Very good piece and in small-town MN, I've seen it happen - multiple times.
Frugally keeping costs down, offering superior customer service and value, and staying out of debt are crucial in starting and keeping a business viable.
I wonder how the MBA-program reacted to his report. Did his professors "get it"?
My wife started a business, fortunately her business required no capital to start and has no plans to expand. She wanted to get into the conservator business - managing estates and court appointed administrator of trusts, but hasn't been able to break into that yet.
She is now essentially a non-live in nanny for a mother-less family of 5 whose father works 6 days out of town and then 6 days off. It's terrible money, but because she has no capital investment, she's able to make some money.
Huh, did we read the same article or did I just not understand your comment about it?
The MBA who's site the article is on seems to get it. Don't spend money you don't have, don't run on credit. Obviously credit isn't always a bad thing but you have to know you can make enough margin to cover the cost of the credit and still have enough to live on. I see no indication he ever had his head up his ass.
Unless the 'preppy, brown-nosing, cookie-cutter MBA moron' talking about is the guy who took over the hardware store.
I didn't see any indication that the various business owners were MBA's. - Actually the one who bought the wrecking yard when back to logging so - pretty much not MBA.
Those were hardly glamor high power positions and that's what today's MBA is all about.
That MBA program had a lot of small business owners as well as some corporate types. No preppies. Not much emphasis on case studies. A real emphasis on coherence - alignment of culture, business model, compensation, marketing - basically helping you think about how everything should fit together and operate with minimum heat loss.
I grew up in a small town and my Dad was a public accountant. I watched businesses survive for years and had always thought it had to do mostly with frugality because the market size was limited, but when I started to write about the hardware store realized what a genius the 1954 owner was in developing customer loyalty and adding value while keeping costs low.
Started that MBA program while employed and fifty years old. Managed to muddle my way to the highest GPA of a cohort of 180 so the profs must not have minded my eccentric thoughts.
Reminds me of that classic bit from Back to School with the Economics professor:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YlVDGmjz7eM
Very good piece and in small-town MN, I've seen it happen - multiple times.
ReplyDeleteFrugally keeping costs down, offering superior customer service and value, and staying out of debt are crucial in starting and keeping a business viable.
I wonder how the MBA-program reacted to his report. Did his professors "get it"?
My wife started a business, fortunately her business required no capital to start and has no plans to expand. She wanted to get into the conservator business - managing estates and court appointed administrator of trusts, but hasn't been able to break into that yet.
She is now essentially a non-live in nanny for a mother-less family of 5 whose father works 6 days out of town and then 6 days off. It's terrible money, but because she has no capital investment, she's able to make some money.
Huh, did we read the same article or did I just not understand your comment about it?
ReplyDeleteThe MBA who's site the article is on seems to get it. Don't spend money you don't have, don't run on credit. Obviously credit isn't always a bad thing but you have to know you can make enough margin to cover the cost of the credit and still have enough to live on. I see no indication he ever had his head up his ass.
Unless the 'preppy, brown-nosing, cookie-cutter MBA moron' talking about is the guy who took over the hardware store.
I didn't see any indication that the various business owners were MBA's. - Actually the one who bought the wrecking yard when back to logging so - pretty much not MBA.
Those were hardly glamor high power positions and that's what today's MBA is all about.
color me confused.
Good article on how to not ruin a small business.
Thanks for linking, Cappy. I think.
ReplyDeleteThat MBA program had a lot of small business owners as well as some corporate types. No preppies. Not much emphasis on case studies. A real emphasis on coherence - alignment of culture, business model, compensation, marketing - basically helping you think about how everything should fit together and operate with minimum heat loss.
I grew up in a small town and my Dad was a public accountant. I watched businesses survive for years and had always thought it had to do mostly with frugality because the market size was limited, but when I started to write about the hardware store realized what a genius the 1954 owner was in developing customer loyalty and adding value while keeping costs low.
Started that MBA program while employed and fifty years old. Managed to muddle my way to the highest GPA of a cohort of 180 so the profs must not have minded my eccentric thoughts.
He is probably one of the more aware MBA's, but the average MBA is pretty darn stupid.
ReplyDeleteThey believe in debt to grow a business, hostile to a free market in money, and think 'inflation is good'.
Yes, this is what is churned out of every MBA school from allegedly great like the Chicago School to your lowest tier university.
Thanks for sharing, I liked your article.
ReplyDeleteIf you had taken BlackBerry instead of BlueBerry, that would have been a big company...