Herman School of Business
Keep an open Mind
The last posting where I talked about buying the gas station brought back other memories of how one business came into being or another went away in an almost seamless fashion.
While I know it actually happened in a more herky-jerky stop and start time frame, with months in between, one thing stands out more than anything else when I look back. I never hesitated to believe in a new idea or opportunity and that was coupled with the feeling that as soon as I knew the business I had was either a loser or was at a peak selling point it was over, and out of my mind.
Even the biggest crash wasn’t hard to let go. I could see the end coming and I prepared as best as I could for the explosion but as soon as the doors were closed…my mind went forward to the next thing. And when I was searching for opportunities I never had one set thing in mind. Now, there was a sequence to things like the national sales managers job for a large corporation turning into my own consulting business to provide the same service for better value, or the selling of muffler franchises becoming a gas station operator with a muffler shop inside which then morphed into an auto detail shop as I wanted to expand my muffler business, which became a franchise company because if one worked why wouldn’t a thousand work…and so on.
Take just the last two years as a perfect example of keeping an open mind. I wanted to be a writer and sell my books. After viewing the many publishing opportunities with their “winning the lottery” chance of success I became a publisher. HSB Press became a reality. And after hiring several PR firms within the book world and I saw that I was a small client again trying to “win the lottery” as one of their struggling success wannabees it became apparent that if I want to be successful at this book game I better become a marketing maven. So, to be a successful writer selling books I also had to become other things or very few people would ever have been exposed to my work.
When you plan ahead and attempt to see too much into the future you are limiting your chances for success. Five year plans are bunk to me, if your business is going to fail far before that, or statistics tell you that you won’t be the owner anymore even if your idea works. How about a good two month plan. With an open mind that you may have to adjust your thinking on the fly all the time.
So, when that last blog posting sunk into my brain I realized just how open my mind has been to new thinking, new ideas, and new roads to turn down, because I wasn’t set in stone about the future except for one thing…I was willing to stay focused on doing whatever it took to get to the finish line…and my open mind allowed me to see what wasn’t working in weeks, not months or years, so I could make the necessary adjustments.
- Posted: 26 November 2007
- Comments: 0
- Category: Running a business
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