Just avoiding one of these mistakes can make a world of difference in your business. For example, many years ago I decided that I would stop making Mistake Number One below, and that sole decision transformed my business. The current national business environment is challenging and that creates pressure to push harder, sometimes spinning your wheels in order to make something happen. A wiser approach is to slow down and think clearly through your business and objectives. Once you’ve given it some thought and created a plan of action, it is time to execute!
Mistake Number One - Failure to Focus
In 1997 I started a solo legal practice. Going against conventional wisdom, I started my firm with no capital, partners or resources. I literally had a rolodex of a few colleagues, a dream and a lot of faith. The business gurus will tell you this is not the recommended approach and, in a perfect world, starting a business on those terms is not advisable. However, we all know that life rarely hands you the luxury of perfect timing or resources. Sometimes you have to just grab the ball and run with it and that is what I did.
Ralph Waldo Emerson said, “Once you make a decision, the universe conspires to make it happen,” and that’s exactly what happened in my case. Once I grabbed the ball and started running, I was able to obtain client referrals, an office to work out of and even an assistant to help me get started. Within three years I went from an initial retainer of $250 dollars on my first case, to over one million dollars in annual revenue. In that roughly three year period I learned numerous lessons that serve me to this day and will serve your business as well, if acted upon. That is the great thing about principles – they work the same way all of the time and they have predictable results. What worked for me will work for you – principles are no respecter of persons.
In the early part of my venture I didn’t know very much about timeless principles. I simply got out my rolodex and started to “hustle” – to call upon everyone I knew to let them know I was open for business. I also began to join networking groups, trade associations, lawyer groups, small business groups, trade-fairs, multiple chambers of commerce, multiple professional connection groups and the like – if there was an event, I was there with business cards in hand. Within a few months I realized that I was wearing myself out!
On top of that, I became aware that I was obtaining mixed results from all of the associations and events that I was attending or participating in. Particularly because I am a lawyer, many small businesses wanted free or very close to free advice and several groups wanted my involvement on committees or other time commitments from me with little return on investment. I further discovered that from a business-building standpoint, even the legal trade associations were a waste of time because who attended those meetings? You guessed it – other lawyers! Thus, I would always be just one of several other similarly situated professionals in the room and that was getting me nowhere very fast.
When this reality came home to me, I admit that I was tempted to “keep plugging away” hoping that if I just kept networking, eventually being involved in all of these groups and associations would somehow pay off – one day my ship would come in. There is something about the human mind – once you’ve mentally committed to a course of action, your tendency is to cling to that course even if it clearly fails to yield results. It is somehow difficult to put down even a failing strategy and to move in a different direction. Yet this is exactly what you must do (and often) to succeed in business – there are no sacred cows. You have to discern when a strategy is not working and then to go about making the needed changes.
Find out the changes I made and how those changes positively affected my business in "Top Five Minority Business Mistakes (And How to Avoid Them) Part II," coming soon!
Best regards, Coach
