As you read through the questions in each section, ask yourself, “If I address this issue:”
How much more money could I have in my pocket?
How much more time would I have to spend with my family and friends?
How much more would I enjoy my business?
Management
1. I don’t have enough time away from here
2. I’m the only one who knows
3. People don’t work the way I expect
4. My people don’t care
5. I can’t trust my people
6. I can’t train people to…
7. I can’t take a day off, vacation, no way!
8. Not enough time to manage in a day
9. I work too many hours
10. My manager don’t know how to manage
11. I don’t know how to manage
12. People do not follow rules
13. I can’t afford quality people
14. I never get the right people
15. I don’t have time to train new people
16. I don’t have the skills to manage
17. I have to do everything around here
18. Work creates problems at home
19. I resent owning the business
20. I would be better off working for someone
Sales & Marketing
1. I don’t have enough sales
2. My people don’t know how to sell
3. I don’t know how to get more sales
4. I hate making sales calls
5. Good salespeople are hard to find
6. I don’t know how to advertise
7. Not enough people see my business
8. I don’t know what my customers want
9. I don’t know if my advertising pays
10. It seems my advertising is ineffective
11. I am the best salesperson here
12. I don’t know what my sales should be
13. I don’t have enough time to make calls
14. I have trouble with objections
15. Sales are continually slow
16. I don’t know what my people are doing
17. I do most selling myself
18. I do not know who my customers are
19. I cannot identify why people buy from us
Operations
1. My costs are too high
2. I’m never sure a job can be done on time
3. I don’t know how much inventory to carry
4. I don’t know what I have in inventory
5. My people waste too much time
6. I’m not sure I’m estimating/pricing profitably
7. I’m the only one who can estimate/price
8. My work is too complex to teach anyone else
9. I have trouble estimating the time a job takes
10. My suppliers are late
11. I need to increase my capacity
12. My paperwork is always getting lost
13. I can’t find anything in my files
14. I’m not sure what my costs are
15. My customers complain too much
16. My subcontractors are hard to control
17. I have trouble keeping my people busy
18. This place is a mess
19. I need new equipment
20. I check on everything/everyone
Financial
1. I don’t know what records I need
2. I don’t like collecting money
3. Budgeting doesn’t work for us
4. We have poor cash flow
5. I don’t have a bill payment routine
6. I am on COD with suppliers
7. We make money, just can’t keep it
8. I never know where I stand financially
9. I finance some of my customers
10. My overhead seems high
11. I do not know where my breakeven is
12. I cannot afford to expand
13. I cannot afford to update equipment
14. I have inconsistent cash flow
15. I cannot get a loan for operations
16. I cannot afford to keep adequate inventory
17. I am receiving calls from creditors/suppliers
18. I do not get financial reports that I understand