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7 Stupid Things Companies Do To Sabotage Their Success

7 Stupid Things Companies Do To Sabotage Their Success

Although many businesses can survive mistakes, many do not. Sometimes an owner or manager makes several critical errors and dive bombs the bottom of the barrel. Here are 7  mistakes that you should avoid to ensure success.

1. No Business Plan
Many companies avoid business plans, and the ones that do write them often create weak plans, or gloss over important goal settings stages.

Write a business plan that is strong and has goals you can achieve. Then make sure you check back with your plan often to rewrite or extend it.

2. Planning for Growth
It is one thing to finance your company, but another to finance its future. If you fail to plan for growth you will find yourself short of cash, space, materials or other critical aspects of your business.

It takes time to get your company solidly on its feet, and even more to expand. Plan that expansion carefully, but also plan for it. Remember this military maxim: On time is late, and early is on time!

3. New Opportunities
Taking on new business prospects takes time and planning. Remember the race between the tortoise and the hare--slow and steady won the race, and often does in business. You can stick to your business plan but still allow for new directions by implementing a process for them.

The key is consistency: don’t jump on something new just because it looks like the next big trend--it could be a flop and destroy your company.

4. Getting Assistance
There is more help available for businesses and their principals than ever before. Look to Linkedin groups, SCORE, SBA, and other resources for small business assistance. Every city has entrepreneur groups and organizations.

Networking for support is a critical component of business success, for contacts, information, and trend-studying.

5. Price Shopping
Too many business owners price shop everything, including people. They are more intent on what they can save on employees than what that employee will do--or not do--for them.

Take the time to find people who share your passion and your goal, especially if you are looking for key personnel. Also, put in the work to check out that person’s qualities and background. It’s one thing to claim a skill on a resume and yet another to prove it with recorded achievements.

6. Continuing Education
Many people think that just because they have started a business that they will either be the ones setting trends or that the people they hire will take care of that. Nothing could be further from the truth in both cases--you must be able to spot emerging trends and jump ahead of them, and rely on yourself.

You can educate yourself by studying and challenging your company goals, promising social and technological movements, and taking continuing education courses where necessary to stay abreast of new legislation in the business world. Stay sharp and stay in business.

7. The “Overnight Success” Fallacy
It is rare that a company or business will be an overnight sensation. It’s much like publishing--a new author has to work sometimes for years before getting published. Expecting anything else is a recipe for failure.

So it is with business. Plan on putting in lots of time, hard work, and constant learning to stay on top and be successful.





7 Stupid Things Companies Do To Sabotage Their Success - To learn more about this author, visit Greg Gaskill's Website.

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John Power
John Power, founder of Biltmore Franchise Consulting, has extensive experience developing and marketing franchises and business opportunities. He has been in and around franchising for over twenty years. From 1980 through 1990 he conceptualized, organized, and developed the American Video Association. He grew AVA to 2,000 national members, before selling the company it 1990. It was later merged into another home video marketing company. From 2000 to 2005 he worked as a contract marketing and human resources consultant to several local and national companies. In 2005 Mr. Power began working as a franchise development consultant on a full-time basis. Since that time he has helped more than three dozen companies initiate and develop their franchising program. He notes that there are many companies interested in developing a franchise program, and who need his specialized assistance. Mr. Power is a “hands-on” franchise consultant. He said, “I am the ‘nuts and bolts’ person who tends to the details for my clients.” Mr. Power holds a B.S. degree with a major in Marketing. See: www.biltmorefranchise.com You may contact Mr. Power at: jpower@biltmorefranchise.co - Visit John Power's Website

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Stephanie Robey is President and CoFounder of Pivot Positive, LLC - an Internet marketing business focused on helping people start work at home ventures. Previously, she was employed at The Search Agency with over 20 years experience in graphic design and 10 years experience in online marketing. She was responsible for launching the Conversion Path Optimization (CPO) unit where she and her team have conducted hundreds of optimization tests for online companies across multiple verticals.

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David Barr is the President of Venture Opportunities, Inc. David has been a professional business broker/intermediary since 1980 focusing on General Business Brokerage and Mergers and Acquisitions representing client transaction value from $400,000 to $20,000,000. Mr. Barr has handled the sale of over four hundred and fifty companies. David earned a university degree from the State University of New York majoring in economics and business. David holds the Mergers and Acquisition Master Intermediary and the Certified Business Intermediary designations from the International Business Brokers Association. He is also a Senior Business Analyst and a Texas licensed Real Estate Agent. For more information about David and Venture Opportunities, visit www.bizdealmaker.com. - Visit David Barr's Website

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John Brennan Ed.D. Dr. Brennan is President of Interpersonal Development, LLC, a training and development firm. Interpersonal Development has provided sales training and coaching to more than 3,000 sales reps from over 100 companies. A native of Australia, Dr. Brennan received his doctorate from the University of Rochester. His dissertation researched the effectiveness of Behavioral Modeling Technology in training people in interpersonal skills. While he has spent most of his career designing or delivering training, he was also a Vice-President of Sales of a training and development franchise with operations in 25 markets. Dr. Brennan has designed and delivered sales training in North America, Asia, Europe, Australia and the Middle East. He has been a guest speaker at numerous national and regional professional conferences. When Microsoft wanted Best Practices articles on sales for their web site, they called Dr. Brennan. The results are at http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/FX011387391033.aspx His firm’s clients have included Volvo, The Prudential, Merrill Lynch, Eastman Kodak, Gannett, Equifax Europe, the Economist Group and countless small businesses. - Visit John Brennan's Website

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Linda Richardson is the Founder and Executive Chairwoman of Richardson, a global sales training and performance improvement company. As a recognized leader in the industry, she has won the coveted Stevie Award for Lifetime Achievement in Sales Excellence and she was identified by Training Industry, Inc. as one of the “Top 20 Most Influential Training Professionals.” Ms. Richardson is credited with the movement to Consultative Selling and is the author of ten books on selling and sales management, including Sales Coaching — Making the Great Leap from Sales Manager to Sales Coach, and Stop Telling, Start Selling. She teaches sales and management at the Wharton Graduate School of the University of Pennsylvania and the Wharton Executive Development Center. Linda is a frequent speaker at industry and client conferences, has been published extensively in industry and training journals, and has been featured in numerous publications, including The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Nation’s Business, Selling Power, Success, and The Conference Board Magazine. Learn more about Richardson's sales training and performance improvement solutions at http://www.richardson.com web - Visit Linda Richardson's Website


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Greg Gaskill
(Visit Greg's Website) Greg Gaskill, President, Mr-SEO.com. Helping businesses succeed online http://www.mr-seo.com 800-613-1821


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