Get rid of excess burdens in your work

In business, you need to operate with maximum efficiency. However, I have seen many companies carrying a lot of “excess burdens”, which hinders their progress. Some of these excess burdens are small things, such as overstaffing or overspending on services. Or, poor investment in their sales and marketing. Some of these overheads are very costly, such as running multiple departments or focusing on channels that do not generate financial returns. This article will help you learn how to identify different types of overburden, so you can evaluate your business and see if there is any pruning that needs to be done.

Strategic overburden

Strategic overload means developing a strategic plan that focuses you in areas where the company should not be focused, or investing resources in a way that does not achieve return on investment or that becomes distracted to more profitable places in the business. These can be things like supporting multiple brands or divisions, multiple products, or multiple sales channels, which together underlie the true focus, service, and profitability of the business.

Operational overloads

Operational overload means the business is running inefficiently. This could be a large staff compared to the real business need, renting a larger office than your real need, paying more for services than the real market rates, or worst case, paying more for services that you don't really use. Every dirham counts in an early-stage business, and inefficiently investing your valuable cash resources means you're wasting dollars that could have been better invested in other activities that yield a higher ROI.

Excessive burdens in sales and marketing

Sales and marketing overload means you invest wages in salespeople who can't generate enough sales to meet goals (or at least cover expenses) or you invest advertising dollars in advertising campaigns that don't generate a profitable return on spend. It is necessary to carefully examine the performance of the sales team and the performance of the advertising team or agency to ensure that goals are met. You can't just stop at aggregation, you should also check the performance of each campaign specifically, to optimize and prune accordingly. You should always stop losing losers and reinvest those dollars to double down on winners.

Strategic case study

As a strategic example, when the existing business was taken over, it operated under two brands, one targeting commercial buyers, and the second targeting residential consumers. When two different things are powered, this means double the effort. We had to build and maintain two websites and two different marketing campaigns. When we looked at the financials by brand, we discovered that the second brand was generating about $20% in revenue, but only $5% in total profits, because the median order size was $2,000 versus $6,000 at the first brand. There was a material operating shortfall in servicing the consumer market, which often involved many return phone calls and many claims and returns, resulting in a lot of overtime. At the end of the day, the second brand was better off.

We decided to close the second brand, the company's original brand, to help us get rid of the excess burden. This helped us sharpen our strategic focus on the most profitable business buyers, helped materially improve operating efficiency, and most importantly, helped us reinvest those marketing dollars into higher-performing business businesses to materially accelerate revenue and earnings growth. The “sacred cow” of the founders was sacrificed, to help the new business scale to greater heights.

Conclusion

Small businesses cannot afford any excess burdens. It should be light, fast, and focused on what will drive the biggest profits. Anything that gets in the way of that goal must be sacrificed for the greater good, no matter how much you want to keep the “sacred cow.” It may cause some short-term pain, but I guarantee you, the long-term gains in focus, business efficiency and profits will heal those wounds quickly. So, why are you waiting? It's time to look for excess burdens in your work. Then, starting with pruning for the larger sacrum, or for the smaller sacrum, and start cutting. Your profits will thank you in the end!