What Is Your Core Business? What do you do?

“You know me as a wine expert, but in another life I would have been a bishop or a dry cleaner, or a dry-cleaning bishop.” Oz Clarke

Your Core Business

Now to take you through some concrete examples from the four business attempts mentioned in my earlier post, “Do what you do”.

Importantly, all the businesses were started by guys who had at least five years’ experience in the waste management industry. These entrepreneurs all had great experience in the sales and operational aspects of their employers and decided to go out on their own, within the same industry.  Three of the employers were huge waste management companies that had existed for many years and still do. They held contracts for the waste management and removal of a variety of sites including office and business parks, restaurants and hotels, shopping centres, sports facilities and other venues.

The point of my short case studies is that your business should focus on what it does. Focus on core business. Sound simple and rather obvious? Read on… Continue reading

Focus on Your Core Business – Do What You Do.

“I understand small business growth. I was one.” George W. Bush

Focus on Your Core Business – not extraneous bling

Over the past seven or so years, I have had occasion to be exposed to at least 4 attempts to start inherently the same business. Two attempts failed dismally, the third survives, but only just, while the fourth is a monumental success.

One of the primary reasons for the failed businesses when compared to the successful business is that the successful business has a singular focus to “do what we do”. All four business attempts, which I’ll write about in some more detail in my next post, were almost identical in intention, method, start-up capital, staff requirements, services offered and target customers; and yet they had vastly different destinies. For the purpose of this article, I will isolate only the principle that I would like to highlight at the moment, to the exclusion of others. This is not to say that other factors did not play a role, or even a significant role, but they simply won’t come into play here. Continue reading