Small Business Failure Comes From Too Many Accidents

When you think of the accidents of life you are generally thinking about things that happen and were unintended. What causes many accidents? Very often it is lack of preparation, loss of focus or lack of education or foresight to name a few.

Too many accidents or just the wrong type of accident occurring once can derail you from your intended accomplishments or bring things permanently to a halt. To have consistent small business growth and the success you desire you must minimize the accidents.

The truth is that most accidents can be prevented. How do you do that? You develop new disciplines. Before I get to how to go about doing this let us take a look at a couple of other aspects of what I call Accidental Self-Employment.

In working with hundreds of self-employed business owners over the years and even in my own businesses, I have observed and experienced the negative effect of accidents. Quite simply, accidents are those things that we say, think, do or fail to do that take us off course and either delay or completely derail our progress.

As you know, if you are honest with yourself, most of the accidents we have can be avoided. These accidents just don't happen. They happen because you have created or allowed an environment to be created.

It is an environment that encourages the repetition of mistakes. Very often, it is an environment where the reason these negative things keep happening is because there is no leadership to embrace change and to make change. Successful small business is about embracing change and making it happen.

That's where new disciplines come in. If you develop new disciplines then you will minimize the accidents and the resulting loss of energy and time. How do you go about developing new disciplines.

First, you must be committed to change. Secondly, you need to understand what a discipline is. A discipline is a bridge between a thought and the action you take to make that new thought a reality. If you repeat the thought and the action over a period of time you have a new discipline.

In owning your own business it is your responsibility, as the owner, to set the example for embracing change by creating new disciplines. Now this may all sound good but the next part is crucial to the success of instilling new disciplines, whether it is for yourself, or your company, or both.

Start with something small where you can see an immediate positive difference. This will encourage you and others to create new disciplines and improvements on other things. Don't rock the boat and create more accidents by starting with something that is too big.

Start with the small things and work up to the bigger ones. Life and business are going to throw you some pretty big challenges. If you haven't mastered the small ones your chances of success are not very good on the big ones.

Apply this process to your business and life. You will cut down on the number of accidents while creating pathways to upgrade your business and your life. Growing small business is always about creating better ways to do things and upgrading.

Embrace change. Develop new disciplines. Do both and you will be creating the pathway to your business and personal growth and success.

Steve Scott is a business design and development coach who collaborates with and supports business owners and professionals who are committed to having more in their businesses and lives.
http://www.stevescottcoaching.com

Why do small businesses fail?

By: Nate Rodnay

Starting a business of your own has a lot of benefits such as being your own boss, facing new challenges, a high growth potential and reaping all the rewards of your hard work, however, success in a small business can never be taken for granted. Entrepreneurs who want to run their own small businesses cannot afford to ignore the difficulty of starting a business. The following are the primary reasons for small business failure

• Lack of planning:

Not having a proper business plan is a major pitfall that can lead to failure of a small business. A SWOT analysis is necessary to be able to overcome difficulties during its growth. A business plan gives proper direction to the business.

• Trying to make a hobby into a business:

Not every hobby can be transformed into business. Before planning to start a small business, the idea must be thoroughly researched for its feasibility.

• Inexperience in managing a small business:

To run a small business successfully it is necessary to be familiar with several aspects of the industry, its trends and possess the skills necessary to market one’s products and services. Inexperience in these aspects can result in failure of the business.

• Poor record keeping and financial controls:

Not maintaining good accounts of profits and expenses, taxes etc is also a cause for small business failing.

• Entrepreneurial enthusiasm:

Entrepreneurs must learn to differentiate between "true opportunities" and just new ideas that are not practical. It is necessary to compare the idea with the business plan objective and see if it the skill and time is really available to put the idea into practice.

• Inefficient money management:

It takes about a year or two for small businesses to make profits, so not having proper resources can hamper the growth of the business. Also, personal use of business funds must be prevented.

• Dependence too much on a single element:

Small business owners must be careful against offering just a single major product service or having just one big client. Though this might be the major source of profits they must think of what might happen when they no longer have the source and try to broaden their horizons.

• Competition:

Competition is a major factor influencing the success or failure of small businesses. Therefore it is necessary to identify the exact nature of competition, their services and how our products/services are superior.

• Poor marketing:

The success or failure of a product can depend on good marketing. Therefore it is important to research every marketing method used and stick to those that are yielding results.

• Entrepreneurial exhaustion:

Having a small business requires patience, capital, time and energy. Not every individual is cut out for it. Long work hours can cause exhaustion and lead to a lack of interest in the business which can stunt its growth.

• Faulty location:

Visibility is very important for the small business. If the store is not easily found by clients and suppliers, profits could suffer.

• Poor selling techniques:

Business fail if owners are not able to get potential customers to buy their products.

• Postponing tasks and improper time management:

Deferring important tasks can be lethal to a business. Staff can be hired if necessary for doing tasks that a business owner doesn’t like to do.

• Inferior quality customer service:

A bad quality customer service such as not replying quickly to emails, phone calls etc can lead to customer dissatisfaction. Also, not giving the customer what he wants may weaken the bond with the small business owner.

Marvist is an Internet marketing research & search engine optimization firm providing professional SEO, pay per click management, affordable SEO, web analytic services to help companies to increase online sales & improve their profitability. Marvist is a fast growing firm & has clients in seven countries.

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