President Obama recently said, "Long before the recession hit, hard work stopped paying off for too many people." That statement applies to business owners, as well, although not in the context the President intended. Fact is, hard work alone never "paid off" - for anyone.

Are you counting on hard work as your wealth-building strategy?  Just how much harder can you work?  Are you "too busy" to look for better ideas than working harder?

A Chief Executive Boards International member once said, "The real measure of the value of your business is how much time you can spend away from it."

If "working harder" is your strategy for growing your business, you'll want to read on.....

Have you downsized most of your administrative staff?  Many companies have offloaded clerical/admin duties to their professional staff, who have the full suite of Office Automation and E-Communications tools at their disposal.  

Is that the highest and best use of your most highly-paid employees' time?  Several CEBI companies don't think so, and have begun adding administrative staff to support their scarce and expensive professional resources.  

What would you rather have your top sales person doing with a spare hour?  Entering an order?  Answering a customer question about a shipment?  Perhaps getting in front of another prospect?  

Think about it....

Here's a different idea for improving your business -- Drama Eradication.  

I recently had two completely different customer experiences -- one with Southwest Airlines, almost "drama free".  Just a calm, orderly process of 150 people boarding an airplane virtually stress free.   

The second was a drama-rich experience in the local Pak Mail store, with a couple of employees who probably raised the collective blood pressure of the few customers in the store by 150 points.  

Here's an article on how to identify and eradicate drama in your company....