Yesterday afternoon my daughter and I were discussing my business.  In fact she was asking me lots of questions about it such as, “What do you do?” “How successful have you been lately?” “Can you give me some examples of your results?” “Are you actively networking?” “Can you make it more affordable?” “Who’s your audience?” “What’s your elevator speech?”  …

About two and a half hours into this conversation she had proposed an entirely new business strategy and marketing plan and given me a kick in the pants about making it happen.  My first thought was, “I think I need to hire this woman as our newest consultant.”  Then I asked her how she got so smart about running a business, and she told me she had a really smart dad who taught her a lot.  “Oh yeah”, I thought.  She just spent over two hours feeding back to me a whole slew of business basics, honed by her own experiences over the last few years, that I seemed to have forgotten, or at least failed to regularly revisit.

The lesson?  Remember the basics; and, if things don’t seem to be going as expected, revisit them. Every once in a while, get a look at your business through someone else’s eyes.  Then evaluate your key performance drivers.  Are your mission, vision, and values still sound?  Does the strategy support the purpose?  Do the plans (marketing, finance, operations, etc.) support the strategy?  Are your processes still working effectively?  Does your organization structure still make sense and support your business activities?  Are your people still capable, on the same page and focused on results?

Many thanks to my wise entrepreneur of a daughter, who looked at my business through fresh eyes and reminded me about the most important better business basic: don’t lose sight of those sound business basics!  They’re the essence of success!

(By the way Sunshine, are you available?  Love, Dad)