SMEs - Live or Die

A business without revenue growth is an expensive hobby.

In small and medium sized businesses, it is the exception and not the rule that individuals start their business day with the singular goal of generating revenue. Most of the time, people simply pick up the work that they didn’t finish the night before, never stopping to prioritize projects or re-assess the economic reward of their outstanding workload. Occasionally, we encounter individuals who create hard copies of their calendars, ensuring that their unfinished tasks are completed. We have yet to meet an individual, with either a self-imposed or corporately-driven mandate, who begins every single day by prioritizing their scheduled tasks based on the potential of each task to generate revenue for the company. It simply doesn’t happen.

How did we forget why companies were created in the first place; to make money. We go to work every single day in order to generate revenue for our company, which in turn generates revenue for ourselves and our families. Can anyone tell me, for the love of all things sacred, how a small or medium sized company benefits from having its owner or a valuable employee spend any amount of time doing anything other than generating sales revenue? Interviewing and hiring, policies and procedures, cleaning, organizing, random meetings and updates... For all of you who think that duties such as these are a part of running a business, I offer a different perspective.

If the primary revenue generator of a small or medium sized business is responsible for 75% of the overall sales revenue for their business (often this number is closer to %90), and the business generates $250k a year in sales, the following holds true:

• This individual generates $3750 per week or $833 per day
• Assuming a 10 hour workday, They generate $83 per hour

Every hour that this individual does anything other than generate sales revenue, they cost their company $83 an hour. If you are the primary revenue generator for your company, you are not saving yourself money by doing your own hiring etc, you are costing your company money and that is unacceptable. Stay focused and make smart business decisions. Your job and your company will live or die as a result of your business decisions.