I am note sure where or how I found this blog but I have been very impressed with the content so far. The name written by the owner of the Nimbus West, Chuck Blakeman. On his blog he writes his business “…provides outcome-based peer advisory, coaching, and consulting for Business Owners, CEOs, and their growing businesses.”

Check out Chucks latest post:

Make more money - stop selling and let people buy

I also like a motto Chuck wrote about in an earlier post:

“Bad plans carried out violently sometimes yield good results. Do something.”

I hope you can see this guy is worth reading. Go to the blog home page here:

Teamnimbuswest.com

If you have the freedom to choose, or design, the way a company operates why not go with what would make you happy if you were a client, employee or vendor of your company?  I really believe this is the only way to go when building a business. One characteristic I would love to see as a customer of any business is transparency.

To me this simply means telling the truth about your business to every party involved.  Is your business young, small, under capitalized, struggling, in a law suit, etc. Let everyone involved know what really is happening.  Have you screwed up, made a mistake, even failed?  Then brag about your experience and tell people what lessons you learned.  In other words turn supposed weaknesses into strengths.  When you do your company will stand out as unique and special in a sea of half-truths and exaggerations.

We practice transparency by telling our clients what our costs are and what are profit is by having them as a client each month.  It is a simple thing to do but since no one else does this it makes us stand out.  I have noticed that standing out is usually a good thing.

Practicing transparency at this very moment, I will say that as I write this post it is 10:30PM and I am a little tired so I am going finish right here and go to bed.  I’ll pick this topic up in another post.  I will conclude by saying isn’t transparency easier? How about refreshing?  So why not give it a try?  I think you will like it.

I received a call from a reporter at US News an World Report two weeks ago. His name was Matt Bandyk, a business writer for the magazine. He had found me through my other blog straightpassthroug.biz and he had some questions about how businesses could lower their merchant account processing fees.  We talked for over a half hour and the I provided him contact information for two of my favorite clients who he also interviewed for the article.  That is enough of my story, here is a link to the article:

How to Deal With Credit Card Mumbo Jumbo

This sounds like an obvious characteristic every business would strive for. However, when I look around and examine my experiences with businesses I often see the idea of making as much money as possible while creating as little value as necessary. Of course I also see companies like Apple that have clearly realized the correlation between creating value and profit.

In his book, How To Be Rich, J. Paul Getty, once the richest man in the word wrote,”The businessman should never lose sight of the central aim of all business — to produce more and better goods or provide more and better services to more people at lower cost.” “More” and “better” are the words that stick out to me in this quote.

So why wouldn’t a business focus on increasing the value of it’s product or service? My mind keeps coming back to two reasons:

1. Lack of awareness of the motive behind the business.
2. Lack of awareness that value creation and profit go together.

Let’s start with motive, why is the business person or corporation operating? I mean the real reason, what drives them?  I don’t believe the motive matters, as long as it is not immoral.  It could be money, ceating jobs, building a better world or even feeding the ego of the owner or CEO.  The key is being aware of the motive and connecting that motive to the every aspect of the business.

Here is an example; I was watching one of my favorite TV shows the other night, The Business of Innovation on CNBC.  The show was focused on company social responsibility (watch it here).  One of the interviews was with the CEO of Timberland, Jeffrey Swartz, who’s family founded the business.  The interview revealed a strong commitment the family and business have to the environment.  Then the discussion moved to the idea of balancing that passion with their commitment to their share holders (profit).  It was a great interview that me made want to buy all my shoes from Timberland.  Bottom line?  What I saw in this CEO and his company was a deep connection to it’s base motive - family pride.  I truly believe they are so proud of what they have created that they are driven to keep building an operating a great company.

In contrast, the mediocrity enerprise is arrived at by not knowing what drives it which results in a lack of passion and vision.  Somewhere in the Bible, I think it the book of Proverbs, it says, “where there is no vision, the people perish.”  When we business types don’t know what really drives us, then we have no vision for greatness and when there is no vision the business will eventually fail.  So discovering what motivates a business is essential.

My second point was realizing that value creation is central to operating a successful business.  I don’t think I need to expounon this, it’s pretty obvious.

So here is how this plays out with myself and Cocard Synergy.  What drives me is esteem, how I and others regard me, myself.  In other words I want to be great. I want to be proud of myself and I want others to see me as a great human being.  Therefore, I will build a great company that produces esteem for me.  I know this confession sounds a little narcisitic but it is the truth; it’s just who I am.

So why I am I committed to creating and increasing value to our clients?  Because I want to be esteemed highly and I have connected that desire with creating a special, unique, innovative and profitable business, which means come hell or high water we will create value (among other things)!

Do you see it?  Do you know what your base motation is?  Once realized can you take that motive and turn it into a vision?  I am in that process now when will you start?

Another Post: More on Creating Value

Yesterday I said I wanted to build the “anti-merchant account company.”  Now it is time for me to define what I mean by that.  So I am going to start writing about a single value each day that I am building into the DNA of this company from the very beginning.

I am going to start with the most important value, which is love.  I know this sounds a little funny for a businesses first value to be love, but why not?  I was first introduced to this word being applied to business when I read Love is the Killer App several years ago.  In this book the author, Tim Sanders, the former Chief Solutions Officer at Yahoo!, expounds about actually focusing on loving you clients and co-workers.  Since I read his book, the idea of loving clients has been in the forefront of my mind, nonetheless I have both failed miserably and succeeded greatly at applying his message.

As a result of trying to live this out I have learned a few things that have shaped my defenition of this value.  Here is what I mean by love as a value for this company:

• Seeing clients as people not just profit centers.
• Asking, from the very start, “how may I serve you?” and then actually listening to their answer.
• Going out of our way to create extra value for each client, no matter how large or small they are.
• Creating ways to share knowledge that will help our clients grow and prosper.
• Taking full responsibility when the sh** hits the fan; even when we did not cause the problem.
• Telling the truth, even when it hurts, even though we may lose a client.

Doesn’t this all seem like basic stuff?  This is just “golden rule” behavior and yet, surprisingly, I believe these types of actions make us stand out now and always will.  If we were to just focus on this value I think we would succeed at building the “anti-merchant account company.”  However, this is just the first value I am ging to write about as we set out to build one kick butt company.