Duplicate yourself

Many people ask how we get and keep good workers. It's a simple practice of giving them the tools they need to start a business of thier own. Most workers want to come in do a job, and go home. We encourage people to have thier own business. We talk in terms of when they have a business some day. We discuss over head, and profitability. These are the words we use when talking with the people who work with us. 

The important word there is "we." Even if you work alone your customers become a part of your business. There was a popular seminar a few years back that taught how your customers could become your sales force by giving you referrals. There is always a network of people when you own a business. By motivating the people in your network to think about your business as a resource your business can grow.

As you grow your business it's important to remember the resource you are becoming. People are calling you. As people call you, you in turn should be able to be that resource. Our solution is that if we are busy we add more people. Being in a constant state of growth can be drain. If you set up more businesses in your field you can continue to grow.

My goal is to have our competitors be businesses we set up for people who have worked for us in the past. Wouldn't that be perfect? To compete with our own business plan using different models developed by different people would improve on our business. In our case as our network grows our ability to have managed growth grows. 

In this process we end up with coworkers who are better trained. The attitude towards the job is at a more positive level. In terms of the day to day operation more people who work with us are seeing things the way we do.

On the other side we do have business owners we helped set up who, I know, wish they were employees again. One gentleman who is very successful asked me to take the business back at one point. I laughed, you couldn't pay me enough to do that business again. I encouraged him, reminded him of what I'm sharing with you today, and he diversified into other business ideas that have become that much more profitable. 

There is always business. There is always money. What you do today can generate more business tomorrow. There's no lack of business or money, ever. People made fortunes in the Great Depression that no one wants to talk about. Business itself seems to have a bad name. In my opinion it's the exploitation of the worker concept. If you take the employee and make them a business owner with the idea they in turn will pay that forward I think the exploitation concept becomes shallow.

If it can happen for me it can happen for anybody. Businesses we have owned over the years have been both large and small. Smaller is better by my experience, but there are no boundaries to your ability. There are also no definitions of what is a small business. Most corporations are just a series of smaller companies under one umbrella. In a way what we are talking about is the same idea.

By encouraging people who work for you to think in business terms, to encourage them to compete with you, you can have the best people building your network. You need to be open to the idea that as you compete in the business world other people can compete within your organization. When that person has out grown you it's best to start them off the best way you can so you have the best competition possible.