21 Great Ways To Build A High Profit Business - Brian Tracy

21 Keys to Building a High Profit Business/4/3/07/Page 1
Title: 21 Great Ways to Build a High Profit Business
Author: Brian Tracy
Hello, I'm Brian Tracy and welcome to this program. Over the last 25
years, I have worked with hundreds of businesses, large and small,
from entrepreneurial start-ups to Fortune 500 corporations. I have
read thousands of books and articles, taken a Masters Degree in
Business and consulted with more than 500 businesses. I have saved
or made my clients many, many millions of dollars over the years by
helping them to apply the ideas you are going to learn in this
program.
The fact is that 20% of the businesses in any industry make 80% of the
profits in that industry. Some companies, selling very much the same
product or service in the same market, earn ten times as much as
other companies. The question is, "Why are some businesses more
profitable than others?"
We know that there is a cause and effect relationship between

corporate activities and profitability. If you do the things that
profitable companies do, you soon enjoy the kind of profits profitable
companies realize. To put it another way, profitability is predictable
if you can figure out how and why it occurs in your business or your
industry.
Perhaps the most important single factor in determining the

profitability of a business is the quality of the thinking of its
management and leadership. In high profit companies, the top
people are focused on performance, results and profitability every
day, all day long.
According to the Menninger Institute, the most important single

quality an executive can develop is the quality of flexibility. In times
of turbulence and rapid change, such as today, your ability to remain
fluid, fast and flexible is absolutely indispensable to the success and
the success of your business.
The very best thinking tool for ongoing flexibility is what I call "Zero-
Based Thinking." This requires that you continually ask yourself this
question, "Is there anything that I am doing in my business today
that, knowing what I now know, I wouldn't start up again today, if I
had to do it over?"
Whenever you are experiencing stress, frustration, resistance or poor

results, either with products, services or people, you should stop and
ask yourself this question, "Is there anything that I am doing today,
that knowing what I now know, I wouldn't get into again today, if I
had to do it over?"
The inability to stop doing things that are no longer working and to
discontinue people who are no longer performing, is the primary
reason for failure in business. On the other hand, your ability to be
fast and flexible in the face of this dynamic market environment is the
key to your success and the success of your business.
To put these 21 power principles into action, you must be open to the
possibility that what you are doing today is no longer appropriate for
the current situation. You must learn to make three statements, over
and over again, for the rest of your business life.
First, you must learn to say, "I was wrong!" Fully 70% of your
decisions will turnout to be wrong in the fullness of time. The sooner
you realize that you are on the wrong road and turn back, the faster
you will get to your destination of business growth and high
profitability.
You must be willing to say, "I made a mistake." The fact is that
everyone around you is aware that you have made a mistake and
they are just waiting for you to have the courage and character to face
up to it. The sooner you admit that you have made a mistake and
stop doing whatever it is, the faster you move toward your real goals.
The third statement that you must learn to say, over and over again
is, "I changed my mind." The superior executive is always willing to
change his or her mind in the face of new information that challenges
the old ideas or the established way of doing things.
When you make a decision to set performance, results and

profitability as your highest goal in business management, and you
are willing to let go of the old that is not working in order to embrace
the new that might work even better, you are on the road to building
a high profit business.
Here are the 21 keys to high profitability, based on more than 50

years of research with many thousands of corporations. The absence
of any one of these 21 keys can, in itself, undermine your profitability
and even lead to the collapse of the enterprise.
Key number one: Develop a clear mission for your business.
For you, your business and your people to perform at a high level,
they need a clear vision of what the business stands for and where it
is going. Why does your business exist at all? A mission must always
be defined in terms of how your business serves and benefits other
people. A good mission statement will contain a method by which
the mission is to be achieved. In addition, a good mission statement
will contain a measure so that an objective third party can assess
whether or not the business is living up to the mission that it set for
itself.
In a study of what Ken Blanchard called the "Fortunate 500" they

discovered that the top 20% of companies, in every industry, over a
30 year period, had clear written values and principles that everyone
knew and was committed to. In addition, the company had a mission
statement that everyone agreed with. Other companies had values
and missions as well, but either they were not written down or
nobody really knew what they were.
To apply for the Baldridge Award for Quality, you must fill out a 50
page application and then invite Baldrigde inspectors to walk around
your company for many months. The inspectors are empowered to
stop any employee, at an level, and ask that employee what the
values, vision and mission of the company are. 95% of all the
employees that the Baldridge inspectors interview must be able to
give the answer without referring to notes. If the employees do not
know your values, vision and mission, the Baldridge inspectors close
the file and drop your application.
Establishing a clear mission for your company, based on the values

that you believe in and refuse to compromise, is the equivalent to
building a deep concrete foundation for building before you begin
construction. The good news is that, you can go back at any time and
build this foundation and begin putting your future on a solid basis.
What are your corporate values? What is your vision for your
company in the years ahead? What is your mission and how will you
know that you have accomplished it? Why does your company exist
in the first place? What great service is your enterprise committed to
offering to the world? These are the most important questions of all
in building a high profit business.
Key number two: Determine exactly what business you are in.
It is absolutely amazing how many people are not quite sure what
business they are in, even though they work in that business all day
long. You always define your business from the point of view of your
customer. You always define the business you are in in terms of what
your products or services do for your customer. What effects do your
products or services have in the lives and work of your customer?
What are the specific benefits that your customers enjoy from using
your products or services?
For example, at one time the railroads dominated cross country

transportation in the United States. But the defined themselves as
being in the business of running railroads. In reality, their mission
should have been to move people and freight over long distances in
the very best way possible at the very best prices.
Because their vision of their business was so limited, bus companies,

trucking companies, shipping companies and eventually airline
companies were able to move in and dominate the industry,
especially in the high profit areas of moving people and moving mail.
What business are you in today, from the point of view of your
customer? What business will you be in tomorrow with the way
things are going in your industry? What business should you be in if
you want to survive and thrive in this dynamic and competitive
environment? What business could you be in if you were to make the
critical changes necessary to lead your field? Remember, the very
best way to predict the future is to create it. And, as Michael Kamay,
the strategic planner said, "Those who do not plan for the future
cannot have one."
Whatever business you are in today, the likelihood is that it is going

to change dramatically in the years ahead. Your job is to be a master
of this change, not a victim of this change. This is a major key to
profitability.
Key number three: Determine exactly who your customer is.
This is the central questioning of all marketing, sales and

profitability. The ability to accurately answer this question, "Who is
my customer?" is the primary determinant of the success of your

business.
Define your customer as accurately and as precisely as you can. What

is your customer's age, education, income, position, value base,
philosophy and background? Where exactly is your customer
located, both geographically and within specific businesses or
organizations? Especially, what does your customer consider value?
What is your customer willing to pay for? What does your customer
want or need that he or she is not now getting from someone else?
Why does your potential customer buy from your competitors? What
would you have to do to get your non-customers to switch to your
products or services?
Keep practicing "Zero-base thinking." If you were not now serving

this market, with these products and services, would you start up
again today?" And, who is your customer likely to be tomorrow, next
year, in five years? Who could your customer be if you were to
change your product or service offerings? Who should your customer
be if you want to be a high profit business in the future?
Finally, what changes do you need to make in your business to be

able to attract and keep the high profit customers of tomorrow? This
is perhaps the most important question that you ask and answer in
building and maintaining a high profit business.
Key number four: Develop competitive advantage or don't

compete.
Your business depends for its very survival on your ability to

develop and maintain a meaningful competitive advantage of some
kind. What is it that your company does really well? Where do you
perform at a high level? What is the area of excellence of your key
products or services?
Your competitive advantage is the aspect of your product or service

that makes you superior in a meaningful way to your competitors.
Your area of competitive advantage is always defined in terms of
what your customer wants, needs and is willing to pay for.
Every company that survives and thrives has a specific and valued
competitive advantage that customers recognize and appreciate.
Every company that gets into trouble is a company that has either
lost its competitive advantage, relative to its competitors in the
marketplace, or a company that never had one at all.
Your ability to develop, maintain and protect your competitive

advantage is the absolutely indispensable prerequisite for company
growth and high profitability.
And since your market is changing so rapidly, you must continually

ask, what will my competitive advantage be tomorrow, based on the
way things are going? What should your competitive advantage be if
you want to rise to the top of your field? What could your
competitive advantage be if you were to make the necessary changes
in your product and service offerings?
Jack Welch of General Electric is famous for his belief that you must
be either number one or number two in your industry or you must
get out and concentrate your resources where becoming number one
or number two is possible. He says, If you dont have competitive
advantage, dont compete! The major competitive advantages today
are Faster, Better, Cheaper combined with superb and timely
customer service. All the most successful and most profitable
companies offer high quality products and services and they offer
them quickly. In addition, they give excellent customer service which
they continually improve. As the result, they are amongst the most
successful companies in their industries.
Key number five: Take a long term view of the business.

Your ability to think well about your business today and about your
business in the future have an inordinate impact on the success and
profitability of your enterprise. All top executives are long term
thinkers. They project forward five years and think about where they
want to be and what they will have to be doing at that time in order
to achieve those goals.
The best work on strategic planning today is being done by Gary

Hamel and Gary Prahaled. Their contribution to business thinking
centers on their idea that, in order to lead your field in the future, you
will have to develop specific core competencies that you probably do
not have today. The key to long term strategic thinking is for you to
identify the core competencies you will require and then begin
immediately to either develop or to acquire those core competencies
so that you will be strongly positioned for the marketplaces of the
future.
Peter Drucker says that he never makes predictions. He merely looks

at what is going on already and identifies the likely consequences in
the years ahead. You should do the same. What are the trends in your
business? Where is your market going? How is your market changing
with regard to people, technology, products, services, finances and
competition? What new capabilities and skills will you need three to
five years from now to be at the top of your field? What steps will
you have to take today in order to begin developing those skills and
abilities?
Your job is to stand back, think about the future, and then begin
taking steps in the short term to guarantee that you will achieve the
profitability that you desire in the long term. This ability to think
long term has never been more important or more valuable than it is
today.
Key number six: Develop a clear sense of direction.
You have heard it said that , when you are up to your "you know
what" in alligators, it's hard to remember that you came here to drain
the swamp.
Because of the turbulence of today's marketplace, most executives

and managers have been reduced to operating, almost like
firefighters, on a daily basis. They are totally preoccupied with short
term problems and the need to get short term operating results. They
mean to spend more time thinking and planning for the future, but
they don't ever seem to get around to it.
But this is not for you. You need to set clear targets for yourself and
for every part of your business. In fact, perhaps your most important
responsibility to your people is to give them a clear sense of direction
in their work. According to psychologists, the greatest single

demotivator in the world of work is, "Not knowing what's expected."
There is a simple five part formula that you can use for the rest of
your career. It is called the "GOSPA Formula." "G" stands for Goals.
A goal is a specific place where you want to end up at the end of a

specific period. For example, your goal could be a certain volume of
sales or a certain level of profitability at the end of a year.
"O" stands for Objectives. These are the sub-goals that you will have
to accomplish in order to achieve your long term goal. If your one
year goal was a certain dollar level of profitability, your objectives
could be in the areas of sales, distribution, manufacturing, cost
control, staff development, technology installation and so on.
The third letter in GOSPA, "S" stands for Strategies. Your strategy is
the method that you are going to use to accomplish the objective on
the way to your goal. For example, with regard to sales, your strategy
could be to build an internal sales force. Your strategy could also be
to outsource all selling to a professional sales organization. And there
could be numerous sub-strategies within the single sales strategy.
The fourth letter in the GOSPA formula, "P," stands for Priorities.
What are the things that you will have to do first and what are the
things that you will have to do second? Which items are more
important and which items are less important?
The final letter in the GOSPA formula is "A," which stands for
Activities. These are the specific daily functions that are clearly
delegated to specific individuals with standards of performance and
deadlines.
If you have thought out this process completely, each activity will be
determined by the current priorities. The achievement of the
priorities will lead to the accomplishing of the strategy. When your
strategy is carried out, you will achieve your objectives, and at the
end of the time period, you will have reached your goal of a specific
level of profitability.
One of the primary qualities of executives in high profit businesses is

that the think and act strategically at all times. They are always
playing down the board. They are always thinking about the future
and about the various different things that they can do to make their
desired future a reality.
Step number seven: Focus on key profit areas.
One of the keys to high profitability in your business is for you to

focus more and more time and energy on producing and delivering
the products and services that yield the highest possible profit to
your organization.
One of the reasons for failure in business is that the company

diversifies too much, spreads its energies and resources over too
many products and ends up producing too many things that
contribute only marginal amounts to the bottomline. You know
exactly what I mean.
Too many companies are offering too many products and services, at
too many price points, to too many different markets, in too many
different ways. The proper strategy is for you to focus and
concentrate your corporate resources on those specific areas where
the highest levels of profitability are possible.
Make a list of every product or service you offer. Gather all of the
costs that are involved in bringing that product or service to the
market. Examine the level of sales volume of that product and then
determine exactly how much profit you make for each one of those
products or services that you sell.
You will find that, if you have a dozen products and services, one of
those products and services is yielding more profit that any of the
others. You will find that 20% of your products or services are
yielding 80% of the total profits of the business. You will also find
that the 80% of products and services that are only giving you 20% of
the profits are probably consuming 80% of your costs of operation.
When you do the analysis, it is often surprising, and sometimes
shocking!
Then, because you are a long term thinker, you should ask, "What are
going to be the high profit products or services of tomorrow? What
are the trends? What will we have to do today to be in a position to
dominate the high profit markets of the future?" This is a major key
to profitability.
Step number eight: Set clear performance targets.
Remember, what gets measured, gets done. You need clear

performance targets, that are quantifiable and measurable. You can't
hit a target that you can't see. It is absolutely amazing how many
people in every organization have no real idea how to measure their
performance. This is a major source of demoralization and
unhappiness.
Human beings have a subconscious "urge to completion." In order to

be happy, people have to have a beginning, a middle and an end to
every task.
One of the most important jobs you have is to set standards of

performance for every task and every activity. It is for you to
establish clear lines of responsibility, schedules and deadlines for the
accomplishment of specific jobs. And then, your job is to make sure
that everyone does what they are supposed to do to the required
standard, on the required schedule.
High performance, high profit organizations are companies where

everyone knows exactly what they supposed to do, when they are
supposed to do it and how they will be measured. All rewards and
bonuses are tied in to clear, measurable performance. This leads to
high levels of motivation, commitment and enthusiasm amongst
everybody who is working toward the achievement of clear goals.
Key number nine: Manage by wandering around.
The best executives spend 75% of their time walking around and
interacting with their staff. This enables them to get accurate and
timely feedback about what is going on, long before it ever appears
on a report or monthly statement.
Lou Gersner turned IBM around within one year by freeing up the
sales managers from paperwork and sending them out into the field
with their salespeople to visit customers and make sales. Since in the
final analysis it is only revenue growth that leads to high

profitability, within one year, IBM had turned around completely.
Have a staff meeting once a week. Discuss what everybody is doing

and how it is going. Meet with your individual staff members on a
regular basis, daily if possible. Keep your door open and keep the
flow of communication going. In this way, you will know everything
that is going on and you will be in a position to move quickly
whenever quick action on your part is advisable or necessary. This is
a major key to high profitability.
Step number ten: Develop an obsession with customer service.
There is a direct relationship between the philosophy of the executive

and the way the staff treats the customer. In excellent organizations,
the key people look upon the customers as special and important in
every way. This philosophy or tone permeates the entire
organization.
Today, we have entered the age of the customer as never before.

Today, customers will walk away from us, after having been with us
for years, if someone else will serve them better or cheaper. Every
day, the bar on customer service is being raised by our competitors
and we have to continue to jump higher just to keep our place in line.
There are four levels of customer service in your business. The first is
to meet expectations. If all you do today is meet expectations, you are
living on borrowed time.
The second level is to exceed expectations. Your ability to exceed

expectations will keep you in the market for a little while longer, but
you are a sitting duck for a competitor who can do better.
The third level of customer expectations is for you to delight your

customers, by doing things for them, faster and more cheerfully than
they could have possible expected.
The fourth level of customer service is for you to amaze your

customers, for you to do things for them that make them so surprised
that they tell other people about their experiences.
It is the individuals and organizations that delight and amaze their

customers that own the future markets. Your job is to set these
standards within your organization. Your job is to continually
emphasize how important your customers are and both encourage
and reward every single person who demonstrates this attitude in
dealing with customers. This is a real key to high profitability.
Key number eleven: Put a strong emphasis on sales and marketing.

The key to high profitability is high sales. The key to business success
is high sales. The key to high stock prices and a great future for
yourself and others is high sales. On the other hand, the primary
reason for business failure is low sales. The primary cause for stress,
frustration, firings, takeovers and bankruptcies is low sales.
In the best companies, the sales and marketing people are the most
respected people of all. They are paid well and promoted faster. The
entire company thinks and talks about sales and customers all the
time, all day long.
The keys to great sales are simple. First, hire well. The best
companies have the best salespeople. And they have the best
salespeople because they hire them very carefully. Second, train them
thoroughly. The best and most profitable companies have the most
advanced sales training programs. The worst companies do no sales
training at all.
Third, manage them professionally. A good sales and marketing

team is like a crack military organization. It has great officers and
great leadership. Your ability to build that top line, higher and higher
is the key to profitability, without which, nothing else will work.
Step number twelve: Appoint and support strong, effective key

executives.
Leadership makes the critical difference in every organization. 28

chief executive officers have been fired from Fortune 500
corporations in the last few years. In every case, the ultimate reason
given for the firing was "failure to perform." And the major reason
these senior executives failed to perform was because they appointed
weak managers and executives under them who they did not have
the courage to replace when the results failed to materialized.
There is nothing that brings about a more rapid change in the

fortunes of a business than to change the key people in charge of
getting results. Top executives are future oriented, goal oriented,
result oriented, solution oriented and action oriented. Top executives
have high levels of energy and they are continually in motion. They
take high levels of initiative and are always looking for ways to go
the extra mile, to exceed expectations, to do more than anyone
expects.
The fastest way for you to move to the front in your business is for
you to do more than you are paid for, for you to ask for or grab
additional responsibility and then get more and better results than
anyone expected. A company can only achieve high profits if it has
competent executives in every key position. The absence of just one
key executive in one key position can be enough to cause the
company to under perform.
Key number thirteen: Staff well at all levels.
The best companies have the best people. The second best companies
have the second best people. The third best companies are on their
way out of business. Your ability to select good people and then to
manage them well is the critical determinant of the success of your
business. People are everything.
95% of your success will be determined by the people you hire for
key positions. 95% of your problems will come from having put the
wrong people in the wrong positions. The rule is for you to "hire slow
and fire fast." Interview people at least three times and check their
references carefully. Take your time. Be patient. And once you have
hired a person, provide someone to work with that person full time
until he or she feels comfortable with the job.
Fortunately, you can learn how to interview and hire good people. It
is a key skill, a key result area. Your ability to pick excellent people
can be the major factor in your success as an executive.
Key number fourteen: Teach, train and develop your people.
The rule is that you cannot expect people to perform at high levels
unless they have been thoroughly trained to perform at those levels.
The highest profit companies in America spend the largest amount

on training. The companies that are marginal spend little or nothing
on training. Xerox conducted a study on the effectiveness of their
training programs recently. They found that they are getting $22 back
to the bottomline to every dollar they invest in training their people.
IBM found that they are getting $26 back to the bottomline for every
dollar they invest in their people. And Motorola found that they are
getting $33 back for every dollar they invest in their people.
Resolve today to turn your company into a learning organization.

The top 20% of companies in America, according to the American
Society for Training and Development, spend 3% or more of their
gross revenues on training the people who are expected to generate
and process those revenues. How does this compare with the amount
that you spend in your company?
The president of a Fortune 500 company said recently that, "Our only
source of sustainable competitive advantage is our ability to learn
and apply new ideas faster than our competition."
Key number fifteen: Develop a caring work environment.
You've heard it said that, "They don't care how much you know until
they know how much you care." Not only are the people the most
important asset of your business, but people are also completely
emotional. People perform to the degree to which they feel that their
superiors care about them as individuals.
In today's tight labor markets, your ability to attract and keep good
people is vital to your success. And the better your people are, the
more demanding they are that they be treated with kindness,
courtesy, respect and openness.
Treat your staff as though they were members of your own family.
Treat them as though they were volunteers who were working
without pay and who could withhold their services at any time. Treat
them as though they have just received a job offer from another
company at a higher salary. Treat them as if your whole business and
future depends on them, because it does.
Key number sixteen: Develop and maintain high levels of

commitment.
Only hire and keep people who are willing to put their whole heart
into the job and into making the company successful. Your very best
people will always be those with the highest level of personal
commitment to you and to getting results. Your biggest problems
will always come from people who are uncommitted in some way,
for some reason.
The average person works at less than 50% of capacity. Many of them
complain, criticize and condemn on a regular basis. This form of
negativity undermines all your best efforts to build a top team.
Ask yourself, based on your experience, "Is there anybody working

for me today that, knowing what I now know, I wouldn't hire back
again today, if I had to do it over?"
Your job as the executive is to create and maintain harmony amongst

your team members. And the measure of how much harmony there
is is how much people laugh together at work. A happy, healthy
work environment is one where people laugh a lot, joke a lot, smile a
lot and are generally happy at work. And one negative, uncommitted
person can disrupt an entire work organization.
Most companies today hire on the basis of attitude and personality.

People can learn the skills and abilities but attitude and personality
are largely fixed. Create an environment where people feel terrific
about themselves.
Key number seventeen: Run the business like a turnaround.
Whenever a business gets into serious trouble, they bring in a team of

turnaround artists. These people take firm control of every
expenditure in the company and begin operating as if the company

were on the verge of financial collapse.
You should do the same. Run a tight ship. Be deadly serious about
costs and expenses. Pay very close attention to every dollar that flows
in and out of the company. Cut out, cut back, and eliminate all non-
essential expenditures on a regular basis.
Set a standard for frugality, for careful use of funds. Lead by

example. Help everyone in the company to be extremely sensitive to
the impact that expenditures have on the bottomline and on the
future success of the enterprise.
All good companies are very thoughtful and careful about money. As
a result, they make far better buying and selling decisions and turn to
be more profitable in the long term.
Key number eighteen: Form strategic alliances at all levels.
Strategic alliances are essential for the long term health and
prosperity of your company. Business is so complex today that the
only way you can succeed is by aligning yourself with a variety of
other business enterprises, at all levels, so that you can all perform at
your very best.
Form strategic alliances with your suppliers and work together with
them to improve quality, delivery times and inventory levels. Form
strategic alliances with your customers so that they see you and your
business as an essential part of their business as well.
Form strategic alliances with your competitors, the businesses that

offer products and services to your same customers but which are not
directly competitive with yours.
The key to high profitability is for you to simplify your operations

and specialize on high value, high profit activities. This requires that
you downsize, outsource or even eliminate those activities that are
not absolutely essential for the success of your business. The most
successful companies today are those who have built a network of
strategic alliances all around them, at all levels. These alliance
partners help them to operate at the highest levels of efficiency and
they, in turn, help their alliance partners in every way possible.
Key number nineteen: Provide outstanding quality, performance

and service.
Your most important asset as a company is your reputation in the

marketplace. It is how you are known to your customers. Your most
valuable asset is contained in the way your customers think about
you, talk about you and describe you to others when you are not
there.
To achieve high profitability, you should think through and decide

clearly how you want to be seen and thought about in the
marketplace. You must then organize and reorganize every part of
your business so that you create the impression that is most
conducive to high levels of repeat sales and high profitability of your
most important products and services.
A reputation for quality in everything you do will help you more

than any other single reputation in selling more and more of your
products and services to more and more customers. Never relax your
striving for ever higher levels of quality. Never become complacent
with success. Remember, "Good enough, seldom is."
A great rule for business success is this, "Only do those things that
you can do in an excellent fashion." If you can not do it in an excellent
fashion, better than any of your competitors, and you do not have the
resources to bring your standards up to that level, you should not be
in that area of business at all.
Demand the best of yourself, of your people, and of your products

and services. Be relentless in your pursuit of quality. Tell everyone
around you that product and service of quality are absolutely
essential. Make any sacrifice, pay any price and even take any loss, if
necessary, to keep up your high standards. This will add to your
profitability as much or more than any other single factor.
Key number twenty: Dedicate resources to research and

development.
Successful companies spend 10% or more of their gross revenues on

research and development activities aimed at bringing new products
and services to the market. 3M aims to have 20% of their revenues
each year coming from new products developed within the last five
years. The fastest growing companies in America, especially high-
tech companies, invest hundreds of millions, and even billions of
dollars in research and development. They work at a frantic pace.
Because their competitors, on all sides, are also willing to invest the
same sums to develop an edge in the industry.
Think things through and then be willing to take intelligent risks to

develop the products and services of tomorrow. Fully 80% of
everything that everyone is consuming today will be obsolete within
five years. This means that fully 80% of all products and services
being consumed in five years do not even exist today.
Many companies have found, by vigorously pursuing research and

developing activities, that they can enter into brand new markets
with brand new products and services that enable them to become
giants in their industries. And this is only possible with a senior
executive focus, combined with substantial budgets, on developing
the products and services of tomorrow.
Here's a good exercise: Assume that your primary revenue generated

today, your primary product or service, will be obsolete and out of
the market within 3-5 years. What will be your next product or
service? What do you have developed to replace your top selling
products of today?
Every year, leading companies are pushed aside by aggressive, brash,

smaller competitors who were willing to channel large sums into R &
D and who have managed to jump to the lead position in the
industry. You remember Satchel Paige, the baseball player once said,
"Dont look back; something might be gaining on you."
In today's dynamic marketplace, your competitors are racing to get

ahead of you, 24 hours a day. You have to run twice as fast just to
stay where you are.
Key number twenty one: Create great morale in your organization.
There was a study completed a few years ago entitled, "A great place
to work." In this study, they interviewed many thousands of
employees to ask them what constituted a great job and a great

company. Here are the answers:
First, the work was challenging and interesting. Second, there was a
high level of trust and support, which was demonstrated in that the
managers did not criticize people for making mistakes. This was an
extremely important part of a great place to work.
Third, people felt that they were "in the know." The company had
wide open communications, in all directions, and everybody felt as if
they were active participants in everything that was going on.
Fourth, in a great place to work, employees felt as if their boss cared

about them as a person rather than just as an employee. The boss
practiced consideration, courtesy and kindness on a regular basis.
Fifth, the happiest employees said that they knew exactly what they
were supposed to do, and to what standard, and by what time.
Finally, in a great place to work, people felt that there were
opportunities for advancement based on hard work and excellent
performance.
Your job is to create a place where people feel terrific about

themselves. Your job is to create a high morale environment, where
people are enthusiastic about coming to work. Your job is to be a
positive, supportive and at the same time, result oriented boss. These
are the ingredients necessary to create a great morale, high
productivity, high levels of creativity and a loyal staff.
Let me summarize this message with a few key points. Perhaps the
most important is that the real key to business success is leadership.
The key to leadership is for you to accept 100% responsibility for
results, with no excuses, no complaining and no blaming of other
people.
The most important thing a leader can do is to lead by example. Be a

role model for the people around you. Continually ask yourself this
question, "What kind of a company would this company be, if
everyone in it was just like me?"
Whatever your answer to that question, make sure that, if everyone

behaved the way you did, this would be a great place to work.
Be open to new ideas, all the time. Be willing to try something new
and different with no guarantees. Read, learn, discuss and seek forth
good ideas everywhere. Invite and encourage suggestions and input
from everyone.
Finally, become extremely action oriented. All successful executives

and successful companies are on what is called a "Continuous
Offensive." They are always trying new things, always moving

forward. They have a sense of urgency and a bias for action.
Resolve today to build an exciting, happy, high energy, high profit

organization and then do what thousands of other companies have
done to make this goal a reality. There are no limits except the limits
you place on yourself. Good luck!

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21 Keys to Building a High Profit Business/4/3/07/Page 1

Title: 21 Great Ways to Build a High Profit Business

Author: Brian Tracy

We know that there is a cause and effect relationship between

Perhaps the most important single factor in determining the

According to the Menninger Institute, the most important single

Whenever you are experiencing stress, frustration, resistance or poor

When you make a decision to set performance, results and

Here are the 21 keys to high profitability, based on more than 50

Key number one: Develop a clear mission for your business.

In a study of what Ken Blanchard called the "Fortunate 500" they

Establishing a clear mission for your company, based on the values

For example, at one time the railroads dominated cross country

Because their vision of their business was so limited, bus companies,

Whatever business you are in today, the likelihood is that it is going

Key number three: Determine exactly who your customer is.

This is the central questioning of all marketing, sales and

my customer?" is the primary determinant of the success of your

Define your customer as accurately and as precisely as you can. What

Keep practicing "Zero-base thinking." If you were not now serving

Finally, what changes do you need to make in your business to be

Key number four: Develop competitive advantage or don't

Your business depends for its very survival on your ability to

Your competitive advantage is the aspect of your product or service

Your ability to develop, maintain and protect your competitive

And since your market is changing so rapidly, you must continually

Key number five: Take a long term view of the business.

The best work on strategic planning today is being done by Gary

Peter Drucker says that he never makes predictions. He merely looks

Key number six: Develop a clear sense of direction.

Because of the turbulence of today's marketplace, most executives

in their work. According to psychologists, the greatest single

A goal is a specific place where you want to end up at the end of a

One of the primary qualities of executives in high profit businesses is

Step number seven: Focus on key profit areas.

One of the keys to high profitability in your business is for you to

One of the reasons for failure in business is that the company

Step number eight: Set clear performance targets.

Remember, what gets measured, gets done. You need clear

Human beings have a subconscious "urge to completion." In order to

One of the most important jobs you have is to set standards of

High performance, high profit organizations are companies where

Key number nine: Manage by wandering around.

final analysis it is only revenue growth that leads to high

Have a staff meeting once a week. Discuss what everybody is doing

Step number ten: Develop an obsession with customer service.

There is a direct relationship between the philosophy of the executive

Today, we have entered the age of the customer as never before.

The second level is to exceed expectations. Your ability to exceed

The third level of customer expectations is for you to delight your

The fourth level of customer service is for you to amaze your

It is the individuals and organizations that delight and amaze their

Key number eleven: Put a strong emphasis on sales and marketing.

Third, manage them professionally. A good sales and marketing

Step number twelve: Appoint and support strong, effective key

Leadership makes the critical difference in every organization. 28

There is nothing that brings about a more rapid change in the

Key number thirteen: Staff well at all levels.