One factor about business that I was not thought when I was pursuing my degree in business, was the importance of being systems-dependent.

After graduating from Ecumenical Junior College with an Associates Degree in Business, my first job was with the Placencia Tourism Center.

After working there for 3 years, I decided to take my skill-set to help my father with his growing fishing lodge on Tarpon Caye.

Year after year I felt like we were running on a thread mill. My dad was stressed out all the time since he was micromanaging every aspect of the island: from the cook, to the fishing guides to the grounds keeper.

It was always something: a broken toilet that needed fixing, to forgetting to buy eggs and having to spend $100 in fuel to send a boat 15 miles to the mainland and back, to pick up a tray of eggs.

It always seem to be one nightmare after the next.

I have since moved on to pursue my passion of developing and growing my digital marketing business.

On my pursuit of learning as much as I could about old and new marketing techniques, I came to realize three important factors when it comes to a business's failure or success:

1. Marketing to the right market segment.

2. Making sure that when your marketing strategies do work, you are providing a quality product or service.

3. That you have a proper system in place to make it all work in synergy.

Many business owners get # 1 and 2 right, but most, I have found, are completely oblivious to # 3.

Last year, for my 36th birthday, I decided to do a fundraiser for the school my daughter attended. I went to Belize Dry Cleaners and and rented a nice suite.

About 2 days after the party, the owner of the company, who is a friend of my wife's family, dropped by the house to pick up the suite to take back to Belize City, where his company is located.

We ended up talking for about an hour.

Within that time frame, we started discussing why so many businesses in Belize just can't seem to get off the ground or grow, even though they have a great concept and great owners and people running the business, including great service.

He told me about this video he stumbled upon on YouTube, called the "E-Myth Revisited"

Immediately after our conversation, I went to my computer and searched for the video.

My mind was blown!

The video starts out by saying: "Within the first 5 years, 80% of businesses fail. Why is it that when we live in the information age, with almost all of the information needed to succeed available for free, 80% of businesses are still failing?"

I reflected upon my 15+ years experience with running Tarpon Caye Lodge with my dad, and came to an epiphany:

One of the main reasons that nothing seem to work right is because we simply did not spend the time to setup a "system" that everyone understood and where, we could easily train any new employee.

We were heavily people-dependent.

If you study franchise businesses like McDonald's, you will realize that their success is due, in a large part, to their business model being systems-dependent and not people-dependent.

McDonald's actually have a Hamburger University.

It states on it's website: training at Hamburger University emphasized consistent restaurant operations procedures, service, quality and cleanliness. It has become the company’s global center of excellence for McDonald’s operations training and leadership development. [emphasis added by me]

FOCUS ON BUILDING SYSTEMS & PROCEDURES

You need to setup your business to be systems-dependent. Which means setting up systems and procedures that require people with the minimum amount of skills to keep it operating at a high level.

BONUS: There are 3 Stages To A Business

1. Infancy: business operates based on what the owner wants instead of what the business needs to grow and succeed.

2. ​Inability to keep up with demand and supply

3. Quality suffers and falls

4. This stage ends when the business owner realize that things cannot continue as it is and expect successful results

5. Adolescence: business owner decides to focus on what customers want, and the business starts to grow...and it reaches outside owner's comfort zone.

• This is the stage that kills most businesses I see in Belize. Business owners hire people to start running their businesses, and start removing themselves from the business. However, often times the people they hire do not live up to expectations, and the owners revert back to "infancy" stage.

• However, if you expand your comfort zone to increase your ability to handle expansion, you will transition into the maturity stage.

1. Maturity: Business has a clear vision and purpose. Hire managers to follow your vision, and to manage the technical people.

• Don't work in your business, work on your business.

• Figure out who are your customers.

• Keep adding value.

• Stay focused on your vision and purpose

• Make your business systems-dependent, not people-dependent: never have your business rely on any one person, including yourself.

Find the book "The E-Myth Revisited: Why Most Small Businesses Don't Work and What to Do About It" on Amazon.com.

At Leslie Tech Digital Marketing, we help people market their business: easily and affordably.

www.leslietech.com

#growyourbusiness #systemsdependent