Work less… for more success!

The irony of this blogpost title versus keeping your nose to the grindstone may cause a few to scratch their head and tilt it ever so gently sideways… Most of our generation was brought up to believe in the “Rise early, work hard, strike gold…” mentality. Yet the unsung key to entrepreneurial success is growing your core business and focusing on delivering high quality products and services, on time, every time. Business owners who know the traps of growing pains too well will tell you it is quite dangerous to reach the breaking point where essential tasks are delegated to less experienced personnel and expecting them to keep up with the mad pace; all it takes is one error, one bad day, and your customer can be hard to recover. We have seen this many times in the service sector, and it ain’t pretty at the customer service counter. That is why from many successful entrepreneurs’ experience I would highly recommend slowing down and ensuring quality control at every step, even if it means affecting the bottom line in the short term and turning away a percentage of business. What you will end up with is your top clients or the cream out of the 80/20 rule, which you can focus on and meet the needs consistently or at the very least, make that your ultimate goal and corporate culture. Then, as your capacity to handle higher volume develops, this core will refer you quality business with similar expectations, an elastic demand based on reliability willing to ensure your profitability and sustainability. Establish win-win relationships and never drop the ball or stop caring. Even when business is good and lined up at the door, in this day of consumer feedback blogs and surveys you will always be rewarded for honouring your promises and staying true to your original business values. In the end, what we leave behind is more important than a checkbook; the gold is a spotless name.

A few quotes you may also appreciate on this topic:

-A successful man is one who can lay a firm foundation with the bricks others have thrown at him.

-I don’t know the key to success, but the key to failure is trying to please everybody.

-Pray that success will not come any faster than you are able to endure it.

– The measure of success is not whether you have a tough problem to deal with, but whether it is the same problem you had last year.