Running Your Internet Business – Doing One’s Job

During this bit of familial nonsense, we ended up calling the police with respect to the theft of property (remember that he was renting and that there was no in-common involved). The phone call was less than satisfactory.

Let me be clear to begin. I believe that the ultimate answer was correct and that the constable was correct. Not in the path he took but in the end place.

The point is that when we callled, we got a very disinterested voice at the other end. He asked a number of questions and then said … “This is a civil matter, we can’t get involved. You’ll have to call your lawyer.”

Now I want to be clear that if we had pursued it as a theft (which it was), then we would have ended up with a number of angry relatives. And the end result would have been worse than the theft.

The key, though is that the constable came across as unwilling to bother taking the report — in other words, do his job.

On the other hand, I had a GPS stolen from my car. Not cool. So I called the police to report the theft. The constable took the report and then explained to me that there wasn’t much point in proceeding. That they would never find the thief nor the GPS and that outside of CSI & television, cars aren’t a good base for fingerprinting (too many hands touch). Again no help but this time the reasons were given and explained so that I agreed with his reasoning.

As entrepreneurs we are going to face this situation — both with ourselves,  our partners,  our employees and our suppliers.

Of course, I’m going to encourage you to ensure that your employees and suppliers do their jobs. After all, if they don’t you won’t survive!

But, more important, is to always appear to be doing the best possible job.

There are always going to be issues where the client isn’t going to get the solution they want. Either because of laws, or ramifications or just physical impossibilities.

Be the second officer … explain why it’s a bad idea (or … or … or ….) and help the client to understand why. Sell the client on not proceeding.

That way, you’ll be perceived as doing your job — and satisfying the client — and not just as avoiding work.

As entrepreneurs we need to ensure that our employees and suppliers understand how important this attitude and behaviour is. To the company, to the client and ultimately to themselves. In effect, selling isn’t just to yes, sometimes you need to sell no.

On the other hand is ourselves and our partners … especially when we’re solo.

Not only do we need to sell our clients on no, but we also need to make sure that we do our jobs — and maybe more — when there is no one there to push us.

Sometimes that is easier said than done.

That’s a big part of why so many internet marketing gurus push the “fix yourself” button so often.  Personally, I’m not a motivation kickstart kind of guy. I’m self-motivating and generally my bulls**t meter screams when I’m in some sort of “Get Motivated” type of presentation.

But the sad truth is if we don’t do it, it won’t get done. So we need to keep motivated.

To do that means we need to know ourselves. Do you need to be externally motivated? Do you need to be helped over the rough spots? Then you better find yourself a good coach and/or motivation guru (or both). Are you self motivating until you collapse? Then you need to identify the warning signs and how you will overcome collapses — which may mean a coach and guru or a beer and wings with a friend.  In case you are wondering, I want to be clear that a coach can and should be used for more than just motivation but I’m focusing on this aspect for this discussion.  In fact, you may find you need different coaches for different aspects of your business life.

In any case, the time to discover that you need motivation is not when you are sunk in the roots of despair.

As an entrepreneur one of the risks you must manage is the risk of your demotivating … and like all the other risk events, management means a plan to avoid (or encourage), and to overcome (or exploit). The one must occur prior to the event, and the other be ready on a moment’s notice if the event occurs.