Summary

The essential guide that helps business owners achieve success at every stage of their companies' life cycle Being a successful business owner means more than knowing one's industry and understanding the basic concepts of leadership or motivation. It means being able to master many areas of business, and knowing how each of these areas relate to and build on each other. It also means understanding how those areas change as a business goes through its inevitable life cycle, and the productive owner must be prepared to change with them. The Facts of Business Life is the first book designed to provide readers with the means of achieving the kind of long-term understanding that is the key to true and lasting success. The book includes the ten Facts of Business Life that every successful business owner knows, including: "If you don't lead, no one will follow," "Being your own boss isn't really what you think it is," and "You don't just have to know the business you're in-you have to know business." Devoting one chapter to each Fact, the book shows readers how they impact businesses at each of the five levels a successful business goes through: Ownership and Opportunity, Creating Your Company's DNA, From Survival to Success, Maintaining Success, and Moving On When It's Time to Go. Packed with valuable advice for every business owner-whether he or she is starting, building, maintaining, or exiting a business, the book may very well be the difference between failure and success. Presents ten practical, actionable business facts that, once understood, can be used to help ensure true success Looks at the most important moments in the evolution of a business Explores everything from the actual role of the owner to the realities of the marketplace, from how to recognize an opportunity to how to lead a company to success, and from how to monitor and control a business to how to determine a company's direction In the blink of an eye, business success can turn into total failure. The Facts of Business Life presents owners and would-be owners with the ten key facts that, applied together, can ensure a strong and lasting enterprise.

Author Biography

BILL McBean spent many of his nearly forty years as a successful business owner in the automobile industry where, among many other achievements, he purchased several underperforming dealerships and turned them into a successful business enterprise with yearly sales of more than $160 million. Since selling the company to the world's largest automotive retailer, AutoNation, McBean has been involved in several new businesses, including McBean Partners, an investment and business mentoring company, and Net Claims Now, which provides administrative services and support to the restoration industry.

Foreword xi

Acknowledgments xv

Introduction xix

Chapter 1: The Facts of Business Life 1

The Facts 3

The Business Life Cycle 9

Chapter 2: The Five Levels of Business Success 13

Level 1: Ownership and Opportunity 17

Level 2: Creating Your Company’s DNA 22

Level 3: From Survival to Success 27

Level 4: Maintaining Success 32

Level 5: Moving on When It’s Time to Go 37

Chapter 3: Fact 1: If You Don’t Lead, No One Will Follow 45

Level 1: Ownership and Opportunity 50

Level 2: Creating Your Company’s DNA 56

Level 3: From Survival to Success 62

Level 4: Maintaining Success 72

Level 5: Moving on When It’s Time to Go 77

Chapter 4: Fact 2: If You Don’t Control It, You Don’t Own It 87

Level 1: Ownership and Opportunity 89

Level 2: Creating Your Company’s DNA 93

Level 3: From Survival to Success 98

Level 4: Maintaining Success 103

Level 5: Moving on When It’s Time to Go 111

Chapter 5: Fact 3: Protecting Your Company’s Assets Should Be Your First Priority 121

Protecting Tangible and Intangible Assets 125

Protecting Products or Services 126

Protecting People 127

Level 1: Ownership and Opportunity 129

Level 2: Creating Your Company’s DNA 134

Level 3: From Survival to Success 142

Level 4: Maintaining Success 150

Level 5: Moving on When It’s Time to Go 159

Chapter 6: Fact 4: Planning Is About Preparing for the Future, Not Predicting It 167

The Elements of a Proper Business Plan 170

Level 1: Ownership and Opportunity 172

Level 2: Creating Your Company’s DNA 175

Level 3: From Survival to Success 179

Level 4: Maintaining Success 182

Level 5: Moving on When It’s Time to Go 187

Chapter 7: Fact 5: If You Don’t Market Your Business, You Won’t Have One 193

The Elements of Marketing 196

Level 1: Ownership and Opportunity 198

Level 2: Creating Your Company’s DNA 204

Level 3: From Survival to Success 212

Level 4: Maintaining Success 218

Level 5: Moving on When It’s Time to Go 224

Chapter 8: Fact 6: The Marketplace Is a War Zone 235

The Products or Services You Sell 238

How Your Business Operates 240

How Your Business Competes—The “X” Factor 241

Level 1: Ownership and Opportunity 242

Level 2: Creating Your Company’s DNA 250

Level 3: From Survival to Success 256

Level 4: Maintaining Success 264

Level 5: Moving on When It’s Time to Go 272

Chapter 9: Fact 7: You Don’t Just Have to Know the Business You’re In, You Have to Know Business 279

Product 281

People 282

Accounting and Finance 283

You 284

Level 1: Ownership and Opportunity 285

Level 2: Creating Your Company’s DNA 293

Level 3: From Survival to Success 300

Level 4: Maintaining Success 307

Level 5: Moving on When It’s Time to Go 314

Conclusion 323

About the Author 325

Index 327

Supplemental Materials

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