‘eye opener’ for me.

Business

I could not have guessed I would have had to know so much about human psychology, conflict resolution, mentoring, leadership, delegation, and diplomacy as a business owner. On top of this I also must understand accounting and bookkeeping, sales, marketing, business development, and operations among other skills. I am truly grateful for the learning I received dealing with my children which helped me more quickly become a leader as a business owner.

Change Your Life

Child at desk - poised to take over the businessChildren

As I mentioned, I don’t know what I must have done with all my extra time before I had kids, but I can tell you I love the time I spend with them now. There is humour, growth, development, companionship, maturity, fun, tears, and love. There is a wonderful feeling of belonging, not only to my family but to the community my children tie me to.

Business

Being in business also ties you to a community of peers, supporters, family, mentors, teachers, advisers, partners, affiliates, and clients. There are literally hundreds of opportunities to be connected in business in ways you could not necessarily have foreseen before you started. The more you give to these connections the more you will get back. It can be an extremely gratifying part of your business.

Growing a business is a life lesson. Be excited to learn. Learn from your children to apply to your business and learn from you business to be a better parent and leader. Remember to teach your kids the benefits of being an entrepreneur and model the way so that they will bring that enthusiasm to all they do in life. Who knows, maybe they will take over the business one day.

I wanted to re-issue this post because I just read another article that brings even more credence to this topic. Check out “Do Parents Make Better Startup Founders?” by John Warrillow.