In January 2016, I conducted several estimating workshops in Colorado. At one workshop, I asked a landscape contractor how 2015 wrapped up for him. He responded that he didn’t know because his financial information was with his CPA and the CPA hadn’t analyzed it yet and gotten back with him. It might be too late to fix problems for 2015, but he needed to see his P&L statement moving forward. Essentially, the P&L statement is a snapshot … [Read more...]
External Excellence
After 30 years of studying green industry contractors, it’s gotten easier to spot the ones who will always remain trunk-slammers and low-ballers. They will never grow into being true professionals because of their thinking – or lack thereof. It’s far more difficult to identify the ones who will be successful in the long run. Long-term success is more a function of character than it is of just thinking.Irrigation contractor Marc Dutton started out … [Read more...]
Growth through corporate DNA
In the last issue, I discussed the D.A.D. (delegate and disappear) principle and the first three of five levels that a green industry entrepreneur passes through on the way to achieving $5 million in annual revenue. Now, I’ll explain the fourth and fifth levels. How it works. A client doing $2.5 to $3 million a year had trouble growing his company beyond that level. Part of his problem was intellectual. He didn’t understand the systems and the … [Read more...]
The D.A.D. Principle
Did you ever notice that many of the people who have large (more than $5 million in annual revenue) green industry companies came from large companies? These entrepreneurs think big. It’s in their DNA. Have you also noticed how difficult it is for small companies to grow to become big companies? It’s not that these entrepreneurs perpetually think small – some do. Rather, it’s because they don’t have a road map to get them to where they want to … [Read more...]
Put Your Numbers To Use
Benchmarks, standards and critical numbers can help you understand your business better and run it more effectively if you know how to use them. They not only can provide you with some measuring sticks, to help you measure what’s important but they also can provide you with context as you compare your business with others both within your market and outside. Here are some suggestions for using them. Study (do your homework). I was once told … [Read more...]