Here is a hint for federal workers on completing projects in less time. Try working on Mondays and Fridays. Forty percent more time spent on a job can make an amazing difference in project completion time. I am always amazed at the schedules of federal workers. At some agencies, if you work six hours per day, as opposed to the normal four hours per day, you get every other Monday off.
Last week I got a notice of bankruptcy in the mail. A former client, who was featured in a previous blog about business consultants, had filed for chapter seven bankruptcy. If you aren't familiar with the federal bankruptcy code, and I sincerely hope you are not, there are two main types of business bankruptcies, chapter seven and chapter eleven. Companies file for a chapter eleven bankruptcy when they hope to survive. They attempt to negotiate a plan of reorganization with creditors.
A chapter seven bankruptcy results in the complete liquidation of a business. The business goes away. The company's assets are sold and the proceeds are distributed to creditors. To paraphrase Billy Crystal's character in “The Princess Bride”, all you can do in a chapter seven bankruptcy is go through their pants pockets and look for loose change. If you don't get that reference, you obviously don't have kids.
My former client was a construction contractor, who had fallen under the influence of a business consultant the way women fell under the influence of Dracula, at least in the movie. I would like to feel sorry for the owner, but he bought the consultant's bullshit eventually putting the douche bag and his wife on payroll. If you want more details, please read my June 2011 blog entry on “Hire a Consultant – Business Vampires.”
The bankruptcy notice reminded me just how much I dislike business consultants / coaches. What do good business coaches and werewolves have in common? Neither actually exists. The reason why there are no good business coaches centers on the qualifications of the average business coach. Business coaches tend to come from one of two backgrounds. Either they come from large businesses and mistakenly believe their experiences are relevant to small businesses. Or, they are small business failures. Why do I say they are small business failures? Because all the good small business owners I know are actually running businesses. There is more money in successfully running a business than coaching others. The people who wash out as business owners become consultants and coaches.
Here's an example from my career past that shows how large company experience is generally irrelevant to small business. My last job before starting the CPA firm with Paul was as controller for a $15 million company that sold and installed telephone systems. My boss, a senior vice president, had been a high ranking executive with Dyncorp before joining our company.
When I started at the company, it was located in some very expensive office space in Tysons Corner. My boss, Jack, rightly sought to move the administrative and operations staff to less expensive space. If Jack had still been working for Dyncorp and looking for office space, he would have assigned a group of three of four people to identify suitable alternatives. They would have done the grunt work, examining properties and doing mundane tasks like counting parking spaces. They would have come back to Jack with three or four alternatives, all likely good choices.
At our company, Jack had no staff to do the property screening. He did it all himself. In short order, he found inexpensive warehouse space in Vienna that could house the fifty or so employees who would be moved to the new space. There was one problem, however, the space for which Jack signed a multi-year lease had ten parking spaces. Our new space had ten parking spaces for fifty people – not to mention the company's fleet of field vehicles. Jack made a bad decision, because his previous big company experience wasn't relevant for a small company.
Recently, I talked to a business broker who is a buddy of mine. He attended a meeting of a group that was intended to be a business to business networking group for business owners. One third of the attendees were business coaches scouting out suckers for clients.
I am in the process of searching for an agent to represent me in my attempt to get my book published. In case you haven't noticed, this blog is my way of testing material for the book. In my agent search, I contacted a woman who held herself out as an expert in business as well as being a literary agent. What were her qualifications? She had owned five businesses previously. She supposed this was fine qualification. I looked at it as a lack of expertise. If she had been successful at one of the previous businesses, she would either still be running the business or be a member of the idle rich from selling it. My experience with literary agents tells me that it isn't a business you get into to pass the time once you get rich. It sounds like a lot of work.
I meet a lot of business coaches with this woman's qualifications. They believe failing at business makes one a fine consultant. Here's how I see this. If you are going to take golf lessons, would you rather the lessons come from Tiger Woods or me? If you need to know how to hit into water hazards, I'm your guy. Otherwise, Tiger is a better bet. You can also get bonus lessons on womanizing. I'm not so good at that either. It hurts my fragile male ego to write that.
Thanks for reading. For real business and tax advice, please visit our S&K web site at www.skcpas.com.
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