Need More Strength? What About Your Vendors?
Note from Jan: This is part of a series on managing tough times. For full benefit, I encourage you to read the articles in sequence. For your convenience, here are the links to the first three:
#1 – 4 Musts for Managing Tough Times
#2 – Hunkering Down
#3 – Using All Your Strength.
Hope you enjoy!
Toiling away at your desk. Pouring over page after page of financial statements. Plugging “what if” numbers into spreadsheets. Maybe there is a mistake in the formulas? No such luck. Hopefully the staff will come through with some great ideas.
They probably will.
But while you are worriedly waiting, let me ask you this…..
Are you sure?
Are you sure you are using ALL of your strength?
Using All Your Strength
Note from Jan: This is the third in a series on managing tough times. For full benefit, I encourage you to read: 4 Musts for Managing Tough Times & Hunkering Down before reading this article.
So —are you using all of your strength?
The best success I’ve experienced with big budget problems (other kinds as well) came about by involving others. Staff members always came up with far more ideas than I did on my own (one time we came up with a list of 100 ways to save money!). Plus they were much more committed Read more
Hunkering Down
This is a follow up to “4 Musts for Managing Tough Times“. Please read that article before hunkering down to read this one.
PLEASE. Don’t just hunker down. It’s important to take charge. Stay out there. Act boldly. AND then just in case… hunker down.
And please don’t read this article until you have set an expense reduction goal. If you are one of many who wants to skip this step, please go back and do this first. Otherwise you’ll just be burning (your time) while reading.
Got your goal?
Good.
It’s design time!
If your goal isn’t huge and if you haven’t already spent some time searching for them – it may be real easy to spot ways to cut back with little pain and just enough gain.
If not – then another line by line study of each expense category may do the trick if you ask yourself questions like:
4 Musts for Managing Tough Times
A group of business owners recently attended a workshop on doing business in a recession. The facilitator told them to cut costs, cut employee hours and raise prices. When it was all over, many participants asked themselves and each other, “Okay but —- how?’.
As they talked about this, I could hear frustration in their voices. And could see fear on their faces. Or maybe I was projecting my own feelings – re-living some tough times of my own.
Yes - I’ve had lots of experience – not with a recession quite like this – but with major budget crunches. Very challenging ones. Lots of perseverance needed. And creative problem solving. And teamwork. Resulting in lessons learned that I’d like to share here - hoping to help anyone hoping for help.
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