I recently had a conversation with The Boss regarding one of his younger employees who was an underachiever. I asked if I could talk with the lad and see if I could help to motivate the young man to improve his work ethic. The Boss agreed and the conversation went something like this. We were in the middle of March Madness and I asked if the young employee had ever played any sports. He said he was on the basketball team in high school. I asked what position he played, and he said he was the starting guard on the team. I then asked how his bracket was going. It was early in the tournament, and he said his bracket was blown up by Kentucky losing to St. Peter’s. I said mine too! I said I was also a Badger fan, and they didn’t help my bracket by exiting as early as they did. We chatted sports for a while and eventually got down to the topics that needed to be addressed. I must say that I am partial to hiring athletes and folks who have been raised on a farm. Farmers understand the responsibility and hard work from young […]

I recently met with The Boss who was frustrated with a newly promoted manager. During our discussion, I found out the new manager was young and not very experienced. I asked how did this person become a manager if he was not ready for the responsibility? The Boss expressed that he had no choice, there was no one else he trusted to promote within his company. I then asked what qualifications did The Boss see in this person that caused The Boss to promote him? The Boss said the new manager was one of his top technicians and had an excellent attendance record. I asked if the person had ever been in a position of authority before? The Boss answered, “not really.” This scenario is happening more often than we’d like in today’s crazy environment where we do not have a sufficient workforce to fill open positions, including open management positions. We begin to promote new managers up the managerial ladder skipping rungs that are important for the person’s professional development. Back in the day, when an employee began to climb the managerial ladder, they began as a supervisor and next was promoted to an assistant manager. After several years, […]

I met with The Boss today and discussed the challenges businesses are facing with their workforce and what to do about it.  We talked about how the economic conditions of the early 2000’s forced business to reinvent and adapt their business models back then.  We remembered when The Boss had to change the business model again when customers forced businesses to create an on-line presence and sell using the web.  Today, our workforce has challenged businesses to change and adapt the business model. The Boss is realizing the younger workforce of today has different values and expectations verses the older workforce of yesteryear. Back in the day, when us older folk first got into business, the workforce we managed came to work Monday through Friday and put in the normal 40-hour work week, had a cubical or desk, and if they were senior associates, had the weekends off.  Today The Boss must manage a workforce, which is made up of several generations, each of which has quite different opinions and attitudes about work life balance and what accountability should look like. The main discussion revolved around, not having enough people to field a workforce team!  Today, The Boss must employ […]

As the challenges continue to pile up in business today, especially in staffing needs, I see organizations lowering their qualifications for new hires. This is done not because The Boss wants to but because The Boss has to! The latest unemployment numbers are telling us we have a 4.6% unemployment nationwide and in Wisconsin, we are looking at 3.2% unemployment. Those of us who are long in the tooth may remember doing business in 1998 when we were also at 3.2% and lower unemployment in Wisconsin. What does The Boss need to do this time around? Because organizations are hiring people who do not have industry experience and may not have the foundational skills desired by new employees, The Boss must do things differently to help these new hires to succeed. Training programs for their new employees and implementing a mentoring program will help the newcomers to assimilate into the company culture. Having a procedure for “onboarding” new people will also help. But above all, The Boss needs to establish SOPs in the workplace for those critical processes. Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) are an investment The Boss can make in the business and investment in all the employees. Developing an […]

I was in Canada fishing for muskies with my son and we were using surface baits when I saw this huge “V” heading for my bait. I immediately became excited and, in an instance, could see a large trophy size muskie hanging on my wall in the Man Cave. I watched the lure and asked my son to man the net. Then, in an instance, I pulled back the rod to set the hook and — nothing. In my excitement, I forgot everything I knew about the art of fishing and I set the hook before the fish bit the lure. I pulled the lure out of the water and my trophy catch was gone. It makes for a good story at the lodge, but I have nothing to show for my efforts. In the past few weeks, I have seen this happen to more than one of my client’s businesses. The Boss was working to land a huge account. He was getting excited and even planning what to do with the excess profits a large job like this could bring. The issue I saw in every case was the larger the job, the lower the profit margin. The Boss […]

I received a call from The Boss of a mid-sized company who wanted to talk with me regarding his cash flow challenges.  I was referred by his lender who noticed that despite the company’s good revenues and decent net profit The Boss was always experiencing cash flow issues.  I asked to see two years of financials and I did an indirect cash flow evaluation on his business along with calculating what I consider the top fourteen ratios I use to evaluate the financial health of an organization.   What I found was the company had good operating profit which meant the organization was generating a healthy sustainable cash flow.  I told this to The Boss who immediately asked me; “If I have such good operating cash flow, why do I not have money?”  The answer was in the ratio analysis.   When I calculated the Return on Total Assets, ROA, I found the ratio to be very high, too high for this type of business.  I began to ask The Boss a few questions regarding his building and equipment.  Now, The Boss was a very frugal man, in my opinion too frugal for the health of the organization.  The Boss would try […]

I was asked by The Boss of a family-owned business to help him control his employee turnover. I reviewed his financials and found a mediocre profit, but everything looked to be in order. The next step was to look inside his organization. I spent time with his department heads and, after some time, I began to understand the root cause of the problem. It often takes a little time for me to get the real stories from the employees because, at first, they see me as an extension of The Boss, I have even been told that I am “in The Boss’s back pocket”. After a few conversations, this myth is dispelled as I tell all my clients from The Boss down that I do not work for The Boss, I work for “The Company”. If I must tell The Boss he or she is wrong, so be it. This encourages more candid and honest conversations with the employees, who by the way usually know the problem and have a good idea of what a solution should be. In this organization, The Boss had family members working in the business. In the eyes of the employees, they have special privileges and […]

Recently I have been in several discussions with business owners revolving around leadership.  In general, we have concluded to many organizations are continuing to experience inefficiencies in production, a disproportionate amount of waste, uncontrolled employee turnover, or any other issues that are a result of poor leadership skills.  In most of these discussions, The Boss agrees that in their organizations they have very good workers, good to adequate managers, but they are lacking leaders. The question is often raised, “Are people born leaders?”  If so, then business owners must identify and hire born leaders if they want to improve leadership in their organization.  As the conversations mature, I often see The Boss begin to think that some people are “born to lead” and have the natural talent to lead. This is different than being a “born leader”.   What I see are talented employees in a growing organization, and The Boss identifies them as a “leader,” and therefore that person is promoted and expected to lead. Often these people are great workers, very good managers, and then promoted into a leadership position in which they underwhelm The Boss.  Why does this happen?  Did The Boss make a poor decision by promoting […]

I was invited to present at a self-employment in the arts conference where my audience was artists, musicians, and other self-employed artist types. My topic was “Financials and the Arts”. I have experience presenting financial literacy to executive directors of nonprofits, so I had a sense of the relationship between understanding the mission of an organization and understanding the financials of an organization. These artists had a very strong sense of mission, but not much of finance. I began by explaining the three financial statements. The profit and loss statement is like your paycheck. If you worked 40 hours a week at $10 an hour, your take-home pay was not $400. It was less due to taxes, insurances, and other deductions. This is how the profit and loss statement works. Your revenue minus your expenses and then you get to take home the difference in the form of profits. Your cash flow statement works like your personal debit card. If you have money in your account, you can draw funds from your debit card or pay bills with it. You don’t have to put money into your debit card account every day in order to use it every day. When […]