by Rufus Wingfield III
The margin of error for most small businesses and startups is critically small. Every choice made, or not made can mean the difference between the business surviving or collapsing. While it’s not an exact science, there are similarities in the actions and decisions that successful small business owners take, make and avoid. Some of these moves, though often seemingly unpretentious, are nevertheless essential.
Arguably the most critical misstep or best move made by small businesses is can be found in the planning phase. Many small business owners feel that they must be a jack of all trades. While they may be the subject matter expert on the product or service, they make be inexperience at planning, execution, and human resources and make the misstep of try to do it all alone. Others realize their limitations and call on experts to ensure their business has a solid foundation. This is one area where Breathe Enterprises has experience working with small businesses, providing human resource expertise, advising them in the planning phase, and assisting in aligning organizational structure to support business strategy.
Effective utilization of technologies can also mean the difference in success and failure of a new business. Though it may sound intimidating to some small business owners, the cost and complexity of new technologies, such as web hosting, social media platforms and cloud services, is not as expensive or complex as they might think. Failure to adapt to new technologies can be a huge misstep for small businesses. Those businesses that adopt and adapt to new technologies experience a streamlining of business processes, and short and long term advances in their businesses.
Training and continuous learning and improvement is vital to all businesses regardless of size. Not investing in training can be a serious misstep for any business. Those businesses who do invest in training that has a direct linkage to the company’s business plan and a training approach that supports the successful implementation of the business strategy significantly reduce their margin of error. Braathe Enterprises offers in-person, personalized training on a variety of business topics. For more information contact BE@ info@braatheenterprises.com.