Who's driving the bus?

Your business is your "vehicle" in a very real sense, in that you probably built it at the outset to take you to a "desired destination", whether that destination was (or still is) financial security, the freedom of being your own boss, or the opportunity to express yourself in building your version of "a better mousetrap".

I have always found fascinating just how far I can stretch the analogy, and still draw useful lessons from it, and I'm going to indulge myself here for a little while to see what we might both learn from the exercise.

Your Dashboard

Let's take your dashboard as a starting point - the collection of indicators designed to feed you a range of important information about your vehicle. In your business what's on your dashboard? Do you have an old-fashioned fuel gauge that tells you how much is left in the tank (I suppose that would be a current bank statement)?

Or do you have a more sophisticated trip computer that provides information on remaining fuel (account balance); distance to the next three fuel stations (aged debtor analysis); current and expected fuel consumption (cashflow analysis and projection); and reserve tank reading (additional funds available for business use)?

Do you have a map in the glove box that provides some indication of the territory you are planning to cover (I guess that would be a basic business plan) or are you just driving around hoping that you will stumble on a good place to settle down?

Or have you upgraded to a GPS system that provides you with pin-point accurate information about your present position and an up to the minute picture of what lies ahead? The analogy gets a bit more complex here, so I'll break out of the hypothetical and move to a real life case I encountered a few months ago.

Have Your Outgrown Your Dashboard?

Now the people I coach are mostly small to medium business (SMB) operators, but I see the same challenges facing them every day: A lousy dashboard - an absence of accurate, timely information about the key indicators of their business health; outdated systems - MYOB and the Missus may have been a solution when turnover was $500,000, but is that combination going to power the dashboard of a vehicle you are now driving at 20 times that speed? What happens if you hit a hole in the road at that speed? What's your fuel consumption these days? Is there enough in the tank to get to the next deal?

Michael Gerber's (The E-Myth Revisited) says that "most small business owners are technicians who've suffered an entrepreneurial seizure," but I suspect that many, while they grow in nous and business smarts, eventually go beyond their ability to fly by the seat of their pants.

You then come across them in various situations: Thumbing a ride with an empty petrol can or flat tyre in hand; or lying on their back in the mud trying to do a running repair on old parts that have long since ceased to work; or scattered spectacularly across the countryside, having taken a chunk out of their suppliers in the crash.

Or you encounter the ones who realised in time the need to invest in upgrading the dashboard of their business - and to take a few advanced driving lessons while they're at it (management training, coaching or a major change in their reading). They're the ones who tend to pull out into the fast lane, looking very relaxed, and to pass their opposition as though standing still (probably on their way to the surf!)

Email me here for a free, informative (and maybe 'disturbing'?) "Dashboard Diagnostic" that you can run on your own business.

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