Hard Conversations & The Value of Real Advice
I’ve talked a lot about the benefits of setting up a board of advisors for a business. As I mentioned last month, I believe it provides the life jacket your business needs to be successful!
Now that summer is upon us, I’ve been spending more time on boats and around the water. Here in Minnesota (as in most places), we’re required to have life preservers on board to comply with the state’s boating laws. Not only does everyone need access to a wearable life jacket of their own, but the boat must have a throwable life preserver in a location that is easy to access in an emergency. This means it can’t be tucked away in a cabinet somewhere, but must be out in the open where it can be grabbed at a moment’s notice.
When was the last time you had a problem - but you didn’t know who to talk to about it? Sometimes things come up - BIG things - that weigh heavy, but you don’t know who to turn to for advice.
Are you doing everything you can to avoid failure in building your franchise system?
Looking back on my decades of experience in the franchise industry, I believe there is one thing that contributed to my success more than anything else: my participation in a business owners’ mastermind group.
My mother, Flo Francis, passed away last month in December 2021 after a long battle with ovarian cancer. She was a wonderful woman who did a lot with her life - and who experienced a tremendous amount of success in her 85 years.
When I was a franchisor, there were few things as valuable to me as the executive business owner peer group I belonged to - I was a member for more than 25 years! I found the group to be both really valuable and fun, as it gave me the opportunity to share ideas, problem solve and find support among like-minded professionals. It made such a big difference in my career and many of those people are good friends today.
As we’ve talked about in the past, building a positive organizational culture is critical to the success of your franchise business. And while we all know the BIG mistakes that can spell ruin for the business (obviously don’t lie, cheat or steal), there are subtler, but equally dangerous, issues that often trip up franchisors - and can make it challenging for them to build a strong and long-lasting culture in the organization.
