The Purpose of Owning A Business

The fastest way to burn out with your business is to stop focusing and striving for this one thing, that I will get to in minute.

What is the purpose of owning and growing a business?

For most people, we start a business because we want to make money, make an impact and have freedom. Right? At least that’s why I have started each business I have owned.

For most people I think the biggest reason start a business though is freedom. Freedom to make as much or as little as you want to make. Freedom to work when you want to work, how you want to work and where you want to work.

Freedom to think, freedom to choose and freedom to decide.

But most entrepreneurs find themselves in a seemingly constant cycle of panic, abbreviated by sweet moments of success. The stats back it up 51% of small business owners have gone no less than 6 months without a paycheck at some point in their business, and almost 60% of small business owners make $50,000 or less per year.

So sure we get into business for money, impact and freedom but many only cage themselves into a prison they can never get out of.

I see a lot on social media, influencers, coaches and gurus who talk about how much they made in their last launch or last year, but you never hear about what their actual profits were. I don’t care if you did $1 Million dollars in sales last year if you had $800k in expenses.

A business is considered profitable when it makes money, after you the owner is paid, and all the bills are covered. If you have a team of people whom you support with a salary, but aren’t bringing home a salary yourself, you are doing something wrong. Plain and simple.

The purpose of a business for the business owner, is and always will be to make you money. PROFIT.

This means that if you can’t afford to hire someone without cutting your own salary, don’t hire that person, go it alone just a little while longer until you hit a number where you can afford to hire someone.

We must be diligent with managing our expenses in business, just because you think you can afford something, doesn’t mean you can. Just because you tell yourself your expenses are just you reinvesting in the business- doesn’t mean you actually are.

If your business is not profitable- do not spend any more and savagely cut expenses until you are profitable again.

Depending on the size of your organization truly dictates what your expenses should be, but cut cut cut, until you are paying yourself.

If you don’t take of yourself first you can’t take care of anyone else.

If the business can’t take care of you first, it can’t take care of anyone else.

A great resource for managing your expenses and finding more profit in your business is “Profit First” By Mike Michaelwicz. I wish I would have read it sooner, and you will wish you had too.

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Now what? Starting over again… from the very beginning.

I’ve been following Alex Charfen for many years. One of his most informative measures of scale in business is called The Billionaire Code. It’s essentially a chart that visualizes scaling a business from “seeker” to creating a legacy business. Through it he walks the CEO of a business through the various phases of a business from income, staffing, constraints businesses and their CEO’s encounter along the way.

It’s the most detailed and comprehensive path to scale any business from an idea, to a hobby, to a real business and then to a legacy business.

When I owed my gym, I loved this resource as I scaled ‘the code.’ One aspect of it I found lacking was what to do then shit starts to go back the wrong way.

In business we are constantly looking to grow, because if you’re not growing you’re dying. It’s a universal truth in business. I found myself wrestling with a few things the last 18 months in my business:

1- I had fallen out of love with my work and wanted to embark on something new. Fitness is definitely a passion based business, because you have to pour your life into your clients, your team and every minute of everyday. I started to feel like when it came to living my life with my priorities in alignment- there was always something in the business that tore me away from my family, friends, sleep and self care. It went from a passion based business to daily drudgery, but being the boss I had to slap a smile on my face, show up everyday and inspire my team and my clients.

2- I noticed a profound shift in the market place and people’s desire to actually act to change. Everyone wants to get in shape and lose weight, but nobody actually wants to commit to a better way of living for health long term. My business became a churn factory- the more my team and I cared about each clients outcome- the fewer clients we had. Granted the clients we had were super committed- but a business needs repeat business to stay in business. Not the promise of repeat business, but the same 300-1000 customers each day, week and month. Without that a business can’t keep the lights on, the rent paid or their team and their teams families fed.

3- Social media and online reviews and presence do no equal income.

4- A business can experience their best year ever- followed rapidly with their worst year ever and bankruptcy. Don’t get cocky, remain humble, and always live beneath your means. Recognize the initial pinch and act quickly. It’s imperative if you want to continue to win in business.

I love being the boss.
I love being self employed.

I live having a team.

I love being the breadwinner and maintaining my independence.

So starting over, having spent my saving to keep my business afloat for the last 6 months of its life, is simply put HARD AS F$&@.

Not knowing what I want to do when I grow up, starting over and just exploring the world as I know and don’t know it. While keeping the lessons I’ve learned and forgetting just enough of the life and work I once knew so that I can open myself up to new lessons and opportunities.

The beauty of being a seeker again is the openness of what’s possible.

The shit bit of being a seeker again is all the uncertainty, and I rely heavily on having a level of certainty in my life.

So how do you handle being a seeker again, when you once had a pretty dang good thing and not even that long ago?

1- Ask yourself questions about what’s important to you in your work- ability to use creativity? Lead a team? Have free time? What kind of money do you want to make per unit? Do you want a service based business or product based business? How long will you give something a go before you decide it’s your next thing or if it’s not?
2- Evaluate what you really don’t want to experience again in your work life and personal life.
3- Get curious. About life, people, other businesses and try to find a need you can fill, and you want to fill that’s interesting enough to pursue.
4- Get busy. Be careful not to get sucked down into defeat and depression. Keep moving forward and recognize that there is beauty in the lessons you are learning and you won’t stay here as long as you keep moving forward. Do one thing each day that will move you forward, out of the middle- and be ok with your direction may change along the way. It’s ok.