If You’re Tired of Fighting Alligators, Drain the Swamp! (How to Work ON the Business, Not Just IN the Business)

My father’s unexpected death in 1973 occurred when I was 20-years-old and a recent university graduate. Consequently, I unexpectedly inherited the leadership position of the small family business of five employees along with a shocking revelation!

 

Not only did I become the leader of our little business, but I also became the leader of our little business that was carrying a HUGE debt! I’m talking about an enormous debt with very little income!

However, with the help of a lot of very good people over many years, I was able to grow our small, debt-laden company into a highly successful organization with over 150 employees.

As I began to lead our small company, I started fighting many worries like alligators trying to take me under: people, money/financing, government regulations, changing ways of customer buying…the list of worries was endless!

What keeps you up at night?

Do you ever feel like “you are up to your neck in alligators”? When dealing with all the worries threatening to pull me under, I had to remind myself that my initial objective wasn’t to fight alligators, it was to “drain the swamp.”

In those early years, I worked 7 days a week (working IN the business). During the normal workweek, I was always the first one to arrive and the last one to leave, late at night.

Then I discovered how to “drain the swamp” (working ON the business, not just IN the business) and how to create an environment where alligators could not survive and where I would not have to fight against the the alligator’s “death roll!”

I would pause from all of my day-to-day work activity for reflection and planning.

In 1999, I wanted to get all of our employees involved in a planning process as a normal way and approach to doing business. That is when I introduced the ON/IN™ principle, which reads:

Work ON the business while we work IN the business. – Bobby Albert

You’ve heard the old saying, “Don’t just sit there, do something.”

Well, when you work ON the job, the saying should be “Don’t just do something, sit there.”

But don’t sit idly! Plan what is to be accomplished and by when, and what needs to be done along the way so the end result is achieved.

Distance racers learn they can start off too fast in a race if they don’t have a plan and pace themselves!

Mountain climbers know it’s not good enough to just reach the top. Because if they haven’t allowed enough time and provisions for getting down, they’ll die!

Underwater divers must plan what to do and when to return to the surface – or they, too, will die!

In other words, we need to…

Work ON the business while we work IN the business. – Bobby Albert

Work ON the Business

So what is working ON, not just working IN, the business? It involves employing three important planning strategies:

• Grow yourself

• Grow your people

• Grow your business

Starting a project is important for any useful activity. So is giving it your best effort along the way.

But after all is said and done, the real key to success is to be able to complete what you are doing on-time and with results that meet or exceed expectations.
And successful completions require working ON (planning) the project – not just IN it.

What percentage of your time are you working IN your business? What percentage of your time are you working ON your business? Please let me hear your comments <here> and share this blog post with a friend or co-worker.

Updated: 10/17/2016