Making life better in disadvantaged communities - our thoughts on everything - from Spirit Lake Consulting, Inc.
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There has been a lot written about how many small business fail. When I got to thinking about it, I concluded that, actually, MOST people don't succeed in business, it is just that their failures are hidden more easily in a small company.
You probably have to be really old to remember Jules Feiffer comics, but, well, I am really old. There was one that showed a man working at his desk saying, "All my life, I have been waiting to be found out. One day, they will come to me and say, "George, you have been found out.' - and I will pack up all my stuff and leave.'"
Having worked in various large organizations, I can say with certainty that there are a good number of people 'waiting to be found out'. I could blame the schools, as it seems the trend to blame our educational system for everything. Part of it is their fault, if a person is not very literate, because the schools are SUPPOSED to teach people to read well, write well, think well and have a basic understanding of mathematics. Yet, many people graduate who have difficulty with all of those things.
Even people who are good students fail in business quite often, though. In a small business, they get fired. In a big business, they may move one level above where they entered in 35 years until they retire making not much more money than the new hires coming in.
For some people, the problem seems to be fear of failure. I don't know how many times I have worked with someone on a project, whether it is a personnel policy, a federal grant, an article or a computer program, and they are "working on it" forever. Often, they are "working on it" for so long that they miss the deadline and it is never submitted. Many times, they have not gotten past the first step, the step they were good at in school - doing research. They got a lot of books or references from other people. They talked to those people. They read the books. Sometimes they even wrote up a summary of the work done in this area before. When it came to doing their own original work, though, they hit a brick wall. Sometimes they never got past the draft stage of writing an outline or a few notes on a piece of paper. Other times, they got 50% or 90% done but were still 'working on it' every time the boss or other people on their team asked about it, until they drove everyone crazy. Of course there were gaps or mistakes in their work - everyone makes mistakes - but because they never let go of it to be reviewed by their supervisor or their peers, until maybe it was too late to fix, they never got criticism that would enable them to fix those errors. It is hard to fire those people because they are always 'working' at doing what the boss says. In a small company, they get fired or laid off because they miss deadlines or take too long and the company cannot afford to pay 100 hours for a job that should take 25. In a large company, they get lukewarm performance reviews and just settle at the lower or middle level for their entire careers
While it might seem contradictory to state that many people fail because they are afraid of failure, I really do think it is true.
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What comes to mind when I think about small businesses failing is the fact that places such as the Small Business Administration do not make it very easy for businesses to fill out applications. There are other postings on this forum where we speak the fact that SBA is not very user-friendly. How are small businesses, especially disadvantaged ones, supposed to complete applications like this if they are understaffed to begin with?
On that note, addressing the fact that people working for large corporations are "waiting to be found out", I think that is definitely true. I have friends working at huge companies who spend most of their time at work searching eBay, or performing other activities that are unrelated to their job. I, personally, like working for a small business because I am able to receive personal attention and training and am able to perform such a wide variety of tasks. After all, nothing is more boring than "pretending" to do work.
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It sounds like Jessica is a hard worker, but I know lots of people who it doesn't bother them not to work. Like she said, they spend all day surfing the Internet, talking with their friends, coming in late because they had errands to run, taking extra lunch time to run more errands and then leaving early. Why the hell is their employer paying for them to go to the dentist, pick up their dry cleaning, get their kids' school pictures, shop for school supplies and all that other stuff?
You know when I buy my groceries ? AFTER WORK ON THE WAY HOME !
I don't think there is a magic way to make those people who just flat don't care if they do a half-ass job to be good workers. They are failures at work and when they get laid off they are the first ones to whine about how unlucky they are but I think most places find a way to keep good workers. You may think you are so smart and fooling everybody but the first round of job cuts Ms. I-spend-all-day-on-Myspace - you're gone!
It's not always that people are lazy and worthless, though some are for sure. Most of the people I have ever met are waiting for someone to tell them what to do. You know how in college people always ask "When is the final exam?" "How many pages does the term paper have to be?" and all that. You hear people at work all the time who say"No one told me to do that" as an excuse for something important not getting done. I saw on the leadership part of your site that you talked about that. I am not sure if that is a skill you can teach somebody. You said it on one of your web pages that it was about courage. It takes courage just to go ahead and do something knowing you might fail or the boss may come and yell at you that you did the wrong thing. I am not sure you can teach that to a person.
I agree it takes courage. The other thing it takes is honesty. One thing we have started lately at SLC is a daily log, keeping track of what you do each hour. It is an eye-opener. I do work a lot of hours - on the average 11 hours a day on weekdays and 3 hours a day on weekends. That comes out to about 61 hours a week. However, if you had asked me, I would have said I work about 80 hours a week. So, where is the difference? I start working around 9 a.m. and usually work until 12:30 or 1 a.m. So, I am thinking I am working 16 hours a day. When I started keeping an hourly log, I would see that I spent two hours working, then dropped my car off to be fixed and walked home. I spent another five hours working, then picked my daughter up at school, helped her with her homework and took her to her tumbling class -- and so on. Once you are your own boss and no one is keeping track of your hours, you need to do it for yourself or you can easily fool yourself into thinking that you are working 50 hours a week when it is really more like 25 or 30.
One of the biggest mistakes that people in small business make, I think, is focusing on the wrong things.
Different tools work for different people. My favorite one is the yahoo calendar.
yahoo.calendar.com
It is free and the advantage for someone like me who travels a lot is that I can access it anywhere I have internet.
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What you said about honesty and what somebody else said about not being bothered to work are the same thing in some people. You need to face up to when you are not doing the best job you can. Alot of times people don't seem to think about doing their best or they fool themselves into thinking they are doing their best when they're not.
I agree. As I said above, one of the important keys to success in a small business is measurement. For example, I have no reduced the number of links on our website with problems to less than 3%. I don't think that is good enough but it was the best we could do and still meet our deadline. So, on the CDs that Breeanne created today there were 2,800 links and about 44 of these did not work. Now, my goal is to get that down as close to zero as I can before the next workshop.
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Measuring is all well and good but I still say it has to do with if you want to do a good job or you don't care. So for you it is important to do a good job and measuring is how you follow if you are doing a good job or not. What do you think about those people who are always saying they don't bother with the details like it is some GOOD thing? What is business but the details knowing when the bills need to be paid, opening up the store on time. Whenever I hear someone say that I am just a big picture person or I am not a detail person I think to myself LAZY! That is just an excuse to not do the part of the job you don't like or is boring or that gets in the way of you being on the Internet at work.
I think how you relate to your co-workers can impact how work is performed and how much will get done. Also, if you are a person who expects perfection then most will follow suit. However, there are some businesses who are more laid back, but the work still gets done. The key is to try and maintain a Positive attitude no matter what. Many times this is difficult for persons living with a disability. But, as my mother use to say, "It's better to always keep a stiff upper lip". Meaning there will be times when you need to put on a good impression, even when you don't feel like it.
Last edited by Willie (2007-06-16 22:38:26)
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do you ever think of quitting? Just wondering.
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If your speaking to me, quitting is not really in my vocabulary or way of thinking. I feel most people are born with leadership skills and others are born to follow. No matter what category you are in, you still have to relate to people on a daily basis. A positive and encouraging example to others can have a major influence, as well as impact on society as a whole. Try it for a day and see how much recognition and self-satisfaction and/or appreciation you have at the end of the day.
Last edited by Willie (2007-08-27 22:37:47)
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Most people don't succeed because they don't realize how much work it is going to be to run a business. For many of us it is seven days a week. Don't get me wrong, it is a labor of love, but if you think you are going to work 9 to 5 or that your employees are going to do all the work and you will collect a huge paycheck, your days in business are numbered. I have seen businesses like that and as soon as the owner goes strutting around telling everyone they are the owner and working 20, 30 hours a week it is not too long before the business starts going under. It is hard work and most people are just too lazy.
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