Does Your Small Business Need A Service Or A Rev Up?

INTRODUCTION:

Hopefully by now you would have come close to finalising your business plan and three way budget for 2016/17 and have your whole team revitalised to actually make things happen for the better over the next 12 months and beyond.

If you feel that this wasn't necessary you would be one of the very lucky few.

If your business was a car would you think it is:

• purring like a Ferrari; or
• efficient as a Tesla; or
• average like one that is 3 year old; or
• sick as a lemon?

When was the last time you had your small business serviced by small business advisors or your small business accountant?

What then would a 'service' look like?

 Is your business flying like a Ferrari or are you driving a lemon?

1. Grease & Oil Change

Review the people you employ and the roles and responsibilities they have within your business. Are they performing up to expectation or is it time to replace or give them a tune up with a formal review and some training?

A small business that wishes to excel needs to have the right people (oil) and also the right training (grease). Without grease and oil the business is well on the way to blowing up.

Figure 2: A grease and oil change is recommended in business or it could find itself blowing up.

2. Fixing Suspension

Is your business bumping along all over the place or does it need to have its suspension fixed so that the ride becomes much smoother?

• Does it need to find ways to smooth out revenue so that overheads can be reduced (overtime, penalty rates)?
• Is it too reliant on major customers?
• Is staff turnover an issue so that screening of potential employees is more thorough or reviews are more regular to keep them on track and minimise the level of employee movement?

Figure 3: With suspension like this get ready for a bumpy ride!

3. Wheel Alignment

Does your business need a wheel alignment so that the work is spread out evenly and you don't experience a burnout too quickly due to wear and tear?

Possibly you or some key team members maybe doing too much of the workload. This is not good for long term success or you may find that extended breaks or replacements will need to be found just when you don't need them such as in peak season!

4. Cleaning Of Fuel Injectors

Does your business stutter along in fits and starts or is it firing on all cylinders? Maybe cash flow lines are blocked and need a good cleaning due to:

• slack monitoring of debtors;
• not getting invoices out promptly;
• allowing obsolete stock to build up;
• not requesting better terms from suppliers.

5. Indicators Keep Jamming

Does your business use its indicators to let people such as customers, your team and bankers know where it is headed or does it get stuck and not release once you've finished a turn?

If your business is indicating that it will be turning left when it wants to go straight ahead, confusion will reign and you may as well drive along with the hazard lights on saying "steer clear of me!".

Figure  4: Steer clear of me!

6. Replacing The Brake Pads

If your business is heading for some tough times due to a wrong decision or failure to make a decision to correct its path, you need to have good brakes.

Do you procrastinate if things aren't going well with a head in the sand approach or do you apply pressure to the brakes and settle, realign and head in the direction you are going at a safer, but brisk pace?

CONCLUSION:

It's funny that we very rarely miss a car service as we know we don't want it to blow up on is as it can be a very expensive mistake not to have it done.

When we have a business, why is that we don't always treat it with same respect when it is going to be one thing that keeps going financially in many cases?