Can You Operate The Business You Created

You have this great idea for a business. You are so passionate about it that it's all you think about. You wake up thinking about it, and you go to sleep thinking about it. You do some research. You put some money aside. You have begun the process of hitching your wagon to your own star.

After a while, maybe a few months, or perhaps over several years, all of the pieces begin to fall into place, and at last, you're a small business owner. The president of your own company. Congratulations. But before you get too carried away, I would be remiss if I didn't mention that you have also acquired another title: The person who gets to make payroll every Friday.

"Now that I've got it, what do I do with it?" That's what the dog said when he caught the car he was chasing, and sometimes, that's how a small business owner feels. Making the transition from chasing your dream to managing it can be a choppy ride. Compared to operating a business, creating one, believe it or not, is the easy part. Let's talk about that.

Two New Terms
The Blasingame Mint is in production again. I just coined two new terms: Entrepreneur Phase (E-Phase for short), and Operating Phase (O-Phase for short).

E-Phase
This is the heady period when you are creating your business, as I described above. When you are dreaming, creating, building, growing - that's the exciting E-Phase. You can solve any problem, slay any dragon, even leap tall buildings, because on the other side of that obstacle is the next exciting step for your business. Those around you remark about your seemingly indomitable spirit.

I liken the E-Phase to bringing a baby into the world. There's no mistaking the maternal instinct. It's unmatched by any other force in nature. Focused and undeterred, for a woman carrying or birthing a baby, no pain or inconvenience is too great to diminish the desire to produce the wonderful result, a baby.

I believe there is such a thing as an entrepreneurial instinct. I have seen it on the faces of entrepreneurs as they were creating and "birthing" their business, and it looks amazingly like the look I just mentioned: Focused and undeterred, no pain or inconvenience so great so as to diminish the desire to produce the wonderful result, a business.

Unlike gestation, there is no set time frame for the E-Phase. It could last a few months, or it could last a few years. One thing is for sure, however, it will end. Here's what that looks like.

O-Phase
The O-Phase is decidedly less exciting than the E-Phase, but it's still intense. The business is now on an even keel and things have sort of settled down. More and more, the challenges are about operating, not creating. Here are three examples:

• The struggle to make payroll while you were in the E-Phase was because of the additional people you hired to take on that new opportunity. In the O-Phase, the struggle might not be accompanied by anything as exciting as a new opportunity. The payroll struggle now is because your accounts receivable have not been managed properly, and you are just out of cash. Having to scramble to cover payroll this time would actually be boring if it weren't so frightening. Your baby is a little sick, and you have to get it well.

• During the E-Phase you talked to your banker about a line of credit that would allow you to take advantage of a new opportunity. In the O-Phase, the visits with your banker are to discuss the ineligible A/R and inventory that may be causing you to break the covenants of your loan agreement. Why has your banker's attitude changed? She seemed so friendly when you signed the note.

• The extra hours you put in on the development of your product lines during the E-Phase were never spent grudgingly. In fact, those long hours were a personal point of pride. Now you're in the O-Phase, and the extra hours are required to tighten your budget and sharpen your marketing plan, because a new competitor opened up on the corner where your customers and prospects must turn to get to your store. No excitement here. Defense is less fun than offense. Now you know how your competitors felt when you first opened.

Can you operate the business you created?
If you are operating a business you know that the O-Phase examples listed above are real world. And you know that there is a seemingly infinite supply of operating challenges that need either your direct attention, or your management of those you hired to deal with operating challenges. Either way, your desk is the ultimate destination of the proverbial "buck".

If you are going to be happy operating your business you have to be prepared to deal with the transition from E-Phase to O-Phase, and you have to learn how to stay excited during the O-Phase. There are people who are outstanding entrepreneurs - they are good at creating something from nothing. But these same people may not be good operators. During the O-Phase you will find out what you are made of.

Operating takes a level of passion and dedication that is at least one notch above that which is required to create. If you are worried about your ability to maintain the passion in the O-Phase, don't despair, there are some things that you can do.

Rediscover the passion.
Jim Donovan, a member of our Brain Trust, and author of This Is Your Life, Not A Dress Rehearsal, says that as you find yourself out of the heady E-Phase and firmly planted in the mundane O-Phase, look back at your business plan, and the things you wrote and were thinking during the E-Phase. Jim says to remind yourself why you started your business in the first place. Why you were willing to make the commitment you made when you were creating something from scratch, against all odds.

Find entrepreneurial ways to solve operating challenges.
The Blasingame Mint just coined a new term: The Entrepreneurial Mantra. Here it is: What would happen if...? Sometimes the operating challenges you face are so mundane that you are lured into dealing with them in a mundane way. In front of one of these challenges, put the Entrepreneur Mantra:

• "What would happen if...instead of reacting to the new competition on the corner, I developed a marketing campaign that made it cool to turn the corner?"

• "What would happen if...instead of reacting to my cashflow problems, I developed a radical way to get my customers to pay on time."

You can just feel those juices flowing again, can't you?

Don't let your ego take you down.
Remember what Dirty Harry said, "A man's got to know his limitations." Make everyone proud of you by putting the best operator you can find in that position. If that's not you, hire an operator.

Write this on a rock... If you're going to be successful as a small business owner, you need the spirit of an entrepreneur, but you MUST have the heart of an operator. Resurrect some of that entrepreneurial instinct, and turn it into an operating advantage.