24 Oct Discover “The 6” Things that can Kill your Trades Business
My head is spinning, the quotes, the scheduling, booking the work, quoting, the supplies, the kids, have i paid them the attention they deserve, is the apprentice at school, what invoices do i need to get out or get in, my coffee has gone cold, the dog is giving me a guilt trip look, haven’t taken him for a walk in over two weeks, ohhh the emails, the emails, i feel like I’m drowning i am, i know there is something important i need to look after…why have i got nine different note pads on my table. Go into business they say, make money, create freedom. I’m frickin drowning here….well i know I’m a winner, I’ve won the award for the greatest number of tabs open on my computer, I’m still not sure where that music is coming from, I’m dying here.. oh, look there is a butterfly, where was I, oh that’s right trusty old Instagram.
Have you put some thought into the things that can kill your Trades business, for those of you that are optimistic, you need this more than anyone, you need to know how you can measure these areas so you can hold yourself accountable and make measurable progress, so let’s get started:
One: A lot of Trades businesses flounder around and are not the best with their time or their teams time, they don’t make the best decisions and they don’t end up heading in the right direction, this can cause a lot of headaches and inconsistency, this can be solved by ensuring the business has a clear Big Picture set and up and documented
Two: Every Trades business needs to grow, for those of you that say, “I need to sort things out before I grow”, you need to remember that if your business is not growing faster than the CPI or measurement for your niche, you are falling behind, which means you can’t keep up with paying wages, COGS and paying yourself what you are worth commercially, this can be fixed by setting up a plan for business growth in line with your Business Financial Model
Three, I’m glad you have a great accountant, just about everyone I know says that have a great accountant, and at the same time they are not in the best financial position, now the accountant is only one part of the solution, there’s pricing systems, underquoting, mates’ rates, family rates, variations not accounted for, Later Payers and the list goes on, this can be fixed by setting up a business financial model that has been designed especially for your trades business.
Four, Ever known a Trades business owner to say that they don’t have time? They are working too many hours, they would love to grow their business, they feel trapped, they feel like they are struck on a treadmill not getting ahead, they were probably in a position making decent results a while ago, unfortunately, now they are not, this can be fixed by setting up the right operational structure for the business to get to the next stage, your need to map out what the ideal structure looks like so you can hop step into it, what you have now is Not working
Five, You know you need to charge more, you believe you deliver a higher standard than your competitors, it’s so fierce out their competition wise, what can you do to get the markets attention, to stand out, where do you start, of course there is a million and one things you can do, This can be fixed by building a better business reputation
Six, in recent times it’s become so much harder to attract and keep team members, we all know by now that the decent ones are being pickier about who they will work with any why, the cowboys & girls are attracting their own. You know it’s almost impossible to grow your business without a decent team, this can be fixed by improving what you have internally, so you are more likely to attract and keep the right team
Sure, there is more that these six areas that need attention, while working with Trades these six are the ones that have come up quite frequently over the last few years
Miles Primrose from BusinessSight has been mentoring trades business owners for over 20 years, you can find the books Miles has written for Trades and Builders on https://www.amazon.com.au/ search for “Miles Primrose” in the book’s category
Or you can find out more by going to
https://businesssight.com.au/ or calling us on 1300 187 233, that’s 1300 1 TRADE
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