Family businesses account for 78% of new job creation in America. That means they train a large majority of all those who learn how to work. That hard work ethic has been the source of the Revolution, Lincoln’s freeing of the slaves, our response in helping to win two world wars and our leadership of the free world.
Thank the family business on your corner for
being there to answer your needs, and
give you a place to find work when you left school.
That work ethic creates 64% of the US gross domestic product. That work ethic supports the US dollar as the value currency that purchases more than 81% of the products that you use in your house and business. That trade, in turn, adds to the value of every family business in the world whether they have a store building or not.
Family businesses are the base upon which every city grows and functions. They are more trusted to provide value and services to your neighbors than big corporations. Family business doesn’t abandon their corners where they have greeted people for generations. They are in their neighborhoods supporting people with family values and can be seen in every city, small or large.
Those family businesses have grown to be
the trusted leaders in their specialties and have
defined value for generations.
Ford, Johnson and Johnson, Pfizer, Sears, Corning and Standard Oil all began as a family business and grew to dominate their special product manufacture and use in the country. How did they grow so large?
They found answers to the many issues that may be bothering you in your family business right now. Those problems may include:
- A lack of adequate records,
- Insufficient investment capital,
- Training or
- A clear vision of what the future will bring.
They may be more interpersonal such as communication problems:
- Nepotism,
- Family conflict or
- How to compensate family members fairly for their contributions and work.
Or they may be centered around how the business stays in business when a central person decides to leave the business:
- How to pass the business on after a founder dies,
- What to do if competition enters your sales territory and you want to move or sell or
- Develop a business centered around another product.
Stay Tuned-These issues will be addressed in subsequent articles.
Number one on your list should be: What records do you keep? What was contributed and who contributed it. The total should equal 100%. That means all the parts of the entire business have been described and valued in dollars and the relative values have been ascribed to the person who contributed them.
As your business grows, many things contribute to its increasing value. What you have put into it is of course the most important value (time, money, attention to detail, new products and services ). The second is how well you have serviced your customers and making them happy so they want more of what you do.
Make sure each subtraction or addition to your value is dated so you remember the value and the person who contributed that value is known.
As you meet, record a description of decisions made and the names of supporters and dissenters. That way a business history will be available when changes need to be made to growth or product. They will guide present memories of the progress of your business.
Have a meeting every year and add your profits or losses to your records so you can keep an up to date record of the value of your progress. Without records you have NO business, for yourself or your government.
Number two on your list should be: Adequate investment capital. Your business will need to change as your market changes. You must keep up or even push your market to change.