What your business can learn from an Italian immigrant and a Jewish copywriter...

To start off the year, let me share a 'rags to riches' story with you that underlines a ‘survival strategy’ for tough times (and the good times too).

Many years back an Italian man migrated to Australia with not much more than the clothes on his back and his skills in cutting hair, and he opened a men's hairdressing salon in the CBD.

This salon was so successful it soon grew to six to eight stylists working for him at one time and after many years, he was able to retire and pass the business over to his son.  But here’s the interesting bit.  Even in his retirement, he would sit at the register and keep a keen eye on what was happening in every facet of the business.  He watched every penny that went into and out of that business.  He could have smiled when he took the money, but hey, no one is perfect!

Today, that business has expanded to a chain of salons.  Even though the son doesn’t sit at the register as his father did, and no longer works in the business day to day, at close of business, without fail, he calls in to each branch to check on the productivity of each stylist, the number of clients they had that day, and notes the day's takings.

Micro managing?  Or just good business sense in running a tight ship?

Another great example ...
In my formative days as a copywriter, I backpacked with my wife and landed a job in a direct mail agency in South Africa.  It was run by a highly astute – and dare I say, very successful Jewish gentleman who had an amazing way of imbuing his staff with a tight ship culture.

Each morning he would ask his secretary to collect all the discarded envelopes from the day’s incoming mail. She was instructed to cut them open, and clip them together with a bulldog clip. This then became his ‘notepad’.  Anyone who entered his office saw it on his desk with his notes on it.  His ‘lead by example’ message was not lost on the staff.  No one DARED waste a thing.

Of course, this may not be how you'd like to manage your business!  But tracking where your money is coming from and going is not a luxury and imbuing your team with a respect for not wasting is a real key to surviving and thriving.

When I told this story to a colleague once, he smiled and commented:

“Whenever I go into a company as a management consultant, one quick look in the stationery cupboard will tell me a lot about the way the company is run. If there is no stationery register or control over who takes what, or if there is an oversupply of stationery and duplication of ordering, and no seeking of competitive pricing, even if the cupboard is untidy … there’s a good chance the rest of the organisation is run the same way.”

This lack of attention to small details manifests itself in ‘cash flow complacency’ … a compacency towards receivables, and an ad hoc approach to payables, overstocking of product, carrying of dead stock, leaving unclaimed stock with distributors …

Now, if this in ANY way gives you an uneasy feeling that you should do some investigation into your systems, great!

Time to call in your accountant and explore ways you can tighten your ‘ship’.

Until next time,

Chris Newton
Results Corporation

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