Statistics show that of one hundred new business startups, only twenty will remain after five years. Then, in the next five years, only four of those remaining twenty will still be functioning. In another five years, three of those four will disappear, leaving one out of the original hundred. That’s a 99 percent small-business fatality rate over a fifteen-year period. This is in accordance with my admittedly anecdotal conclusion that nine out of ten new small businesses are mismanaged.
Gauge your own situation and look ahead. Are you an employee of a small business? If so, the numbers are not on your side. Or do you own a small business? If so, there is hope because you have the power to direct it.
Too often, what ends a business or a job, or what casts an onerous spell on a life, is death by a thousand cuts. This is relentless erosion caused by recurring inefficiencies and their toxic offspring, fire killing and distraction. These time wasters undermine efforts to create and sell a good product that has a viable market. And in personal life? You’ve seen it in those who can’t seem to break out of the bad-luck syndrome. It’s not mysterious tough luck that takes people down; it’s serial inefficiency. The great news is that inefficiency is easy to correct if one can see the cause of it.
Photo Credits: Jorge Franganillo
