Planning does not create success or even the best plan. It also doesn’t create action. Most planning just creates paper, spreadsheets, complexity, doubt, paralysis, and dream-dampening. There are two things that create a far better plan than planning itself.

If you believe that meticulous and detailed planning of every possible contingency is the best way to create success you won’t like this post. To make matters worse, I’m probably going to accuse you of living in a dream world.

How many SUCCESSFUL businesses were started from a highly developed business plan? Next to none. And of the very, very few I’ve found that were started from a business plan, when asked how that worked out for them, most laughed but none said that reality had followed their excel spreadsheet plan.

Yet we keep slavishly promoting an antique practice that has almost never done anything for anyone except get someone an “A” in an MBA class on how to build a business plan. Oh, and it will get you into debt, because banks are still requiring business plans so they have a teddy bear to hold while they give you money. None of those work out either, but most banks haven’t figured out there is a much better way to see if someone is going to be successful.

This isn’t a blog on the attributes of success (maybe I’ll do that one next week), but creating a 30-page business plan isn’t one of them. To the contrary, the simpler the initial plan, the better, because it’s going to change anyway.

I advocate a 2-Page Strategic Plan (never do another classic Business Plan unless you have an antique bank asking for one). A simple 2-page Strategic Plan is set up to change, adapt, and be clarified every one to three months – you know, sort of like life.

It shouldn’t take more than a few hours to do it because, again, like life, it’s going to change very quickly. The only part that is likely to not change is the objective – what do we want to see as a result? The rest of it is up for grabs – anything that gets us to that result will be added and anything that isn’t will be removed.

Once you’ve got a simple plan, the two keys to making it into a great plan are:

1. Commitment (to the objective, not a plan)
2. Movement (in a purposeful directions toward the objective, not “activity” based on a plan)

It is NEVER how good your plan is that creates success, but how committed you are to the bad plan you’ve got and how willing you are to get moving on it NOW. As you move with absolute commitment in a clear direction toward the objective – that commitment and that movement will work together to make your so-so plan into a world class one.

Commitment and movement create success, not a tortured 30-page document. And a simple 2-page plan will become brilliant over time if there is enough commitment to the objective and enough movement to inform you what to keep doing and what to keep changing.

Stop thinking, get a clear objective and get moving with abandoned commitment toward that goal. Use the movement to make the plan better all the time. You’ll make more money in less time by committed movement than you will by sitting around trying to figure out what might go wrong.

As I was writing my new book “Making Money is Killing Your Business” and getting feedback on it, a lot of people told me that some of the principles in this book are things they’ve never heard before. I’ve frequently heard, “I’ve never been given permission to think that way.” Allow me to set the record straight. I’ve never had an original thought in my life and I’m pretty sure no one else has either.

Picasso said “Good artists borrow. Great artists steal.” There is nothing new under the sun and when I hear people claiming they have an amazing new way of doing something that no one else has ever thought of, it usually turns out it was all just marketing.

One of the big re-discoveries of old truths for me was that a business is supposed to throw off three things for us, time, money and significance. But for some reason we only expect it to give us one: money. And because we focus on just making money, our business never gives back time or helps us have a significant impact in the world around us. We’re too busy making money to get to the important stuff.

As a result everything is backwards. We build a business and take whatever lifestyle that business happens to throw off for us, which at best usually involves having money, but rarely a lot of time, and almost never significance. This isn’t surprising because “he who makes the rules wins,” and we too often let our business and the business world around us make the rules for us. Making Money was written to help us take hold of our business and re-make the rules in our favor so that our business finally becomes our servant to do our bidding, not the other way around.

On Monday, I’m able to head to London, Belfast, and Nairobi Kenya largely because I’ve been committed to making my business live by my rules. I have to rein it in every day of every week, but simply being committed to do so has made all the difference. Working for free with business owners in Kenya is a great reward for having made the rules in my business. I’m looking forward to a lot more time, money, and significance to come as I force my business to live by my rule: Live well by doing good.

Are you making the rules or reacting to your business? He who makes the rules wins.

Rather than encouraging us to do and be the same, this constant focus on “exceptional people” can keep us from building our own life of significance. We feel if our sports hero wins, we win. Or if my business guru is paying attention to me, I’m significant. While we idolize our hero, too often we lose site of what got them there. And I can guarantee you that with very few exceptions, it wasn’t talent, but struggle.

Is it possible that deep and willing commitment to the persistent effort it takes to get to your Big Why is what actually creates meaning and joy?

Are we too focused on the result, thinking that “arriving” will make us happy? Why do athletes, music heroes, and business people who are already at the top of their field and financially secure keep going? Why don’t they retire as soon as they get there?

I believe it is because they have found the secret (such an over used term) of meaning and joy. They understand that joy is not found in the destination but in the journey, and that love of the process of persistent struggle is the key to joy.

How did your star athlete get to the level they are at? By persistent struggle on the weight machines, on the track and daily work at perfecting their craft. Relentless, consistent, persistent struggle. And a deep love for that process. Yo Yo Ma (world-famous cellist) once told my daughter “The key to becoming a world class musician is to learn to love to practice; to practice very day as if you’re sitting on stage at Carnegie Hall for your debut concert.”

Do you love the process or are you focused on the result? Measure the result, but focus on the process, and learn to love the process of building your mental muscles. Learn to love the process and the ongoing development of both your craft and your business. You will find the most meaning and joy in having made it through the tough times and having created success by loving the persistent process of getting there.

Your heroes didn’t get there by talent. They got there by learning to love the process of getting there. Take the things in this blog with you into the real world, get beat up, fall down, get back up a little stronger, and do it again. Build your mental muscles one at a time, but relentlessly. Unswerving commitment to the process of getting there is the only thing that will get you there. We get what we intend, not what we hope for.

Circumstances don’t make me who I am. How I respond to them does.

Respond with tenacity! That will get you there! Do what it takes to build a business and a life of significance!
Let’s do it together!

I’ve never used my blog to directly advocate for an issue, but the SBA’s long-term focus on big business has moved from absurd to something there is no word for. I don’t want more handouts. I just want them to stop giving them to big businesses, and expanding to include even more big businesses to give handouts to. Help us stop it.

The SBA lost its way at its inception in 1953 when politicians bowing to big business interests defined “small” as any business with fewer than 500 employees. That is 99.9% of all businesses, a ludicrous and meaningless description of small. This happened because big businesses lobbying their politician wanted to make sure they didn’t get left out of the handouts. As a result, the SBA focuses almost all of its attention on larger businesses from 100-500 employees. Only 17,000 of the 28 million businesses don’t qualify!

They are now expanding the definition to include 9,450 of those 17,000, because large businesses with 400-500+ employees are once again growing huge and don’t want to be left out of the handouts that were set up to encourage small businesses to compete against the Bigs.

We can stop this nonsense. What can you do? Go to the SBA site here and submit the following objection, or your own. They must post them publicly and enough complaints will get their attention and require a response.

Rasmussen (a polling company) says the traditional three classes in America – rich, middle class and poor, have now been replaced by only two – The Ruling Elite, and everyone else. We have become a nation ruled by the Bigs who have completely lost touch with who they exist to serve.

But in the Participation Age we are now in, you can make a difference. Go to the SBA site and let them know a “small” business has fewer than 20 employees, and to stop expanding to serve their big business cronies.

Copy the following, fill in the contact info on the SBA site here, and paste the following or your own objection. Let’s begin to create a voice for small business at the table of the Bigs.

COPY THE FOLLOWING:
The existing SBA definition of “small” includes 28 million out of 28 million businesses (only 17,000 are left out). It’s like saying all people less than 7’ tall are “short”. Your continuing expansions move it to 7 1/2’ tall people.

How can you claim to serve small business when you include 99.9% of all businesses, and want to increase that to 99.95%? No understanding of “small” justifies these increases, and only goes to demonstrate that the SBA does not have a focus on small business.

In 2009 Australia passed the Fair Trade Act that formally defined “small” as “under 15 employees”. Even that would still include over 80% of all businesses in America, but would be a much more realistic definition of “small”.

I hereby formally request that you defend your definition of “small” against the commonly held understanding of the word “small”, and either

a) Reduce the standards by nearly 2500% (from 500 employees to 20) to reflect a realistic understanding of small, or
b) Rename yourself the Mid-to-Large Size Business Administration (MLSBA).

See the Miriam Webster definition of “small”:

1. having comparatively little size or slight dimensions

2 a: minor in influence, power, or rank
b : operating on a limited scale

3 lacking in strength – a small voice

4 a: little or close to zero in an objectively measurable aspect (as quantity) b: made up of few or little units
b. How does “comparatively little” describe 99.9% of all businesses?
c. How does 99.9% reflect “minor in influence, power or rank?
d. How is 100-500 employees “lacking in strength” when compared to the 80%+ businesses with fewer than 10-15 employees?

5. How is 28 million out of 28 million “little or close to zero”, or “made up of few or little units”?

I look forward to your formal public reply.

Gandhi – “Anyone who thinks they are too small to make a difference has never gone to bed with a mosquito”.

Thanks for making a difference!

The National Federation of Independent Businesses, or NFIB, rated it #1 because they thought it has the most potential for real impact in the lives of the readers.

Readers are indeed finding their lives and businesses transformed by the principles and practical in this book.

“Never in my life have I read a book so full of transformational content that actually got me creating a better business for myself.” – Julia Gentry, TheUltimateE.com

“Every small business owner will benefit from this easy yet profound read. I was ready to throw in the towel on our six-year-old real estate business, but after reading Chuck’s book we have increased our gross revenue by 27% and doubled our net profit.” – Sandy Corrigan, The Corrigan Group

Making Money is built on profoundly simple ideas that have been around forever and ignored as being too simple to work. I’ve learned the hard way that the profound things are always simple and will revolutionize any business willing to give up complexity for effectiveness.

Making Money helps business owners move from a focus on trying to make money to building a business that does it for them while they’re on vacation. It debunks the idea that small business is a 30 year grind, and introduces the concept of building a business in just three to five years that runs itself.

Making Money also replaces the traditional concept of retirement with using your business to quickly build your Ideal Lifestyle, moving you and your business from survival through success to significance.

The principles and tools in this book grew out of years of hacking it up in the trenches and learning what really works. It’s been a privilege to start and build a number of businesses before helping others do it. I don’t see myself as a business coach, advisor, consultant, etc., but as a guy who built a number of businesses and now helps others avoid the mistakes I’ve made.

My company, The Crankset Group has an off the grid approach that has been adopted by thousands of business owners. We’re growing internationally now with 3to5 Clubs (our committed communities for 24 business owners each) starting in throughout the states and in Europe, with an objective of having 3to5 Clubs in every major city in the world.

It’s also been a privilege to have articles and mentions in the last year in Harvard Business Review, Entrepreneur Magazine, CNNMoney.com, NYTimes.com, other magazines and small business blogs throughout the U.S., Australia, and New Zealand.

I firmly believe Making Money is Killing Your Business inspires a new way of thinking that will transform how you approach your business and your future. I’m getting regular feedback from people we’ve never met who confirm it.

I’d love to hear how it’s impacting your business.

Conation is one of the 1,000 most obscure English words and yet the most important business word you’ve never heard. Want to know if you’re doing well and going where you want? Filter everything through the word conation:

Conation – the will to succeed that manifests itself in single-minded pursuit of a goal.

Or my definition:

Committed Movement in a Purposeful Direction

It’s nuts that this word has been buried in the lexicon, but there was too much “doing” in it for the academics to feel comfortable, so they let the word drift into obscurity. These Thinker/Cognaters love cognition because it allows them to justify sitting around thinking things to death without taking any action. Conation is scary to them because it requires action and metrics of success, not just pontificating.

But if you bring Conation back into your life and business as your main filter, and use cognition as a faithful servant of your Conation, you’re going to be a lot more successful. Conation is way more important to your success than cognition.

The Conative Filter

1. Commitment – Affection/Passion – are you sold out to what you’re doing? Willing to go down with the ship? Do you have “quiet resolve” to succeed no matter what? If not, your chances for success are low. Commitment, utter abandonment to the cause is the foundation of success.
2. Movement – Activation – Doing – are you sitting around cognating (thinking) about what great things might happen if you ever did something? Or are you moving forward and figuring it out as you go? Doers get things done while Thinkers are thinking about doing something someday.
3. Purpose – Cognition – Discipline/Plan – Do you have a plan for the highest and best use of your time (Yield per Hour)? Cognition is ONE of the things you need to be doing to be successful. It’s a faithful servant of conation.
4. Direction – Vision – Just because you’re going flat out doesn’t mean you’re going the right direction. Do you have utter clarity about where you want to end up, exactly what it looks like, and when you want to be there? You get what you intend, not what you hope for.

Conation is all four, not just two or three. Direction, Purposeful, and Movement without Commitment will not sustain you. Commitment, Purpose, and Direction are useless without Movement. Movement, Commitment and Direction are of no value without Purpose (a plan to get there).

Want to know whether you’ll be successful, or why you’re not? Use the conative filter to see if you’ve got all four attributes going at once. If not, shore up the one that needs your attention. You’ll make more money in less time and make a bigger splash in the world around you.

People with committed movement in a purposeful direction make history. Cognating dreamers write about them later.

As we start out, we take cues from Giant Corporation, Inc. that we should develop cool logos, fancy brochures, zippy websites, and catchy copy. But this is a waste of time and money for a lot of small businesses and a huge misdirection of focus. There is a better way for most of us.

A janitorial supply company wrote a response in another blog promoting all this fancy “branding” (to which this blog is a response):

“I think the most important thing you can do to brand your company is to provide superior customer support. Here at CleanItSupply.com we pride ourselves on our customer service. We answer our telephones and respond to customer’s needs immediately. Customer service is what sets us apart for the rest and has customers coming back over and over again!

CleanItSupply.com has it figured out. For a small company the most important “branding” you can do is provide the best service possible and create raving fans.

Where do 95% of all our customers come from? I ask this question almost every time I speak and from the mouths of thousands of business owners → “95% of our future customers come from our existing customers referring them.”

For those under 30, 85% of product discussions are face2face and only 7% are online. The rest are by telephone or email. For those over 30, 92% are face2face and the rest are online, email, and phone. Our customers are talking directly to their FRIENDS, not with strangers or digital friends online. They are telling their FRIENDS what their experience was with us. And 90+% of our customers come from those human, face2face discussions.

So what are we doing going out and buying advertisements and creating fancy brochures and clever tag lines to attract people we’ve never met? The best brand we can build is to

get those who know us, to love us.

When we get big and have more money than time, we can go the fancy ad route.

But for now, focus on being the best in YOUR world and specifically on turning customers into raving fans. That’s the best branding you can do because it’s authentic, it’s really who you are, and it’s targeted at your best opportunity for finding future customers – from your existing ones.

Good on you, CleanItSupply.com!

Sitting in a hotel lobby in Martinborough, New Zealand after a bike ride, two professors from Vancouver asked me if I thought education was important for success. They hit my hot button. If, like the old saying goes, knowledge is power, then librarians would rule the world. They don’t. Something else is more correlated to success than education.

Millions of higher degree recipients make less during their careers than people who dropped out of high school. And millions who never finished high school make huge impacts and a lot of money.

We miss cause and effect all the time. As an example, people love to say, “College graduates make a million dollars more in their lifetime than non-college graduates.”Is it because they went to school, or because they are motivated to do anything that will make them successful? I think it’s the latter.

If they were told they needed to apprentice with a businessperson they would do that instead of getting an MBA (that would be my advice). They are motivated and committed, and will do whatever they have to in order to be successful.

There is some clear correlation between education in the hard sciences (pharmaceuticals, engineering, plumbing, etc.) and success. If you violate hydrology ($%@* flows downhill), you’ll make a lousy plumber. But there is little correlation in the soft sciences. People build committed communities all the time without ever taking a sociology course. Others help people get past their bad habits without ever taking a psychology course.

Business is one of the soft sciences where education is least correlated with success. Dropouts from college (or people who never went) start hugely successful companies all the time. “Is college necessary?” is becoming a mainstream question.

What makes business owners successful? According to research, education doesn’t show up in the top five. (Entrepreneurial Intuition, an Empirical Approach, La Pira, April 2010), but these do:

1. Seeing the big picture – being a visionary is most important. If you can’t see it, you won’t shoot for it.
2. Speed of Execution – taking action while others are researching.
3. Never giving up; being the bull dog; finding a way to make it work.
4. Being a life-long learner.

Learning is massively different than being educated. Education fills our heads with information, while learning transforms our lives and the world around us with grounded and applied intelligence.

If you want to have your head filled with facts, get an education. It you want to learn, change lives and/or make money, you’re better off apprenticing with someone who’s done it. They won’t try to educate you, they’ll just make sure you are effective and becoming something you aren’t, yet.

The Greeks were wrong.

We don’t think our way to a new way of acting; we act our way to a new way of thinking.

Go do something with someone who’s already done it; and learn from their experience.

The Vancouver professor’s responses? “Check, please.”

And why working towards educating them may be the answer.

*I Don’t Understand?*

I can remember being fresh out of High School and working for a contractor. Some of the people I worked with had a bad attitude about the lifestyle the owner was able to live.

He had a boat, a nice car, and seemed to be making a lot of money. For an individual making $8.00 per hour many of these things appear to be out of reach.

I remember very vividly some of these guy’s telling me how we were being taken advantage because every hour we worked at $8.00 per hour, the
contractor made $24.00 per hour. I soon adopted a similar attitude to my co-workers.

How is it fair that he makes $24.00 per hour while only paying me $8.00?

That’s not fair! I should be making more!

What I was uneducated about was what goes into running a business. I had no skin in the game, all I had to do each was show up to get paid. If the contractor did not go out and get more work, his lifestyle would come to a screeching halt.

I had no clue about how his business worked, or the risk he had associated with running it. The stress of running a business can be very high at times.

*Uneducated*

When I discuss being uneducated, I mean about the way a business runs, not the education you receive in school. The education you receive in school is not necessarily going to apply to what I’m discussing here.

Years later as I progressed along as an employee for different companies and started to learn about selling and then marketing, I worked on being educated in business.

I learned about overhead, and all of the other expenses that go into running a business. Things like insurance, repairs, janitorial expenses, employee gifts, bonuses, etc.

I started my own small businesses along the way such as mowing, vending machines, a sandwich shop, and eventually taking the plunge and devoting my family to being 100% entrepreneurial. Yes, I left a job where I made good money to go out and start my own business to make zero money. Crazy huh?

You can read, discuss, and complain about how you should make more money, but until you run your own business, you don’t have any real experience about what pay for performance really is.

The average person doesn’t realize how much sacrifice, struggle, and heartache the small business owner has to go through to build a successful business.

If you want to make more money as a small business owner, you can do four different things.

1. Get new customers.
2. Sell more to your existing customers.
3. Increase your average sale.
4. Raise your prices.

*Educate Your Employees*

It’s a personal decision on how much you want to educate your employees about the inner workings of your business. I have met owners who will
disclose anything, and others who disclose nothing to their employees.

I believe the people who are protesting on Wall Street and other venues around the country are not educated on what it takes to run a business. Why else would they make such crazy demands.

I mean really, do they actually think someone should just send them a check because they have more money than they do? You must be uneducated with that type of thinking.

*It’s Tough*

It’s hard to make a business successful, and most employees don’t appreciate what it takes. This can give many owners a bad taste in their mouth about sharing information about overhead and other costs. Most people don’t realize that it costs the business money to even pay them. There are costs associated with payroll taxes that the business must cover to even have employees.

From a small business owners point of view their employees must be able to add something to the business, or the small business owner cannot afford to keep them.

Let’s use an example from one of the most well know pay for performance venues in the world, professional sports. I’m going to use football as the example.

Joe Montana was one of the best quarterbacks in the game. At a certain point the team he played for knew he was nearing the end of his career. When his performance started to decline because of injuries, he became less valuable.

In professional sports you are judged solely by your performance, you either make the team or you don’t. There is no tenure, you either perform or you don’t.

There are no handouts in pro football.

Even if you win the Super Bowl one year, you better keep winning, or the owners will find someone who will. This is the “Law of the Jungle.” Only the strong will survive.

*The Everyday Workforce*

In the everyday work force it’s typically not that harsh, especially in a small business. I’ll say that a small business is less than 99 employees for our discussion here. Most small business owners I know feel an allegiance to their employees, but there are always exceptions.

It’s easy to get a pack mentality and think you deserve more. Or listen to a small segment of leaders in our country spouting off about people who are making more than we are to “Pay their fair share.”

I have been on both sides of the fence and understand what each side feels. The bottom line is that as small business owners we can’t do it by ourselves, and most employees can’t do it without small business owners.

If you’re an employee, think about what you can do to add extra value to the company you work for. If you’re constantly working to improve yourself, and make the company better, your small business owner will appreciate it. If they don’t, go find somewhere else to work.

If you’re a small business owner, work towards educating your employees about what it takes to run your business. Share as much as you feel
comfortable sharing. It’s your business, do as you see fit.

*One Thought*

If I can leave you with one thought it would be “There are no free handouts.”

Yes, there are things that are publicized as free, but they are not free. Just because you don’t pay for your insurance, doesn’t’ mean it’s free. Somebody, somewhere has to cover that cost.

I have a client who pay’s an average of $1,000 per month, per employee to cover health insurance. That means that one employee is costing $12,000 per year, just to cover their insurance. Holy cow, that’s a chunk of change!

If you’re making less now than you did 5-years ago, look at yourself. What have you done in the last 5-years to improve your skills, knowledge, and abilities to help become more valuable?

Your value at any job has a shelf life. There is no status quo in anything. There is only growing or dying. Most employees are letting their value decrease because they are not taking responsibility to make themselves more valuable.

Take responsibility for yourself and don’t wait for someone else to tell you to improve, be proactive and improve yourself.

If you wait for someone else to tell you what to do to improve yourself, you become beholden to them. Once this happens, it’s difficult to ever get out of their chains.

Stop the protests. If you don’t like what you’re being paid, start your own business. The opportunities are endless.

If it is to be, it’s up to you

Chapter Six in my next book, Bad Plans Carried Out Violently, is about Conation, the most important business word you’ve never heard. Its antonym is just as obscure and just as critical for you to know – velleity.

Our whole community of business owners use this phrase all the time:

You get what you intend, not what you hope for.

Nothing could describe the above better than two of the 1,000 most obscure words in the English language – conation and velleity (vel-lee-ity).

Conation is “Committed Movement in a Purposeful Direction”. The dictionary says its the desire plus the volition at the same time. I know I want to do it because I already am. I don’t need to desire it and get all motivated. I just do it because I want it.

Velleity is the desire with no intention of ever doing anything about it. It’s the exact opposite of conation. Wouldn’t it be nice if things worked out better next year? Wouldn’t it be nice if I only worked half as much as I do now? Would it be nice if… that’s velleity.

What’s the difference between a visionary and a dreamer? A visionary is already doing it (conation) and a dreamer is talking about how nice it would if… (velleity).

You get what you intend, not what you hope for.
CONATION < – - – - – - – - – > VELLEITY