Ever thought about if you may be the kind of person who could be financially successful at owning your own business? Almost everybody has at one time or another. In reality I hear folk nearly every single day of my working life let me know how much they dream about owning their own business.
The issue is nonetheless , that when permitted to intricate about their dreams, these same folk typically end up sharing their feelings about their lot in life, their director, their place of work, and their other team members; and, it is through these rantings I'm ready to learn the true inner workings of their minds. I will get a pretty solid feel for whether these people are cut from the entrepreneurial cloth, or not.
Many carry on aimlessly about how their supervisor "doesn't have an idea how to run the business," or that their "workplace is a unreserved train wreck." Their verbal spewage overflows of talk of the "dirty bathrooms, high food cost, taking crew members, and low worker morale" - all of which, they reject having any responsibility for, of course; but , if they owned the place, "things would certainly be different", or that's what they say.
Let me just say I don't believe you can become a successful owner of any sort of business without first having a long and successful track record of taking a possession mind-set pertaining to the activities that happen around you in your present or prior places of employ. Actually, composing and cultivating an ownership mentality over many years is among the active ingredients to achieving success as a real entrepreneur down the road. Part of this mind-set is the integration of passion and strength with the condition understanding of the value of a greenback - even when that greenback is not actually yours. This permits one to grow into the giant shoes of having one's own business.
For me, I started my company, ROI, back in July of 1987. At the time, I was working for a restaurant chain as a W-2 worker. I worked 50-60 hours a week for them; in the meantime, working each chance I could on my new start-up business. As I got better at doing my "day job", needless to say, I invested more time, money, and effort at growing what I hoped would become my fulltime gig - my personal company.
Many years passed and I continued to take whatever decent W-2 positions that came my way - all the time learning and growing and saving my cash. This permitted me to put food on the table for my young family while I grabbed every chance to create the larger and better future that I longed for. Make no mistake about it, I worked hard and long at making my own "American dream", and I did everything in my power to get it.
let's be crystal clear. Even though I owned the equity of ROI (which was worth nothing at the time), in my mind, I also "owned" the restaurants that I operated for both my employer and my clients. I "owned" the decisions. I "owned" the way That I conducted the business. I "owned" the results - just like I owned ROI. What I realized during these early stages of my development and the development of my company is that, in many instances, the workers, the managers, and the district managers working for these firms really received more of the bottom line profits than the equity owners did, themselves.
Equity ownership is nothing apart from a legal excellence and, as great and glorious as that may sound, a possession mind-set regarding one's career in the bizz of his choice - including those with whom he selects to give his blood, sweat, and tears - is, many times, worth significantly more.
Without any doubt, I made a pile of mistakes along the way; however as time went by, I became noticeably better at developing this ownership mind-set in any and each restaurant and bar I came in touch with. Even though the equity was owned by others, the possession mindset was the property of me. I drove myself to battle to become the best operator of diners globally. I saw the corporation or the client as nothing other than an investor; anything performance-wise was up to me.
I operated as if the company borrowed cash from the bank for me, so I could make the business flow with customers and money. And, come heck or high water, I was going to drive results and performance to new highs; thus,. Winning my check, my bonus, my benefits, and, better yet my education together with the funding to permit me to grow ROI. It was obviously a "win-win" for all parties involved; but , in my mind, it was I who had the absolute most to gain or lose, and I wasn't about to let those golden opportunities pass me by.
I learned that an essential component to maintaining and growing real life equity possession in any business enterprise is that one must begin with a proactive, day-to-day ownership mentality - willing and able to engage in the everyday operations. I learned and believe to this day that great owners do not let go of the driver's seat or take their foot off the accelerator pedal of their own business; and she or he who operates the best business while maintaining this proactive approach - no matter how massive or successful she or he becomes, wins! Sure, there are exceptions, but very darn few - not sufficient to risk shaking the dice.
Of course, I spent my entire career inside the confines of the bistro and bar industry, so I decided to create an easy-to-understand formula for those running a restaurant, or multiple cafes, to discover how best to create a sub-structure that would pass the test of time. I call it the "Rule of 56: for one to maintain a robust possession mind-set, one must break single unit restaurants, or big eatery companies, into parts of 56" - my version of micromanagement.
I reckoned that a cafe has roughly 56 different management functions, i.e.: purchasing, operations, human resources, marketing, and so on. (the precise list varies depending on who you ask). If you desire to own the situation, the decisions, and the results, then you're best off selecting which of those functions are the most impactful to the overall success of the business; then, essentially, cherry-pick those that you wish to handle and delegate the others. By taking on this ownership mind-set, you can attain the absolute best results that others can only wish for.
Why is the number 56 so major? Because, in addition to breaking each eatery down into 56 parts, I also think that one cannot manage any enormous restaurant company for any length of time and with any form of consistency by having responsibility of more than 56 different cafe locations; and, those 56 locations are best managed when distributed among 8 direct reports with oversight of seven locations each. I have seen rare examples when doing otherwise was successful but , even then, performance had been stunted significantly.
I made and used these rules of the road throughout the 1990's. While everyone else seemed to be preaching personal empowerment, I was teaching, coaching and inspiring micromanagement. I discovered with micromanagement I could control performance which proved to be a critical essential part to the successfulness of any entrepreneurial endeavour. In reality it's been this "secret formula", if you will , which has driven my complete career, with numerous of others with whom I have cheerfully shared it for over 25 years now. Usually, when I see failing ownerships - either in equity or in perspective, I'm able to point to the lacking of one or more elements to this formula as the contributory factor to their failure - even in their simplest form.
Once you become great at handling a few elements, you are then able to take on 1 or 2 more, and so on. As a consequence, while you master the management of every one of the 56 elements of the cafe, your ownership mentality and control expands; and, with it, you are certainly most likely to raise your revenue, as well.
So that the key is knowing yourself and what you are personally great at, then meshing it with what is critically important for the success of the business in the industry which you are in - whether your name is on the entity forms, the bank loan, or the insurance programmes or not.
Without any question, for years now I've had a far higher level of ownership mindset for their diners and bars than do my clients - the owners and executives, themselves. Of course, this approach specifies that I get in the muck of the day-to-day operations, marketing, human resources, and financial performance linked with each business - which many are not willing to do, however quite candidly, these are the parts of the business that I adore the most anyway, so it's a "win-win" for me.
Over the more than 25 years that I have been doing this, I have entered into numerous handshake deals (at least 56, I am sure) where I have supplied countless hours of my work and expertise, and, in fact, my hard-earned money, to those who required it to get their diner start up off the ground or their restaurant back on track. Each. Time I'd say the same thing, "after I am gone and after all is said and done, and after you make this trattoria into a glowing financial success, I expect you to stroke me a check for my part of ownership." Unfortunately , to date, I haven't received a single check in the mail; however that doesn't detour me, because I "own" those restaurants - all 56 parts of them.
It's with this possession mentality that I begin every day as I focus on my cafes, my customers, my people, and my financial performance. For me, there's no other way to do business: I may as well own it, or forget it. And I will not be forgetting ' it anytime soon.
The issue is nonetheless , that when permitted to intricate about their dreams, these same folk typically end up sharing their feelings about their lot in life, their director, their place of work, and their other team members; and, it is through these rantings I'm ready to learn the true inner workings of their minds. I will get a pretty solid feel for whether these people are cut from the entrepreneurial cloth, or not.
Many carry on aimlessly about how their supervisor "doesn't have an idea how to run the business," or that their "workplace is a unreserved train wreck." Their verbal spewage overflows of talk of the "dirty bathrooms, high food cost, taking crew members, and low worker morale" - all of which, they reject having any responsibility for, of course; but , if they owned the place, "things would certainly be different", or that's what they say.
Let me just say I don't believe you can become a successful owner of any sort of business without first having a long and successful track record of taking a possession mind-set pertaining to the activities that happen around you in your present or prior places of employ. Actually, composing and cultivating an ownership mentality over many years is among the active ingredients to achieving success as a real entrepreneur down the road. Part of this mind-set is the integration of passion and strength with the condition understanding of the value of a greenback - even when that greenback is not actually yours. This permits one to grow into the giant shoes of having one's own business.
For me, I started my company, ROI, back in July of 1987. At the time, I was working for a restaurant chain as a W-2 worker. I worked 50-60 hours a week for them; in the meantime, working each chance I could on my new start-up business. As I got better at doing my "day job", needless to say, I invested more time, money, and effort at growing what I hoped would become my fulltime gig - my personal company.
Many years passed and I continued to take whatever decent W-2 positions that came my way - all the time learning and growing and saving my cash. This permitted me to put food on the table for my young family while I grabbed every chance to create the larger and better future that I longed for. Make no mistake about it, I worked hard and long at making my own "American dream", and I did everything in my power to get it.
let's be crystal clear. Even though I owned the equity of ROI (which was worth nothing at the time), in my mind, I also "owned" the restaurants that I operated for both my employer and my clients. I "owned" the decisions. I "owned" the way That I conducted the business. I "owned" the results - just like I owned ROI. What I realized during these early stages of my development and the development of my company is that, in many instances, the workers, the managers, and the district managers working for these firms really received more of the bottom line profits than the equity owners did, themselves.
Equity ownership is nothing apart from a legal excellence and, as great and glorious as that may sound, a possession mind-set regarding one's career in the bizz of his choice - including those with whom he selects to give his blood, sweat, and tears - is, many times, worth significantly more.
Without any doubt, I made a pile of mistakes along the way; however as time went by, I became noticeably better at developing this ownership mind-set in any and each restaurant and bar I came in touch with. Even though the equity was owned by others, the possession mindset was the property of me. I drove myself to battle to become the best operator of diners globally. I saw the corporation or the client as nothing other than an investor; anything performance-wise was up to me.
I operated as if the company borrowed cash from the bank for me, so I could make the business flow with customers and money. And, come heck or high water, I was going to drive results and performance to new highs; thus,. Winning my check, my bonus, my benefits, and, better yet my education together with the funding to permit me to grow ROI. It was obviously a "win-win" for all parties involved; but , in my mind, it was I who had the absolute most to gain or lose, and I wasn't about to let those golden opportunities pass me by.
I learned that an essential component to maintaining and growing real life equity possession in any business enterprise is that one must begin with a proactive, day-to-day ownership mentality - willing and able to engage in the everyday operations. I learned and believe to this day that great owners do not let go of the driver's seat or take their foot off the accelerator pedal of their own business; and she or he who operates the best business while maintaining this proactive approach - no matter how massive or successful she or he becomes, wins! Sure, there are exceptions, but very darn few - not sufficient to risk shaking the dice.
Of course, I spent my entire career inside the confines of the bistro and bar industry, so I decided to create an easy-to-understand formula for those running a restaurant, or multiple cafes, to discover how best to create a sub-structure that would pass the test of time. I call it the "Rule of 56: for one to maintain a robust possession mind-set, one must break single unit restaurants, or big eatery companies, into parts of 56" - my version of micromanagement.
I reckoned that a cafe has roughly 56 different management functions, i.e.: purchasing, operations, human resources, marketing, and so on. (the precise list varies depending on who you ask). If you desire to own the situation, the decisions, and the results, then you're best off selecting which of those functions are the most impactful to the overall success of the business; then, essentially, cherry-pick those that you wish to handle and delegate the others. By taking on this ownership mind-set, you can attain the absolute best results that others can only wish for.
Why is the number 56 so major? Because, in addition to breaking each eatery down into 56 parts, I also think that one cannot manage any enormous restaurant company for any length of time and with any form of consistency by having responsibility of more than 56 different cafe locations; and, those 56 locations are best managed when distributed among 8 direct reports with oversight of seven locations each. I have seen rare examples when doing otherwise was successful but , even then, performance had been stunted significantly.
I made and used these rules of the road throughout the 1990's. While everyone else seemed to be preaching personal empowerment, I was teaching, coaching and inspiring micromanagement. I discovered with micromanagement I could control performance which proved to be a critical essential part to the successfulness of any entrepreneurial endeavour. In reality it's been this "secret formula", if you will , which has driven my complete career, with numerous of others with whom I have cheerfully shared it for over 25 years now. Usually, when I see failing ownerships - either in equity or in perspective, I'm able to point to the lacking of one or more elements to this formula as the contributory factor to their failure - even in their simplest form.
Once you become great at handling a few elements, you are then able to take on 1 or 2 more, and so on. As a consequence, while you master the management of every one of the 56 elements of the cafe, your ownership mentality and control expands; and, with it, you are certainly most likely to raise your revenue, as well.
So that the key is knowing yourself and what you are personally great at, then meshing it with what is critically important for the success of the business in the industry which you are in - whether your name is on the entity forms, the bank loan, or the insurance programmes or not.
Without any question, for years now I've had a far higher level of ownership mindset for their diners and bars than do my clients - the owners and executives, themselves. Of course, this approach specifies that I get in the muck of the day-to-day operations, marketing, human resources, and financial performance linked with each business - which many are not willing to do, however quite candidly, these are the parts of the business that I adore the most anyway, so it's a "win-win" for me.
Over the more than 25 years that I have been doing this, I have entered into numerous handshake deals (at least 56, I am sure) where I have supplied countless hours of my work and expertise, and, in fact, my hard-earned money, to those who required it to get their diner start up off the ground or their restaurant back on track. Each. Time I'd say the same thing, "after I am gone and after all is said and done, and after you make this trattoria into a glowing financial success, I expect you to stroke me a check for my part of ownership." Unfortunately , to date, I haven't received a single check in the mail; however that doesn't detour me, because I "own" those restaurants - all 56 parts of them.
It's with this possession mentality that I begin every day as I focus on my cafes, my customers, my people, and my financial performance. For me, there's no other way to do business: I may as well own it, or forget it. And I will not be forgetting ' it anytime soon.
About the Author:
Johnthan Bansel is a part-time MBA student, majoring in finance. He has been working with banks in restructuring corporate loans and obligations, dealing with merger and acquisitions as well. Infrequently, his work requires that he travel, and writing comes naturally for him, hence he started making articles of all sorts, from little short stories to lengthly essay since one year gone.
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