The Insidious Danger of “Displacement Activities” – Part I

KickStart: Don’t waste precious business time on non-important busy work.

Maybe Fyodor Dostoevsky said it best 143 years ago, “Above all, don’t lie to yourself.” And yes, our Home Services industry is full of hard-working entrepreneurs who are lying to themselves.😥

“Say what, Steve?” Here’s the deal. Everyone “fritters away” time. This isn’t necessarily a bad thing- we all need down time to relax and recharge.😎 But when we fool (lie to) ourselves we may fall into what I call…

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Why (and How to) Focus On 3 Essential Business Areas

KickStart: man·​age ˈma-nij To direct with a degree of skill. 

small business owner focuses on prioritiesFinding a balance in business (and life) is an ongoing, moving target for most of us. Our shared Home Service Pro entrepreneurial challenge? Managing our OCD tendencies to not get distracted off into Displacement Activities!🙄 Instead, you must focus ONLY on the high-profit, “important stuff”.

True Confession Time: I still find myself going down obsessive rat holes while wasting enormous time on pursuits that add nothing to my happiness, relationships or even my financial net worth!🤔 (You’d think I would have learned by now!)😲

Remember, your residential services company is an incredibly fragile creature. This means as a service business owner or manager you must…

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The “5-W” Home Services Accountability Checklist

KickStart: “Accountability breeds response-ability.”  Stephen R. Covey

An essential part of growing into adulthood is becoming “accountable” for our actions. Honestly? Prisons are full of overgrown babies who have never matured enough to follow this basic rule of nature: “For every action there is… a re-action.”😥

However, I (eventually) learned that “accountability” shouldn’t focus ONLY on the bone-headed mistakes of my service employees! Instead, when a worker took “response-ability” I needed to both praise them and share the extra profits that they generated!

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The Unexpected Happens! Will You Be Ready in Your Service Business?

KickStart: “… the inexperienced keep right on going and suffer the consequences.” (Proverbs 22: 3)  If you choose to “stay small” protect yourself going forward.

content home service contractorI’m so very proud of you! You’ve analyzed your personality, skills, circumstances and what you (and your family) want out of life.

This honest self-appraisal may have convinced you that the inevitable stress, drama and (at times) agonizing sacrifices required to build a larger Critical Mass Business simply aren’t for you. Instead…

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Are You Loving the “SELF”-Employed Life?🤔

KickStart: “When you come to a fork in the road, take it!”😲 Yogi Berra, Baseball Hall of Fame catcher/manager and pithy folk philosopher.

Good for Yogi! He was a man of action! But Yogi overlooked a very important part of any “fork in the road”.

Recognizing that a decision “masquerading as a small choice” now can have HUGE consequences later in life!😲

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OBSESS Over (Your Home Service Clients) FEELINGS!

KickStart: “… it’s not what you say or what you do, but how you make people feel that matters the most.” Tony Hsieh, Zappos founder

focus on residential services profits“Feelings, Steve? Seriously?” As a rugged, profits-obsessed residential services business owner you likely focus ONLY on your bottom line! (I did too!) After all, who had time for a squishy, hard-to-manage word like, “feelings”?

I mean, everyone knows “emotions are for sissies”?💪 Right? WRONG! For far too many agonizing years I struggled before FINALLY learning that…

In a residential service business success is based on building “trusting relationships” (TR’s)! 

In fact, Mr. Logical here even reduced this concept into an “Emotional Equation”: Success= (ETR + HTR) x SE= CMB. Say what, Steve?😲

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