Happy New Year 2017 - Bid Adieu to 2016

Time flies by very fast and it is no wonder that it is a precious entity. It seems just yesterday that 2016 had started and it has come to an end today. From tomorrow, it will be year 2017. It had been an wonderful year 2016 and it is time again to say good bye to year 2016. In doing so, I would like to recall all my supporters who supported us through the daily challenges. As always, there might have been mistakes on our part, some challenges which we might not have been able to complete. And there are other reasons for which we would like to Thank You.

This is time when we bury our past mistakes and look for the brighter opportunities where we could do better. It is a time when we want to laugh and bring cheer to our family, our friends and our associates. It is time when we make new resolutions. Just add zing to your life and enjoy.

Wishing You A Very Happy & Healthy New Year 2017.

 

As Per Promise... A Few More Tips

However successful you might be, you need inspiration & motivation at different times. We also need to have knowledge about new things, new concepts happening out there. To do so, you need to read different books, see different videos, hear audios if they are available & good, see inspirational movies, hear music giving inspiration or whatever feels good. Music has the ability to change mood & inspire. There are many minds in this world and some of them might be really Super. To understand their concept, you need to read their concept papers or books.

You have to constantly look for habits or places which are distractions for you. These are such places or things where you would go automatically due to your habits or the good temporary feeling you might get. These small distractions may take good amount of productive time and your productivity or efficiency comes down. You need to be wary of that.

On the road towards success, make a companion called failure. There is no success without failure... I must say temporary setbacks instead of failure. You can fail only if you stop trying. And until you fail in your mind, you are going to win. The rest failure/setbacks are only temporary out of which we need to find ways. 

Every big project comes out of a small step. Break that big project into small modules and complete the modules. Your big project will be completed in no time.

Get More In The Coming Year 2017 Using These Tips

If you have reviewed your last year and are happy that you achieved your targets. Congratulations. And all the best for the new year targets. But if you are wondering what went wrong and how you have not achieved what you wanted, then here are some tips that would help you in the coming year. The tips are to use your time so that you are on track to achieve your target. Even if you lag behind, the technique of reflecting on what you have done will help you get back on track.

1. I know many of you are not morning persons. One of the first things that you need to do is to get up earlier than what you do. You might be able to do so by getting up earlier by 10-15 minutes gradually moving towards getting up about  1-2 hrs early. You might ask - should we sleep less? No, you need not sleep less. You just sleep early. You should also have your morning schedule. Unless you have one, you might not actually pick up the habit to get up early.

2. Watch less TV. If you are not watching, great. If you are watching only news, some comedy program to de-stress, good. But if you have habit of watching movies and sitcoms daily, you really do not value your time. These things are worrisome as they are addictive. And if they are addictive, you would really waste your time doing nothing.

3. Focus. Focus is of great significance as it might be the only difference between achieving targets and not achieving them. If you focus, you get different paths of reaching your target and eventually reach at your goal.

4. Exercise. If you are getting up early, then give time to exercise. First you may want to meditate or write that book that you have in your mind. But do give some time to exercise.  

I think the list can be bigger and I will come back tomorrow. I want to keep this blog smaller as too much sweet things might make you diabetic ;) (On a Lighter Note).

Reflection - How The Year 2016 Went By

Finally, the year 2017 is about to end. This is the last week and only a few days to go before new year 2017 comes along. New Year, New Goals, New Targets. But what about the past? Any time is good time for review of our acts. If you can review it daily, weekly or monthly then it is better. Review of your actions and achievements till date give you fair idea about the next actions that you need to take. We also get to know whether we are on the right track or do we need to change some things. At the end of our period, we must be able to be near our target. If we review the same, we will know if we will be somewhere near it. If we are not there on target, we need to change our course of action and take appropriate steps so that we again come back on road towards our target. The more number of times we do reflection, the better.

Most of the time we are too busy in our work. So, traditions have been created in India and new festivals are there. So, we clean all our places before Diwali. We see that many scrap things come out. Similarly, we have Year Ending / New Year Eve. We can use the year ending to reflect on the targets that we had agreed to achieve in this year. What are the things that we did right? How can we improve upon some of the things. We can also take this time to Thank all the stake holders, customers, staff, suppliers and our friends to be with us all this time. We need to tell them that it was all due to their support that you are on the position that you are and that you look forward to the continuing relation with them.

Take some time and reflect on the past activities and also plan your targets for the new year. Hopefully, you will get some medicine / tonic, so that you are strong enough next year.

People And The Company They Keep

Strong minds discuss ideas, Average minds discuss events, & Weak minds discuss people. Or so said Socrates. It is true. And not just that. If you live with people of strong minds, you will become one. If you leave with people of weak minds, you will become one. The company you keep will influence you, unless you are a strong influence on others.

Even the way people speak are different. If you speak to a royal person, you will know it just by the language he uses. Similarly, if you speak to some laborer, you will know it by the language. If you are staying with people who are active, you too will become active in their presence. You can judge for yourself if you see how your teen years affect you. If you fall in good company, you will just move with your friend in good colleges or for great career. But instead, a bad company will earn you bad habits; habits you may not be proud of. May be your performance will come down. It may not be entirely due to you. But here your company plays an influence on you.

Even the great author Napolean Hill has dedicated quite some time in discussing the influence of good company on your mind and your actions. Try to make good companies and soon you will see that your success will be on different level altogether.

Dangal - Do The Most Unpleasant Task First

There is Dangal everywhere. Since there is no major release, all theaters are screening Dangal Movie. The reviews of the movie is also great. And why should it not be? After all, it has Bollywood Mr. Perfectionist in it. Aamir Khan has truly given the word Mr. Perfectionist a new definition altogether. He has altered his body and in a way that no one could think of. The last movie that we saw of Aamir was PK. In PK his body was normal. If you see Dangal, you will see that in the first half of the film, Aamir is well built for wrestling. Only in the later part, he is shown overweight. And for the most of the part, he is shown overweight. 

Now you will think that the movie was shot sequentially. First came the starting part and the film is progressively shot, meaning that the first scenes were shoot first and then gradually the later scenes came into picture.But it was the other way round, 

Aamir shoot the overweight part first because it was the most unpleasant one. He gave the genuine feel to the character. By increasing the weight of his body, he also felt the way overweight body behaves and changed his body language accordingly.Once he had finished the shooting for the overweight body part, he began working on his body in his 'Fat to Fit' program. And he did a lot of work for that. Once he was fit, he shoot for the first part of the movie. In Aamir Khan's word, if he had shoot Fit part first and then the Fat part, he might not have had any reason to get fit soon. Hence he did the reverse way.

It also tells us that we should do the unpleasant task first. Once this is done, our mind is free to work on other things. For that, 'Eat the Frog in the morning' theory was developed. Frog is not one of the most delicious things to eat, but rather very bad taste. So, if you eat the frog first, then you would be happy to finish the remaining meal. Isn't it?

P.S. (On lighter note): If you have been invited for lunch or dinner, you should not follow the above idea. Think of it. If you eat the thing you dislike, then the host might think that you like that the most. They will serve you that thing. So, if you are going to some host, eat what you like first.

Dangal - Remove All The Obstacles Coming Between Your Goals

Watched Dangal today. Really Inspiring Movie. Really a Movie to show you the path on how to reach your goals. Especially the starting part of the journey in the life of Geeta Kumari Phogat. Mr. Mahavir Singh Phogat, very well played by Aamir Khan, has a goal in life. To win a Gold Medal for India in Wrestling. He is not able to do it in India and hence, he wants his daughters to do it. It is really tough in the initial days for the girls. At one point, they are so fed up with the training that they go to their father cum coach to tell the different problems that they are facing. Other problems are okay, but the genuine problem seems to be the hairs. 

The dialogue by Aamir Khan is inspiring. I will remove all those obstacles which come in the way of the goals or which distract you from the goals. 

That needs to be truyly written in Bold & Gold. If you have some goal, you will truly go all out towards it. People who laugh at you will not matter. He changes the food and goes towards non-veg so that the girls are strong by eating protien. There are no players. So play the girls with the boys. Voila. What "goal-keeping" - I mean way to keep moving towards your goal. At one point, he also leaves his job, so that he can give enough time towards the coaching of the girls. Even when Geeta is international player and he is barred from training her, he manages somehow by getting the videos and then analyzing them. No obstacle is big enough for him in getting Gold for India in wrestling. 

You have to see the movie and take lessons in Goal keeping, if you truly want to achieve something. 

Focus On Customer Experience To Grow Your Business

Customer is not only an important stakeholder in your business, it is the only purpose. They are the heart of your business. You should not take for granted for any of the customer. Even if there is a small customer, it's experience with you should be good. There are two reasons for that:

1. This small customer can become big - you never know.

2. This one customer can become your advertiser. He will refer your name if somebody wants what you manufacture or sell. He will also take your name with good will.

Good will is very hard to create. It takes years to make an positive image but this will erode in a matter of few hours or days. For great experience to a customer, listen to him. First you must listen to his problems and offer solution. You must never use rough language when with customer. In fact, your language should always be soft because if it is rough, you cannot underestimate the power of habit. The rough words will come out in midst of an important meeting. The packaging of your products must be good enough to give a good feel to a customer. If the quality of your product, packaging of your product and the delivery of your product - all these things are right, then no one can stop you from growing your business. Because ultimately these three things are important and become a package to give a experience to your customer. 

All your customer facing executives & staff should be trained in soft skills. They cannot simply behave outrageously with customers. At the end of the day, it is the customer who gives business and hence the training to the customer facing staff is very important. When you send someone for quality complaints, your personnel should be with sufficient knowledge. Even if your products are to the specification, the problem of customer should be understood. If you become a part of the solution, you will win the trust of the customer. The experience you are giving will be good.

Grow Your Confidence To Grow Your Business

Will you do business with people who do not seem certain? Will you do business with people who do not seem to be sure of themselves, are confused? If no, then how will other people do business with you, if you seem to be same. Your business growth will be directly proportional to what confidence you can give to your prospective client. 

You should be certain with your thought pattern and not get confused with what other people might say. You might have some other thoughts about the subject, but understand and then think over it instead of seeming to be confused. You should be fluent in your talk; if you have stammering problems while talking, your thought clarity must be seen by other people. If you take small challenges and complete them, your confidence will grow and you will be ready to take on bigger challenges. When your confidence grows, so will your business. Customers do not like to put their money on confused people. They want to work with confident people, because they know that their money is safe. You should give that confidence to your customers about your ability to do the work.

Confident people will often take risks wherever they see an opportunity. They will not let it pass. They will not pass judgement on others. They will be happy with themselves. They will also be willing to help others and will not be insecure with the success of others. If you exercise daily, your confidence will improve. You have to do it to feel it.

Go Out and grow your confidence.

Negotiation Tactic - How To Get Good Offer From Sales People?

Negotiation is very important part of business. Not just business, even general life. Just as you need to market yourself in our day-to-day life, you also need to negotiate in your family, at office, with colleague, with boss, with your customer, with your supplier. When your kid is not studying, you have to show her carrot of something, so she studies. At some point, you also have to negotiate with colleague to do certain things. You have to negotiate with your boss for that extra good remarks so you can get good increment. 

While dealing with supplier, you should have one thing in mind. You should not show that you are the final authority. You should get all the good offer that you can get and tell the salesperson that you are not the final authority and you will need to discuss it with the final authority. In case, he has better offers, you can get that by taking some time. This way you may also pass on the blame for not taking the decision in salesman's favor.

As a rule, you need to shot down the first offer. Normally, when the first offer is given, there is scope for negotiations. Also, you can ask for the cost break up and see where the cost can go down. You can just delete some head and ask to revise the price on offer.

Mindset: How Much Can It Affect You?

How important is mindset? People say that he was born rich and so he is rich. People may give n number of reasons, why that person is super successful or rich. I remember the joke - What will a beggar do if he wins a lottery of 1 Lakh? The answer was, he will buy a car and beg in that car. The moral of the story was that beggar has a particular mindset and he cannot come out of it. 

If you take a rich man R and a poor man P. Exchange their souls so that the rich man R soul is in the body of poor man while the poor man soul P is in the body of rich man. The whole property & bank balances of R are now owned by P's soul while R's soul is now penniless. Give them a year and you will see the original rich man is rich again, while the original poor man is poor again. The moral again is that the rich man has a mindset. It cannot live the way it is. He takes matter in his own hands. He will do anything. He will trade his time or use his brains to gain the riches and after some time he will be rich again. 

The reverse is true. Even if P gets so much of wealth, he is not able to handle it. Instead of investing or increasing business, he is there using the luxuries and wasting his time. Thereby, by the end of a year or whatever days, he will be poor again. 

You can know the differences between men by seeing how they walk. Some might be very slow. Whatever work they want to do, it will be as if it is too much for them. While the other persons body language will be such that it will look that he is always in hurry. If you have decided your goal, your entire mindset changes and you do not look at the obstacles, but only at the opportunities and the target. 

Change your mindset and you will change.

Credit - An Important Part Of Your Business

Doing Business is simple? You get machinery, you get raw material, you manufacture, you sell. Simple. Or is it? 

In between these, you have overheads - mainly fixed. If you are manufacturing - you have to have place. Main overhead would be Rent, Labour/Staff payments, Electricity, and others. You have to manage these overheads. So, it is simple. You buy 100 worth material and sell it worth 150 and manage the overheads in that 50. Whatever is left is yours. It is not that easy though. Finance is an important part of business. In fact, very important. Even the best running businesses can fail if your finance is not good. By not good, I mean, if your cash flow is not good. 

Normally, you get raw material on credit and after manufacturing sell the material on credit. If both the credits match - say you get 45 days and you give 45 days, then most of your things are in balance. If you are big brand or company like Bajaj, then you get the raw material on credit, while you sell on advance payment. This makes you cash rich.

When you start anew, you have two main problems. You do not have history, so you do not get credit. Second, you are in need so you need to give credit. This increases your working capital needs. You can manage only limited turnover in the limited resources that you have. You need to work your way with your suppliers, with payment commitments that you need to honor. If you honor those commitments, a few months down the line your credit will be extended. Getting credit is very important as it is like you are getting a short term loan. Instead of going towards your bank, you can just rework your credit terms with your suppliers to get 15 to 30 days more. If you get that, consider that you have got a loan of that amount. Similarly, if you try to give cash discount for immediate payments, that may help you in generating more business and in turn more turnover in same resources. 

Extend your resources with honoring your payments to suppliers and keeping good quality & giving cash discounts to your customers. You may just do more within your limited resources.

Make Space By Throwing Waste Out

We have limited space in office. To utilize this space effectively, we must be able to take time each week or month to throw away the unwanted things. There are many things which are not of much use but we still keep thinking that this will be of help at some time. But most of the time you will see that it is not being used. Best way is to have your parameters for different items. If this item has not been used in six months or one year then probably you don't need it. If it is some eatable then it might have expired. Throw that out.

Similarly, you have habit of buying new things be it bags, clothes, shoes, utensils, new gadgets which we do not use after some time. Each & Everything in your house, office or your plant takes up energy. The lesser the things, the better. Keep limited space for things until you expand. Once things are limited, make it a point to First drive out older unused things and then get new things. Or if it is not possible, first buy new and then throw out older stuff.

Take The First Step & God Will Help You

We think about different things which we can start but fail to even start. For some, it is procrastination, for some it is inertia. There is lots of inertia that people have. And this inertia stops them from keeping their date with the starting of the project. According to Newton's law, a thing with no motion will try to be motionless & a thing in motion will always try to be in motion, until external forces act.

If you are already doing something, then the momentum will be with you. But if you want to start something, you will need external forces so you come into motion. This force need not necessarily be external, it can be your internal will power, it can be your drive to do something, it may even be circumstances in which you want to run your home. There can be different situations for all.

The thing you need to do is, Take the first step. The moment you take the first step, you will come to a situation where you will gain momentum. God will help you at different steps. You need to have patience. In fact, a lot of it. With time the momentum will increase and you would soon be running good show.

Go out today & take that first step.

Don't Begin Your Day Until You Finish It

Don't get confused with the title. If you are confused read it again and try to find meaning. When you do anything, you first do it in your mind. For example, you are making tea. When you think of making tea, you do everything first in your mind. You will take water, tea powder, sugar, etc and it is finished within seconds. Then you make it physically. This is for all major activities before doing it. Even for your day to day tasks. Only difference is you don't plan the tasks earlier.

When you start your day, what do you do? Do you start your activities immediately or do you take some time to meditate, think, about short term & long term future. If you plan your day, you will have accomplished what you need to do. But if you just go about it, you will be driven by problems. Instead, take out some time, and plan your day. Finish most of the planning and only then start your day physically. Of course, you need to count on the other issues that crop up like there is new or old customer and he wants to meet urgently. Or there is supplier or some production or marketing issue. But if major part of your day is planned ahead, you will reach moon if you want.

Do You Take Vacation?

For most of the Indians, work is workship. And we cannot leave our workplace. Even if we do, we are constantly thinking about the work & workplace. More so, if it is small company or shop where you cannot leave your seat.

You work all day long and deserve a break in between. Weekly off is different ball game. You should take bigger break. You should plan 8-10 days and go to different places. The break will give you enough time to rejuvenate your mind & body. Rejuvenated mind will give you fresh ideas & your relaxed body will be eager to execute them. Taking breaks is no way lesser than the habit told by Stefan Covey, where he describes seven habits. He tells us that it is extremely important to sharpen your axe after some time otherwise the time taken to cut the trees will increase with passing time.

The productivity increases tremendously after the break. You can even have some short term targets after completing which you can go for a break. You can also take along some different groups for different places.

Short Term Effect Of Reading Books In Your Life

You must take time out of your busy schedules to relax your mind from the stresses of business. However successful you might be, you will have some small troubles which take your time. These troubles sometimes take the shape of stress. You need to keep some hobby to keep off these stresses. Reading Books might be just that hobby which turns up into yet another thing of giving you new words, new views about world. 

Reading non-fiction book is another good habit that will do lots of good to you. Reading positive message giving books creates some positive images in your mind which later help in your life. The subconscious mind takes up the small nuances in the books and will imbibe them slowly in your life. To understand the effect, just go back to your college days and see how films and the characters in these films used to bring change in your behavior. For example, if you see Three Idiots or Dil Chahta hai or any other movie whose craze was great, you will notice that people behave like those characters for a few days until some other movie with strong character comes up to take up their imagination. Soon, the older mannerisms are changed to suit the new character. 

It is similar effect when you read book. If you read books of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle based on the famous detective - Sherlock Holmes, your daily language will change a bit and you will probably speak and think differently. You will also begin to look for those subtle little things and extend your logic to come to conclusions, however erratic they might be. You should make a list of marketing books, strategy books, biography books, great fiction stories which will leave short term positive effect in your life until you read another book to create another effect.

How To Hammer Your Goals Into Your Daily Life

There are two types of people - people who do not bother what's going around and go about their life as usual. The other type - will not be satisfied with what they are getting and are target oriented and these are the people who go ahead in life. They take the risk and are rewarded accordingly. They will not worry about their comfort zone and will go out of their way to achieve what responsibility they have undertaken. There are some kind of people, who will give hundred reasons why some thing cannot be done. The other type of person will say yes and will go about finding a way to do it.

There are people who set goals. But those goals are there only for a few days. They do not have burning desire and so the goals remain in background. There is method to achieve goals. You should go about setting goal and then keeping it in places where you see them daily. Make some related pictures and then keep them in front of you - at your home, at your office, in your car, etc. When you see it daily, it begins to infiltrate in your sub-conscious mind. In fact, you should write it daily a few times. Writing does two things. One - you get the habit of writing. Two - When you write, it is hammered on to your mind because it is done daily. Three - 85 % of your brain cells are used when you write. When you write, the third effect is the greater contributor to the hammering of goal in your mind. Just do it and see for six months. You will find ways to achieve your goal and will not leave it midway just like you leave your resolutions each year.

Don't Take Decision Out Of Emotions

There are moments in life in which we are very excited, happy. Moments ago you have got news or results for which you have been working. Out of happiness, you take some decision. After a week, probably you regret it. Have you faced the situation? Or take another situation. Something happens and situation is out of control and in the heat of the moment, you do something which you regret whole life.

These are real situations and you will observe that there are times when you should not have taken decision or you should not have given your word. For people who change their minds & action anytime, it might be easy as they might not give much weight to their words. But for people who follow their words, it is good very tough.

It is advised that you should not take any major long lasting decision when you are very happy or very sad or very angry or super excited.

Diary - A Notebook Journal

We live in a digital world. Almost everyone is making new website and ask us to create account on their website. A simple way to do this is to keep one username and password on all general websites and different at places where your security might be compromised. Previously it was easy, as simple password was enough. Even 4 letters would be enough. Due to security, many general websites also push for complex password like having capital & small letters, numbers, symbols, etc. This becomes confusing to our minds. We put in older password & reset new one. After a while, we try to login again and find ourselves putting wrong password again.

This is the reason why maintaining a book is good option. As soon as you create new account or email I'd, it will be entered in book. Everything is documented.

How To Save For A Rainy Day?

Napolean Hill's Book - Laws Of Success - fields one interesting habit - Habit of Saving. Habit of Saving is such habit, which can make a difference between success & failure. There is one example in the book - that of two worker, working in same company. One of them has a habit of saving. So out of the 100 that he gets, he will save around 20 and work with the 80 that remains. The other one is the person whose 100 become zero at the end of month. Our habits are so designed that we will spend most of the money available with us until we are bound to stop. The little savings that the first one does becomes significant enough. The second one develops some instrument which is very good, but he does not have any money to make instruments and sell. 

The first one gives his savings and they make some 100 instruments and go for selling. After sometime all are sold. They make a 50:50 partnership and start a company of making those instruments. Soon, it is big enough and they make some million dollars by selling the stake of the company. This windfall might not have come for the first worker, had he not had the habit of saving. 

But how do we save? The best way to save is to take out some amount of money from your earnings and deposit it or invest it somewhere so that it is not liquid money and you are not able to spend it. Our spending habits makes us spend all the money that we have and if we put a habit of separating 'x' amount of money each month before spending, soon it will be 12x in that year. If you invest it in some good scheme, it will increase by the day/month. You can use this money when there is a Rainy Day and you need it. But until that time, let it be safe from you.

Implementation Speed - Direct & Indirect Benefits

What do you do when you get one good idea? Sit on it & forget it or Implement it? If you look at the successful people near you or people who you see in news, you will see that they do not waste time in implementing what they like. They will just catch hold of the thing they like and implement it in their life or business. That is the reason someone said that if you are implementing what you preach others, you would be a more successful person. 

I have been reading many books. I have read some books on Business Leaders/Moguls in India - right from Ratan Tata, Rahul Bajaj, Aditya Birla & others who belonged to that group of people who have changed the landscape of India. I have also visited Jamnagar and the Reliance colony that is in Jamnagar. While there and also in papers, I read how Reliance is able to build such big projects without any delay. First they will list out what things are needed to complete the project. Once the steps are identified, they will give all the resources needed right at the start of the project. Mukesh Ambani had implemented many of the projects run by Sir Dhirubhai, before time. 

There are direct & indirect benefits that you get if you are completing the project before time. The direct benefit is of course that the project is complete and there are no cost overruns. The delay in projects are often accompanied by the cost overruns, which increase the budget or the cost of the project. The indirect benefit is that the plant can become operational on time and can immediately start production and hence the revenues. The delay in projects not only increases the cost overruns, but also delays the revenues which is not counted as the project is not complete. Say, if the project cost is 100, the delays make the cost to 120 or more and if there is revenue generation of, say 10 units per month, then this should be added to the cost of the project. This way, the actual overrun cost of the project will come. 

And if you consider all this, you will learn that the implementation speed of a person is critical importance.

Brand Name - How Much Weight Should We Give To It?

After you have registered your business, you begin to think of production & marketing. In marketing, you think about the different names that you give to your products, the new logo, the visiting card, et all. How much money or time should you spent on it. It is rather tricky question. What matters really are the 4 P's. Product, Placement, Price & Positioning.

If you go out there or read the Brand Equity or other marketing publication, you will see that there is no perfect name or logo. You will find both simple & complex names. Some have meanings, others are just symbols or names. For example, Dove & Tresemme, both are hair brands. But while Dove truly signifies the softness of shampoo, Tresemme does not do anything. But Dove does a lot of advertising, it is hammering it's name, it has positioned itself as top end of softness and truly distinguished itself with its price. I have even seen some use Dove just on face, just because of the cost. Would it have mattered if Dove name would have been, say LirVa. Not really. It not only has good quality, good advertisement, good Positioning, but also good distribution. You take any of it away from Dove & examine if Dove would have been as successful.

Your name should be unique, no doubt. But name should be last thing on your mind. I know that Good things without name can be as successful as some thing with carefully thought out name. If you don't believe me, just remember the most successful car of India which had no name. It's engine cc became it's name - Maruti 800.

Change Small Things Regularly

Inertia is a very big word. Inertia is the resistance to change your current position. Everyone has inertia. It takes great energy to come out of inertia. Nobody likes change. Everyone likes to be in his own comfort zone. When you are in comfort zone, your progress is limited. That is the reason why you should always challenge your status quo. Challenge yourself and try to come out of comfort zone.

It may be difficult to change all of a sudden. Instead you can engage your brain by confusing it ( sorry for the word). By confusing, I mean you should change your small habits. If you are combing your hair with right hand, use left hand for a week. Write a note with your other hand (use left hand if you are right handed). Wear your watch in right hand. You can change the pocket where you keep your wallet. You can just see how awkward it is at start, but 2-3 days later, your mind/brain adjusts to new inputs and you feel comfortable.

These are small things which you practice in life. You can practice similar things in your business/ professional life too.

How To Increase Bottom Line In Business

The basic measures of business are top line & bottom line. Top line is the total revenues that you generated in a business in particular year. Growing top line indicates that your business is growing and not stagnant. It is basically a multiplication of number of units you sold with the unit price. When top line grows, there is increase in at least one of them.

Bottom Line is the basic profit that you made. This comes from top line minus the expenses & purchases. Whatever your top line is, you should have healthy bottom line. Increasing Bottom Line is the basic purpose of business. If you have constant top line i.e. sustainable sales, you can increase your bottom line by decreasing the expenses. If you are not able to increase sales, you should control expenses. You can control them by use of automation, decreasing repeatable tasks, reducing raw material costs, extending credit period thereby decreasing finance cost, think of capital investments so your running costs come down.

Other way to increase bottom line is to increase top line keeping the expenses at current levels.
T.L. - E = B.L.

Above equation will ease your outlook. To increase B.L., increase T.L. or decrease E.

Negotiation Skills - An Art

Negotiation skills are very important in business. The impact that a seemingly small decision can have on your business cannot be undermined. A small difference in paise/cents can give you a telling figure if you just multiply with high quantity & calculate over year. You need to be very clear on how much you can give.

When negotiating you need to understand that there are certain points which you can cede and some which you cannot let go. You should also be clear about the complete picture that the proposal brings. For example, if you are sticking to small/ trivial issue and overlooking big one, you can be in trouble. You cannot overlook the big complete picture and should not consider only short term gains.

Many a times you fall weak in discussion if you show desperation. If you are in need, then you cannot negotiate much. Normal follow up is OK, but if you are following up aggressively, then you show desperation. Even if you have desperation, you should not show it & rather let the other person take action. You should just remind him about yourself so he remembers topic.

Setting Up Business? How To Register?

Having confirmed that you are taking on Entrepreneurship, let us see the first step of Registering the business. You have options of Registering as Proprietorship, Partnership, Limited Liability Partnership (LLP) & Private Limited Company. It all depends on how you are viewing your business in coming years. If you want to keep it small and independent, you should keep it as Proprietorship. If you are having a partner with whom you want to go, go for Partnership firm. But Proprietorship & Partnership firms have one drawback. Just in case you are bankrupt, creditors can claim your property too. You & your business are one entity & not separate. Second, if you are thinking of taking bank loan or venture capital or private equity, you should rather go for Private Limited Or LLP.

If you want to go for supply to big companies or looking for investors then better go for Private Limited company. Since the accounts are audited, investors are willing to invest looking at balance sheet. If you are not willing to make it big, do not go for Private Limited registration. For small businesses LLP, Partnership or Proprietorship is best as accounting costs are also low.

LLP is best combination of Partnership & Private Limited company. Unlike Partnership, the firm & persons are different entities. The liability of partner is Limited to the firms liability. Creditors cannot force you to pay legally. Of course these things come only when you are not genuinely involved in business.

Why Wait For Breakdown?

The topic that I want to focus on is Breakdown.  Though this is primarily important for manufacturing units, it may also be taken up by other firms - be it software, finance, trading, small shops, etc. This is because almost every field employs some or other kind of machine. We are very engrossed in day to day running of the business and hence we are not able to plan a shutdown. If there is no planned shut down, then there will be breakdown. When breakdown happens, there is no option but to correct the machine at the earliest and start the work again. 

What happens in Breakdown? Breakdown is sudden. It will disturb all your planning. You have planned everything pre & post production. Especially if the raw material feed to the machine is perishable in few hours. The manpower will also be idle for the time that the breakdown takes to clear. If the maintenance team is in house, then it is easy. But if you have to call external help then it may take time as they are not in your control. The most important thing is your production loss. That cannot be covered. Man hours are also lost. You may have to bear many losses if everything is put together. And the important thing is that you have to start running the show at the earliest. This gives very less time for repair or maintenance and hence the work is not done as it ought to have been done. 

Can these all things be avoided. Partially, yes. Why I am saying partially is because there are certain breakdowns which might be sudden and out of control. But 80% of the things can be controlled by use of Preventive Maintenance. You have to make a list of all the machines and a daily, weekly & monthly plan for those machines. If you have this plan ready, you will plan for the shutdown and many of the production losses that occur during the breakdown can be prevented. For traders, finance, software people also there are computers and other items which need attention. You can keep a record or outsource it to some third party. They will clean your system from time to time and keep it in order.

Dilemma - Start Early Or Start Late

Have a great business idea in your mind? Waiting for right time to start up? Should you start early or late? Frankly there are no rules and even if there was any rule, there are always exceptions to it.

When you are very young, you do not have any experience of how a business is carried out. You are so raw that people might not believe in you at first. Money is also important. All in all, I must say that if you are just out of college, then you must spend some quality time with some industry so you are familiar with it. You can also accumulate some money so you have some seed money. You also get some time to think more on it and can plan a few things before playing out.

On the other hand if you are more than 40-45, then you are sufficiently experienced and have seen industry from close quarters. If you have been planning for the same, you also have time in which you can accumulate seed money by keeping your lifestyle below what you can afford & by investing in assets which can be liquidated in needy times. At the same time, it is also tricky. Since you have grown senior in your company, you might be getting fat salary and your family has grown big now. If you start up, your salary will stop & your expenses will be pretty high. You must plan so that your savings are there for about 1 year or so.

But if you are in 25-35 group, then time is great for you. Your family is small so you can spend more time with company. You have experience as well as low expenses. Your salary might not be that high when compared with what you might have got after 10 year. I consider this as golden period.

Detach Yourself From Business

Watch the next time when you are watching a cricket match. When some players commit mistake, immediately you say he did it wrong way. Probably he should have played it other way. But the player has been playing the game more than you. He is expert. You are a third person who is not in that situation so you are not bogged down with the responsibility that the player has. You are able to analyze situation better because you are outside it.

The same situation is with your business. We have been running the show for so many days. We begin to think that we have tried all that we could do. You are unable to think the solution of the problem at hand. Imagine a situation where you have a friend and has come to you with problem. You will hear & may be you will give him a couple of possible solutions.

When you are facing a problem, the more you think the more you are stressed. Instead take a break. Go to a pleasant cool place. Detach Yourself from you. Now imagine that some third person has the same problem that you have. Believe me you will immediately come up with 2-3 solutions to your problem. Try this next time when you are facing some problem.

Value Of Customer Retention

Customer is the most important part of our business. He is the reason you exist in the business. If Customer is not there, you simply cannot exist. It is not very easy to gain customer. You have to keep many things right before the first customer comes in and if he is happy, your things are working. You have to keep the customer happy. A happy customer will tell two others and they will come to you to buy the product. But remember that an unhappy customer will tell 100 others and they will not come to you. They may also tell others and your name will simply come down as a supplier.

You have to understand that it is very hard to retain a customer. But if you are able to retain him, you do not have to look further. He can be your regular customer and you just have to serve him each time, so that he is satisfied always. You can find other customers while retaining this one. This will help you increase your business. For example, if you are doing a thousand dollar per month business with one customer and he is happy. You should understand that your 12000 dollar per year is genuine business opportunity and if you retain it, this business will continue. If you add another 20000 dollar per year customer after six months, your 32000 dollar per year is fixed. So, if you find new customer while retaining the older ones your business will grow year-on-year. But if you are running behind new customers and make the older ones suffer then you will lag behind on both the counts. The regular customer may look elsewhere and leave you, while if new customer is not satisfied, he may not continue with you.

Do all things possible to retain the new customer.