Ramsay Mameesh

Get the MOST out of your Small Business
by: Ramsay Mameesh

Every year Fortune 500 Companies, and many other large corporations, spend millions upon millions of dollars on business consulting. Receiving consulting assistance in every facet of their business; management, human resources, marketing, operations etc. A few large firms dominate the industry, employing the majority, of the 1 million people who work in the consulting industry.

Fortunately, and unfortunately, most small businesses can’t afford high-priced consulting services. Fortunate, because in many cases, the end product of the expensive consulting service is worthless. Unfortunate, because many small business owners, could benefit from quality business consulting.

Why does your business exist? What do you want to achieve with your business? What are your business goals? Do you have any idea how to accomplish them? Do you have a business plan?

A small business is a miniature version of a corporation.  The difference between the two is mainly the absence, of  layers of managers, between the C.E.O and the janitor. In many small businesses, the C.E.O is the head of human resources, marketing, sales, and performs the janitorial services as well.

In a large corporation, the C.E.O has the ability to hire qualified managers, to lead each of the different areas of the business. And yet, corporations with skilled managers, still pay large sums to consulting firms for business help. In small businesses, the C.E.O. performs several managerial roles, and usually lacks the money to obtain consulting help. Life is not fair for the small business owner.

However, there is a business planning concept that is simple, easy to understand, that can be applied to any part of your small business, at any stage. It will clarify the business decision making process, creating a focused plan, leading to better results.

It is called MOST. Mission - Objective - Strategy - Tactics. It is a comprehensive approach to business planning, that can be used in corporations or small businesses, and that levels the playing field for everyone. And best of all - it’s free! No need for high-priced consulting services, you’re learning about it right now, and you can use it right away.

MOST can be used before you start your small business, to create your small business plan, it can be applied to any area of your small business, even to individual campaigns within your small business.

The best way to explain MOST, is of course, through an example. Let’s use MOST to increase customer satisfaction.

• Mission - Increase customer satisfaction.
• Objective - Raise percentage of “Highly Satisfied”, responses  from 30% to 50%, in the next quarterly customer satisfaction survey.
• Strategy - Incentivize Employees.
• Tactic - Offer employees 10% salary bonus if objective is met.

With MOST, you begin with the Mission and end with the Tactic. The Mission determines the Objective, which determines the Strategy, which determines the Tactic. It is a systematic approach to business planning.

There is always only one Mission, however, there can be several Objectives, Strategies, and Tactics, stemming from the Mission. For instance let’s expand the business.

• Mission - Expand the Business
• Objective - Increase online sales by 20%
  Open 2 new retail stores
• Strategy - Use online advertising
  Identify high net worth neighborhoods in Northern California
• Tactics - Use Google PPC
  Conduct Census Bureau Research

MOST produces comprehensive, focused, quantifiable, business plans. MOST speeds up the decision making process, concentrates the thinking process, and can be applied to any process within your business.

Using MOST, will get you the most, out of your small business.

Ramsay Mameesh received his B.S. in Business Administration from California State University. He has worked for large corporations and owned small businesses. His current business is Retirement Planning.
 

Up is down. The sun rises in the west and sets in the east. The price of oil does not affect inflation.

The price of oil, nearly hit $100 and an all time high, and many economists would have you believe that it doesn’t matter. Our economy has changed, the price of oil doesn’t affect us as much and besides, nothings happened so far? Right?

This line of reasoning coming from many “respected” economists, and oil traders, is nothing more than economic laziness and stupidity.

Our economy has changed. We have become a service economy instead of a manufacturing economy, and therefore the impact of rising oil prices on the cost of production, is much less than it used to be. That’s the good news? No, that’s the bad news.

It means that we have replaced, higher paying manufacturing jobs, with lower paying service jobs. It means that the average American worker is earning less than his father did. It means that our trade defecit grows and our currency declines. It means the end of our economic superpower status.

High, and more importantly, rising oil prices is still inflationary. Besides gasoline at the pump, every single thing you purchase, involves oil in some way. When the price of oil rises, the cost of production and transportation, of that item rises as well.

But nothings happened so far? That’s right, “nothing” that you “see” besides rising gasoline prices, has happened so far. But a lot, that you don’t “see” is happening, and a lot more that you are going to “feel” will happen.

So far, rising oil prices, they were $20 a barrel at the beginning of the Bush administration, have in combination with the spending for the war in Iraq and the tax cuts for the rich, resulted in the devaluation of the dollar and modest interest rate hikes.

Because we outsourced our manufacturing to China and other low wage countries, the cost of production dramatically declined, our CEO’s became very wealthy pocketing the difference between your wage and that of the Chinese laborer. In return you got cheap products, which kept inflation down, and helped mask your lower wage.

Oil prices began rising, the cost of production even with lower wages began to rise, but U.S. corporate earnings remained strong and inflation low. Why? The Chinese and other manufacturers, could absorb the rising costs of production, because of increasing demand (volume)  and by keeping wages low.

Where was this increasing demand coming from? You and your house. At the same time that oil prices were rising, the U.S. housing market was booming, and Americans were spending their home’s equity. The increasing demand, in combination with low wage manufacturing, was reducing the effect of oil on inflation.

But the housing market is declining? Exactly. The party is over. Now comes the hangover. The smart money has already left the country for euros and gold.

You are going to lose your jobs. As demand slows, the Chinese manufacturers who have been maintaining profits from shrinking margins (due to higher oil prices) but increased volume, are going to get hurt. When they pass the pain onto the U.S. corporations, the corporations are going to pass part of the cost onto you, and take lower earnings.

When the CEO’s bonus and job is tied to corporate earnings, they will try to maintain earnings, by cutting costs. When they cut costs - they cut your job.

Economics has not changed. Your house, and low Chinese wages, fueled the Chinese and U.S. economies, and only delayed the effect of oil on inflation.

The U.S. and Chinese economies are going to go through a very hard period until the price of oil begins to decline.

Is tomorrow, November 5, 2007, the day the stock market finally collapses? As I write this on a beautiful Sunday morning in Northern California, Citigroup is holding an emergency board meeting, to plan the resignation of their CEO, and most probably to sort through the collateral damage of their collateral debt obligations.

Citigroup couldn’t wait until Monday, to send out a press release, announcing that their Prince of a CEO was going to spend more time with his family? I haven’t been this nervous since August of ‘07, when the stock market should have collapsed, and the economy nearly disintegrated.

The reason why the U.S. economy did not implode back in August, was due to massive (and continuing) infusions of capital from the Federal Reserve, European Central Banks, Arab and Chinese governments, and Fed rate cuts.

All the grand intervention did, was buy time, and with Citigroup’s announcement of an emergency board meeting, it appears that time may be up.  This is an extraordinary event, in a time of great uncertainty, one that may not register on main street, but can send shock waves through Wall Street.

And it appears that Americans, with their seven second attention spans, are incapable of learning from history, and that we might as well stop teaching economics in our universities.

Citibank helped bring about the stock market crash of 1929. It was Charles Mitchell, CEO of National City Bank (later re-named Citibank), that opened the speculation door to individual investors. The crash of 1929 didn’t happen in one day.

In the stock market crash of 1929, their was an initial drop on “Black Thursday”, Citibank and other large Wall Street investors poured money into the stock market, to try and restore confidence. Five days later, on “Black Thursday”, the stock market collapsed.

Are we watching a bad Hollywood sequel, of a horror film, that first ran almost a century ago? I don’t know? But let’s ask none other than, Chairman of Citigroup William Rhodes, who stated back in March to the Financial Times “What is clear to me is that in the next year a material correction in the markets will occur.” From The Economist Blog titled “Citibank warns of crash. But why?”

That’s the history - here’s the economics.

Economic cycles dictate that their will be stock market crashes and recessions. Whether they are short-term and soft, or long-term and hard (i.e. Depression), depend on the nature of the response. We have already seen, since August of 2007, swift and massive intervention to keep the economy going.

The question is how many more interventions are possible before time and capital runs out?