Jochum's Small Business McNuggets

Everybody seems to like small, digestable bits of advice, so here are some principles I've developed over the years...

1. Keep Answers Simple: The more obvious the answer, the more powerful it is in the marketplace.

2. Never trust anything (or anyone) your “common sense” doesn’t support: Common Sense always appears as a suddenly self-evident (“slap to the head”) truth to a previously confused audience.

3. Use “good” strategy when planning: Good strategies focus on “what to do” rather than “how to do it.”

4. Customer-centric businesses succeed by focusing on two goals: Treat customers so they want to (1) buy more and (2) complain less.

5. Avoid design arrogance (i.e. “build it and they will come”): Establish and manage clear and reachable objectives that are specifically designed to achieve sales revenues.

6. Short-term focus foreground, Big Picture focus background: What is generally required for start-up success is good solid business logic and an ability to address the real near-term issues... not committees, brain trusts or long-term initiatives. These things certainly have their place in overall business success, but don’t try to "build the bridge from the other side of the river."

7. If you are not a Research Center, don’t spend money like one: Limit the pursuit of every cool technology or service idea that might be important to "someone someday" and exert sound investment principals and self-control.

8. Emphasize success through collaboration: Embrace the idea that “Nobody should feel individually successful if we are not collectively successful” to drive every team member to align their professional goals with the company goals of revenue and profitability

9. Create a Discipline of Execution: Build a culture that values productivity over procedure. Fundamentally, execution is the discipline of exposing reality and acting on it.

10. Cultivate a culture of openness: Foster an atmosphere of honesty and candor and lay the framework for collaboration and communication amongst team members and partners.

11. Don’t be afraid of the Negatives: Honest, open exchanges will show the balance between optimism, motivation & realism.

12. Just signing off on a plan is not enough: Leadership means drilling down for explanations until every key answer is clear, defendable and achievable.

13. Lead by example: "Do as I say, not as I do" cultures rarely succeed. Every team member should feel that, “unless I make this happen, our collective efforts won’t matter.”