The following is an excerpt from a single conversation, but we hear "similar" comments regularly. If you read the 3rd paragraph closely, you'll find a very common business fault that strangles many contractors.
"I can't afford that," sighed Carey, a 14 year contracting veteran in Cleveland Heights, Ohio. "I used to say this whenever some 'new' business thing would pop up."
"This happened fairly often. Like when we looked into a new digital copier/printer. The sales rep proved I'd save money over the old way. He'd show what I overpaid in toner, time wasted with employees having to get up and down instead of sending documents by email, the whole thing. And I'd give my standard response, 'I can't afford that'."
"Eventually, after over-spending on our old system, we replaced it. I'd have been ahead if I'd done it sooner. But nooo " ... Carey mocked himself, "I couldn't afford it."
"Same for my old clunky phone system, training my techs, or replacing my aging trucks. Nearly every time I had to replace one, I'd look back and see that repairs, rotten mileage, and lost time in the broken trucks had cost me real money. Not to mention the negative 'image' they sent customers."
"That's when I realized something that changed my business."
What Carey realized is a falsehood that hurts, even bankrupts many small businesses. The link explains this truth: Business die when small problems seem big and big problems seem small.
No comments:
Post a Comment