Work with Trusted Business Advisors

April 7, 2020 | Gary Furr Expert Tips

Engaging trusted advisors is an important aspect of business success. Your banker wants your business to succeed, and they know that professional advisors help to make that success more likely. You should consider your bankers one of those advisors!

EXPERT TIP | Gary Furr, Organizational Development Consultant:

Nothing of any great significance is ever accomplished alone. We need those around us to help us in the areas we do not have expertise. As a business owner, it is important to engage advisors to help strengthen your business and fill the gaps that may exist within your organization. Engage advisors with real-world business experience to help you achieve success.

A wonderful benefit of a management team that has breadth, depth, strength, and longevity is that it prevents the operation from being fully dependent on the owner. Be proactive and intentional to get the advice and guidance you need. The health of your business depends on it for the short and long term.

With over 40 years of C-level business experience and an MBA in organizational development, I am uniquely qualified to help you achieve success in your business. Give me a call to set up a free consultation: 503-312-3145.

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Crisis Management for Small and Medium Enterprises

April 2, 2020 | SME White Papers

Small- and medium-sized businesses drive half of the GDP of the top 17 economies in the world (according to the World Bank) and, right now, the majority of these businesses are in crisis due to Covid-19. Customers are cancelling orders. Sales are declining 50% or more in many industries. Workers are getting laid off. Fear is taking over.

Now, at this time, we need a plan. We need to be proactive. We need to remain calm.

As a business leader, you need clarity and advice to navigate in these unprecedented times.

How do you meet this crisis proactively? What strategies should you employ, what tactics should you implement? How are you leading your people, your customers, and clients. How are you managing money, sales, operations, investment, HR policies, workflow, and more?

Read this guide on Crisis Management for Small & Medium Enterprises written by six experts and Certified Global SME Advisors. In this guide, you’ll learn:

How to be more proactive than ever before
How to create a tactical management plan
How to navigate this crisis
What to say to your banker
51 ways to protect your business
How to work from home, and
How to remain firm and calm.

There are two kinds of businesses operating today. Those that are busier because of the crisis. And those that are fearing for their existence. However, all companies need to protect their people, their customers, and their cash flow.

Essential service businesses are being strained with challenging supply chains, a worried labor force, and customers staying at home. All of these factors create unique opportunities to reduce uncertainty for our customers. Non-essential services that are locked down need to be prepared to ramp up in the near future to meet pent up demand with a depleted supply chain.

Please click here to obtain a free copy of Crisis Management for Small and Medium Enterprises.

Get Your Kindle Copy

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Good Business Practices Create Trust

March 31, 2020 | Gary Furr Expert Tips

Your banker wants your business to succeed, and so they want to see your business engage in good business practices. Your banker knows that these practices pave the way for success, and it boosts their confidence that your business is going to reach its targets.

EXPERT TIP | Gary Furr, Organizational Development Consultant:

Bankers understand good business practices and can easily recognize when a business has them in place or does not. As a business owner, it’s essential that you have a clear strategy for your business, a vision of where the business is going, and a plan to bridge the gap between your current state and your desired future. It is also important to have documented processes and procedures of how the business runs day-to-day.

A number of bankers reported seeing many businesses running by the seat of their pants. Those businesses have no business best practices in place to create standard operating procedures on how work gets done, and as a result they have inconsistencies in operations. Bankers know that a well-run company with good processes and procedures will help the business generate a greater profit margin, thereby reducing their risk. They know what to look for when looking at your company.

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Setting Your Business up for Recovery

March 26, 2020 | News

The Seattle Shrimp Tank Covid-19 Expert Panel

This global pandemic is already having a profound impact on small- and medium-sized businesses, but now is the time to prepare strategies for recovery. Listen to this podcast produced by Dan Weedin in Seattle where he interviews business experts from Seattle, Portland, Miami, Canada, and Australia on what business owners should be thinking about during the Covid-19 crisis. Recorded March 18, 2020.

https://shrimptankpodcast.com/seattle-episode-86-covid-19-expert-panel/

The panel of experts includes:

Phil Symchych, SME Business Wealth Builder, Canada

phil@smewealthbuilder.com

Dan Weedin, Toro Consulting & Weedin Unleashed, Seattle WA

dan@danweedin.com

Art Koch, Arthur Koch Management Consulting, LLC, Miami, FL

art@arthurkochmgt.com

Dean Robinson, Family Business Advisor, Sydney, Australia

dean@deanrobinson.com.au

Gary Furr, Gary Furr Consulting, Portland, OR

garyfurr@garyfurrconsulting.com

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Communicate Both the Good and Bad

March 24, 2020 | Gary Furr Expert Tips

Most relationships hinge on communication, including banking relationships. Proactive communication is high on the list of what the bankers’ best customers do well. Not surprisingly, it is also exactly what their poorly performing customers do not do well. Many bankers report that their poor-performing customers often do not communicate at all unless it is requested by the bank.

EXPERT TIP | Gary Furr, Organizational Development Consultant:

Regular communication is critical to your relationship with your banker. Communicate during good times and—more importantly—during bad times. Bankers take bad news well, but they take no news poorly. Respect and good communication skills are important in any relationship, including the one you have with your banker.

As a sign of respect for your banker, I recommend asking your banker what they need from you and then making a point of executing on their wishes. Remember, they are there to help you, not to make things complicated for you—but they have requirements they must adhere to. Listen to their request; arguing about it will undermine your partnership. They will do what they say they will do and so should you. Your banker’s reputation with their bank is important, and it partially depends on your success. Provide your banker with all the information they are interested in in a timely manner.

That proactive communication will increase your banker’s trust in you and your business, and it will get them more invested in your business success.

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Review Your Business Credit History

March 17, 2020 | Gary Furr Expert Tips

Bankers will want to review your personal and business credit history before loaning you any money. It would be good for you to take the time to review your personal and business credit history before approaching the bank to ensure that there are no inaccuracies. If there are inaccuracies, get them corrected before going to see your banker. This paves the way for developing a trusting relationship with your banker and business success.

EXPERT TIP | Gary Furr, Organizational Development Consultant:

As a business owner, you should understand the principles of credit that your banker is using to judge your credit worthiness. The five C’s of credit are character, capacity, capital, collateral, and conditions. Understanding and utilizing the five C’s of credit builds trust with your banker, and every lasting relationship relies on trust.

Let’s look at two of the five C’s.

Capacity: Do you have the capacity to repay the loan? Banks and bankers obviously want the money they loan to be repaid—and they want to see that you have the capacity to do so. If your debt-to-equity ratio is too high, your capacity to repay the debt is too low and it is unlikely you will get a loan.

Capital: What kind of capital are you willing to put toward securing your loan? Any contribution by you the borrower helps to reduce the risk of default. Do you have personal wealth or assets that can be used as a secondary repayment source through the sale of the pledged asset?

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Your Financials and Your Banking Relationship

March 10, 2020 | Gary Furr Expert Tips

Numbers drive everything in your business and if you are not focused on the numbers, then you do not know if your business is winning or losing the game. The bankers I interviewed for my book Make Your Banker Happy all said that their best customers are focused on their financials on a regular basis and provide accurate information when asked.

EXPERT TIP | Gary Furr, Organizational Development Consultant:

Bankers like business owners who focus on their financials, understand them, and use them to help guide their business to profitable success. Bankers appreciate business owners who use their P&L and balance sheet to ask better questions in order to make better decisions. They like business owners who produce a cash flow projection and use metrics to guide the business to sustainable success.

I find that many business owners are not paying close attention to their financials; instead they wait until the end of the year to see how they are doing. I have had business owners tell me they know where they are even though they are not paying attention to their financials. When I ask how that is possible, they say, “I have money in my checking account so I know how I am doing.” That is not how you get your banker to love you.

Not surprisingly, the bankers I talked to reported that their most challenging customers do the opposite of what their best customers do—which is pay attention and understand their financials. Considering that the greatest cause of poor performance is not knowing your numbers, it is time to get serious about them!

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You and Your Banker: An Important Business Relationship

March 3, 2020 | Gary Furr Expert Tips

One critical mistake I see many business owners make is neglecting their relationship with their banker. Your banker can play an important role in your business success, and time spent developing and maintaining that relationship is an excellent investment in your business.

EXPERT TIP | Gary Furr, Organizational Development Consultant:

When I was chief operations officer for a $40 million company, I learned a valuable lesson on how important our banker was to our success. Business does not always go as planned and due to the excellent relationship we had established with our banker, we were able to navigate the downturns in the economy and business. Establishing a trusting relationship with your banker in good times will help you when bad times come, as they inevitably do.

Banking is about more than just rates. You want a banker who is there for the long-term and understands your community and your business.

I spoke with many bankers to prepare to write Make Your Banker Happy, and their feedback revealed ten key areas that are part of establishing a solid, trusting relationship with your banker:

Financials
Credit
Communication
Business practices
Management team
Professionalism
Customer focus
Appreciation of the relationship
Being proactive
Succession plans

Their suggestions and guidance provide a blueprint for establishing the kind of banking relationship that will serve you and your business.

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Generating Motivation to Increase Business Growth

February 25, 2020 | Seven Steps to Accelerated Business Growth

Watch Video

We have been exploring the seven steps to accelerating business growth. The first six steps are clarity of direction, communication, having a plan, intense focus, discipline, and results. Step seven is motivation. The wonderful thing that happens as you follow these steps is that you see results, and those results increase your motivation to keep investing in your business. You essentially create a powerful feedback loop that continues to result in business growth.

When we start getting results, we get motivated. It’s like going to the gym. If I start going to the gym and the scale tells me that I’m beginning to lose weight, then I’m motivated to go back and do it again because I can see that I’m getting results. It’s the same in business. Once I get great results, I get highly motivated. Once I get motivated, I want to repeat the process to continue to get results.

Successful business owners keep raising the bar to go higher and higher and get better and better, not only in their business but in their personal lives as well. That intense motivation keeps the process going.

EXPERT TIP | Gary Furr, Organizational Development Consultant:
Brendon Burchard says that individuals are like power plants. Power plants don’t bring energy in, they generate energy. We have to generate our energy in order to gain the success that we want to gain, and we can do that through following these steps that I’ve outlined. Once you start getting results, you get highly motivated, and once you’re highly motivated, you want to repeat the process. You’re acting like a power plant: You start generating energy and enthusiasm for your own success.

When you follow these steps, you can create the business and the life that you deserve and that you want—but you have to have the courage to choose. You have to have the courage to step up to the plate and say, “This is what I want for my business and my personal life.” Some people are afraid to admit what they want because they are afraid to fail.

If you write all these things down, you can program your subconscious mind to create an amazing future for yourself—for your business and your personal life. You deserve to live the life that you want to live, and you deserve to have a successful business—but none of that will happen unless you apply the steps to get there.

You can create the business and the life of your choosing, but you have to have the courage to step up to the plate and say, “This is what I want.”

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Achieve Amazing Results

February 18, 2020 | Seven Steps to Accelerated Business Growth

Watch Video

We have been exploring the seven steps to accelerating business growth. The first five steps are clarity of direction, communication, having a plan, intense focus, and discipline. Step six is the step everyone is striving for: results. When you follow the first five steps, you will be amazed by the results you achieve and the business growth that is unlocked.

The goal of the first five steps is the amazing results that are achieved in step six. When you have taken time to clarify the direction you want for your business and personal life and communicated that clearly to those around you, created a plan of action to bridge the gap between your current state and desired future, and then become intensely focused on that with the discipline to stay at it each day, you will be amazed at the results you get and how fast it happens.

EXPERT TIP | Gary Furr, Organizational Development Consultant:
The steps sound like a lot to do and it can be overwhelming. But the key is to chunk it down into smaller increments. Think of it this way: If you make 1/10 of a 1 percent improvement in your business and your personal life every day, it adds up. It equals a 0.5 percent improvement in a week. That equals a 2 percent improvement each month, which is a 24 percent improvement over the course of a year. This is a lot and if it’s like compound interest, then that would double ever 2.7 years. In 10 years you would have 1000 percent improvement in your business and your personal life, including your bank account. These are serious results.

In 2014 I started working with someone who had been in business for five years. That year he had made his first profit so I started working with him because he wanted to sell his business. He was tired of working so hard and not getting the results that he wanted. We set the goal to sell his business in two years, and we communicated that to the one person who worked with him. We had clear direction and created a plan of action. As we worked on intense focus, it became clear that he was distracted at work. He would be in the office for eight hours but really he wasn’t accomplishing anything. He was distracted by LinkedIn, Facebook, emails, texts, and phone calls. I made him commit to spending four hours a day without distractions, intensely focused on his business and disciplined to do that each day. I asked him to commit to doing this from eight to noon every day, and that after that he could do whatever he wanted.

That adds up to just 20 hours per week. That was in 2014 at the end and in 2015 he generated $800,000 of cash in his business and he was able to pay off all his debt. In 2016 that went to $1.2 million. He’s still only working four hours a day but he went to $1.2 million in revenue and didn’t want to sell his business anymore because it was generating lots of revenue. He’s still only working 20 hours a week and he’s getting amazing results.

You can create the business and the life of your choosing, but you have to have the courage to step up to the plate and say, “This is what I want.”

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