About Us (continued)

Survival Part Deux

So you thought that just because we quit writing for awhile, we were done?

I'm writing finally in 2014.  Part of this is due to the fact that I can now edit and add pages easily.  We're upgrading our website, moving it into a slightly more robust and current landscape.  Part of it was due to a real question.  Would Team Mates survive 2008, 2009 and the rest of the years, and live to tell the tale?

The year 2008 was frightening.  It held us in our seats, a little bit like "Play Misty For Me."  Remember that solid Clint Eastwood thriller?  All I remember was that the date I was with when I saw it dug her fingers into the back of my hand until she drew blood.  It was downright horrifying.  

I went into that year knowing that something was wrong.  Aside from the unrest in my own industry, there were signs that we were headed for a, well, slight downward trend.  Housing and property went on a tailspin ride that landed the whole economy in a deep pit.  Banks started asking for money from the government because no one had any to actually put into them.  People began talking about being 'upside down' on their property.  By the end of the year, we were all standing on our heads, watching the blood drain from our feet and we no longer saw any part of industry or the world as being safe.  

Team Mates suffered during that time.  We knew it and there was nothing that we could do.  Sales slowed, payments slowed and we knew that it was make or break time.  The assistance of a very wonderful banker helped to pull us out literally at the last minute.  We refinanced, paid off a lot of debts and came through the year scathed but alive. 

It was a time when I finally faced the fact that we needed a new and better structure, a new way to do our work and a whole lot of guidance.  Recurrent during that year was contact with a consulting company known as E-Myth, Incorporated.  They aren't an ordinary consultant and make absolutely no promise that they can solve your troubles.  The only thing that is provided in fact, is a coach who, via telephone calls and assignments, whose primary function is to encourage you to work hard on your business.  

I've been a consultant in the past.  I was pretty miserable at it.  One thing that I never got beyond was listening to the owners say "I've put my heart and soul [a cliche at best] into this company and it owes me."  We never got around to fixing what was wrong.  

By the end of 2008, though, I finally realized that I didn't want to be one of those owners.  So I listened.  And imagined.  And watched my company and observed others like mine and finally began to understand that something was drastically wrong with the way that we were doing business.  The secret was, well, change.  

So, curious?  Different writing today, huh?  And we're still here to write about it.  There's more.

Want to read more?