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Avoid Negative Cash Flow With Budget Forecasting
Posted by: | CommentsBudgeting can help you avoid negative cash flow by helping you know when to hire personnel or purchase equipment. You know it isn’t good to have large swings up or down in your cash flow. Right? So you want to plan for investing events like these in advance so you forecast the months where your business will need debt financing or investor funding. And even possibly more money out of your own personal funds.
Now don’t get tricked into thinking because you’re a home-based business or a single person services company you don’t need to develop a realistic budget. Negative cash flow can be a crippling threat to your new venture. And you must craft ways to deal with it in advance.
No matter how small or large your company is, you still need to pay very close attention to this serious financial advice.
Cash Flow Projections Can Avoid Negative Cash Flow
Negative cash flow results when you spend more money during the month than what you generate (net income). When you prepare a budget in advance, you won’t be surprised by money being spent or investments you make that you were not anticipating.
Now what I’m recommending here you do is figure out when your business will run out of cash in the planning phase instead of when you’re in the middle of trying to execute on your business plan.
And conduct your strategic thinking by modeling your forecasts and adjusting your estimates in a spreadsheet. Not while you’re in the middle of a fire fight in running your business. This financial analysis process will help you analyze how your different business assumptions can drastically affect your need for capital and your timing when you should add staff like engineers, office managers, and administrative assistants.
Don’t just wing it and pray it’ll all work out for you.
Types of Budgeting
There are two types of budgets:
- Zero based budgeting
- Historical budgeting
Zero Based Budgeting
If you’re just starting out in business, then a zero based budget is what you’ll create first to anticipate periods of negative cash flow. Zero base means you don’t have any prior historical financial numbers to plug into your budget. So you need to figure out what will be your starting numbers. I’d be happy to talk with you about how to get realistic numbers for your start-up forecasts.
Your zero based budget will consist of three financial statements:
- Income statement — profit and loss or P&L (like a movie)
- Balance Sheet (snap shot)
- Cash flow statement (tells you what happen with your cash during the month)
Income Statement:
The income statement is like a movie of what happen in your business during the month. So you’ll have to estimate your sales, cost of goods sold (direct costs), marketing and sales expenses, and general an administrative expenses such as accounting, legal, and training (indirect costs).
Balance Sheet:
Second, create your balance sheet which is like a snap shot of your business at a moment in time. So you will craft a zero based balance sheet.
Assets:
You’ll budget for all your assets like cash, accounts receivables, inventory, furniture and equipment, etc.
Liabilities:
Now estimate your current and long-term liabilities like payroll, accounts payables, and long-term debt such as a business loan.
Equity:
Your owner’s equity will be the amount of your own funds you’ll give to your new venture.
Now your balance sheet has to balance. Right? So assets equals liabilities plus owners equity.
Cash Flow Statement:
Finally, you need to include a zero based cash flow statement. Your cash flow statement tells you what happened to your cash during the month based on changes in your balance sheet.
Here’s the time when you should be really concerned. And that is when your cash flow from operations is negative.
Now this is your zero based forecast. And you’ll only have to do this one time. So next year you’ll engage in historical budgeting.
Historical Budgeting
So that was all about zero based forecasting where you were starting out in your first year of business. It’ll help you predict months when you may experience negative cash flow. After the first year, you will be doing historical budgeting. This means You’ll begin with your financial statements from last year and plug them into your budget forecast.
Then you’ll increase any financial numbers where you believe you can grow your business like sales, inventory, equipment, personnel, accounts receivables, and accounts payable. And then update your personnel numbers to reflect new hires that will help you grow your sales.
Get Help With Budgeting
No matter how complex or simple your business, you need a budget to avoid negative cash flow. Because so many people today are looking at starting their own business, I’m afraid that many will be doomed before they start.
You can sign-up for my complementary Forecasting Your Budget consulting session. I will help you develop forecasts for your business which will help you budget everything you’ll need to be successful and steer your business through periods of negative cash from operations.
And your financial forecast will help you anticipate financing needs and pin point when you may need outside funding to avoid negative cash flow. You can review my Financing Strategies Report to understand if debt or equity financing will be necessary to successfully execute on your business plan.
Eye Opening Help With Debt Vs. Cash Business Decisions
Posted by: | CommentsI find it intriguing that many business owners need help with debt verses cash decisions because in this economy “cash is king.” The question I’m often asked by business owners is should I pay cash or finance the piece of equipment I want to purchase for my business? And some CEOs anxiously come to me saying I have extra cash this month. So should I use my cash to pay down my long-term debt?
Well the answer is most of the time a simple response. No. Keep your precious cash to take advantage of supplier discounts and fund strategic projects in your firm. You may need your cash to hire a new employee or pay for training costs which could make your staff more efficient. And a strategic project, lower inventory prices or service efficiencies, new employee, or better trained team in turn could dramatically lower your direct costs which would have a bigger positive impact on your company’s profitability.
You know that paying down long-term debt faster won’t improve your business profitability. Right? And using cash in this way has a negative impact on your cash position.
You need to first thoroughly understand your market and how supply and demand factors may shift from month to month and year over year in your markets before financing or spending cash. Macroeconomic conditions and microeconomics in your local market can be another factor which will influence your decision to finance or dole out cash. The current and future economic trends for sure play a role in my determinations as a financing professional to move forward with your funding request.
It is something I’d definitely include in my lending analysis before recommending you to a funding committee.
Now business debt includes current liabilities and long-term liabilities. I’m sure I don’t need to tell you that you must pay your current liabilities every month. Avoid late fees and take advantage of supplier discounts for paying early. Current liabilities include credit card payments, rent, workers compensation payments, etc.
But using cash to pay off long-term debt or to purchase equipment can be foolish. Hold onto your cash for more strategic purposes, to survive a temporary slow down in customer demand, and to take advantage of discounts from your suppliers.
Cash Flow Is King
As long as your cash flow from operations covers your principle and interests payments, you should leverage financing or lease equipment when possible.
Without getting too technical, you need to know whether outlaying a large sum of cash will throw your “current ratio” out of whack. So you need to make sure your “current ratio” stays align with industry standards and with your local market. The “current ratio” is what I use as your lender to measure your ability to pay off debt with your current assets.
Now another very important ratio I rely on to measure your ability to pay back debt on-time is the “debt to equity ratio.” This ratio helps me to verify how much “skin you have in the game” to pay back your current long-term debt and any future debt which would be added to your capital structure. Cash purchases and equity draws could put your business in a bind when it comes to future financing or investor capital, depending on the cash outlay and other debt on your balance sheet.
And just because your net income is positive and even substantial, you may not have the actual cash in reality. Yes, financial statement analysis is sometimes very tricky. For this reason, cash flow analysis is also another key step in deciding whether to payoff debt, purchase assets in cash, or finance or lease.
In short, I would say that before making large cash purchases or pay down long-term debt that you must perform financial and sensitivity analysis to know how using large sums of cash and/or signing on for additional debt financing will affect your immediate and near term business risks.
Why Do You Need Help With Debt Vs. Cash Decisions?
Well you don’t want to end up in a cash strapped position. Right? You know my financial company provides financing for equipment, commercial property, and business lines of credit. I can help you clarify your debt verses cash decisions.
Get expert advice. Sign-up for a complementary Help With Debt Vs. Cash Financing session with me today. And I will address your specific concerns with your debt verses cash decisions.
You can check out my complementary Business Survival Report which gives you an overview of the financing options you have as a business owner or commercial property investor.
Cash Flow Financing Doles Out Cold Cash Into Your Hand
Posted by: | CommentsIs cash flow financing the thing you need to get you over money shortages in your business? There may be serious reasons why you are short on cash, which I will discuss below. And I can help you snag some long over due money for your firm in seven business days or less.
Cash Flow Financing Tips
If you allow your customers flexible terms because they have the power to demand you wait for your money (the government or large company), then you need a cash flow financing solution to help you bring in cash to pay monthly expenses and your payroll. In the finance world we say that “rent and salaries don’t float.” And I’m sure nobody understands that better than you at this time.
Now you may have very good strategic reasons to allow your customers to pay slow. But it’s always best practice to review your accounts receivable process, policies, and procedures to do a better job in invoicing and staying on top of customer payments.
The first question I’d ask you is whether you know your fast paying clients verses your slow paying clients. Look at the relationship differences your company has with each group of clients: speedy verses unhurried in paying you. Is there something here about your accounts receivables policies you can restructure to shorten the amount of time your leisurely paying customers enjoy right now by holding onto your hard cash?
I ask this direct question because you want to base your cash flow financing request on customers who pay you in 15, 30, 45, and 60 days or more.
And do you track the date they were first invoice by your company and can you clearly show me how many days your customers are past due?
Cash flow loans like factoring, purchase order finance, and inventory finance are based primarily on your customer’s credit worthiness. That’s right, your company’s credit plays a very small role in whether you get the cash or not. And this type of financing is especially beneficial to start-ups and companies with virtually no assets to pledge to secure a loan.
You know what you’re doing in reality is extending credit to your late paying customers. So do they deserve an interest free loan from your “cash strapped” firm at this time? And have you performed a credit check recently or truly understand the viability of each firm you’re extending credit?
One huge value for you which comes with cash flow financing is that I can help you evaluate the credit worthiness of your customers you decide to include in your cash flow financing program.
Because in business as you already know things change for better or worse. And they can change very rapidly you know.
Get Back Into the Cash Flow
The one loan program that’s fueling businesses today is the cash flow loans. Get back into the money flow today with my Money Tree cash flow solutions. I will help you identify customers you want to pick for your financing solution and share all the fine points with you about my Money Tree cash programs.
Call me today to find out more about how my Money Tree cash flow program can help your situation. You can also sign-up for a complementary Money Tree Cash Flow consultation.
I will share with you all the best practices I know in helping you better structure and manage your business money flow.
Lenders Insist On Accrual Basis Accounting
Posted by: | CommentsAccrual Basis accounting is the only way to know where your business is on the profit measurement scale. Increase your profits and be more successful through financial accounting and best practices in accrual accounting. Business owners must match-up expenses and revenues so that you can accurately determine how much cash you have on hand for future investments. And accrual accounting is the best method for aligning your revenues with your expenses.
It’s not enough to know how much cash you have in your pocket right now. Lenders want to make sure you manage your accounts receivables effectively and pay your creditors on time.
How Does Accrual Basis Accounting Help Your Lender?
Well your lender wants to verify that your business makes enough money on a monthly basis to pay back your loan. By looking at your financial statements, lenders can quickly identify negative and positive financial trends in your business. Lenders are looking for good growth trends over the prior 12 to 24 months.
As lenders, the question we want answered is whether your business or commercial property produces enough cash on a monthly basis to pay back your loan. Your financial reports may indicate your business is profitable, but you may be cash poor. And it could be only a matter of time before your business runs out of cash and sputters to a dead stop.
If you’re in a cash strapped situation right now, a cash flow loan based on your accounts receivables may be the solution for you to help you rescue your business.
Two Critical Financial Functions to Manage In Your Business
The two main financial areas I want to make sure you oversee effectively in your business and with your commercial property is your accounts receivables and accounts payables.
Accounts Receivables:
Accounts receivables is the most important financial management function in your business to control. It’s about doing every thing you can do to ensure your customers are paying you on-time.
Accounts receivable best practice is critical to invoice your customers on a timely basis. Don’t wait until the end of the month to bill your customers. You may be surprised, but some business owners have a fear of invoicing their clients. If your industry allows it, invoice immediately. At minimum invoice on a weekly basis to improve your cash flow.
Train your customers to pay your invoices on-time.
For your commercial property tenants, you need to make sure you clearly communicate in writing your policies on when your tenant must pay the rent and other expenses that your tenant is responsible for paying. If your tenants don’t pay you on-time, then you can’t pay your lender as promised.
Accrual Basis accounting says that you recognize the revenue at the time you complete the work or deliver the product verses when you receive the cash from your customer.
Accounts Payables:
Accounts payable should be consistent. Align your money coming in with your money going out. Remember that “rent and payroll don’t float.” And you must pay your bills the same time every month to avoid late fees on credit cards for example.
You are the main controller in your company. Do you review every bill that comes into your company or do you simply hand off this task to your bookkeeper? It would be a mistake on your part to hand over your bills or bank statements to your bookkeeper without first approving each invoice from your creditors or correspondence from your bank.
And banks do make mistakes. You need to verify accuracy of charges and deposits. And you can’t expect your bookkeeper to know the intimate details of your business.
Accrual Basis accounting requires that you recognize expenses at the time the expense is incurred whether you have actually paid the expense or not.
Financial Analysis
Accrual accounting is the only accounting method which allows you to perform financial analysis. You can compare your performance to prior periods like comparing the current quarter to the same time period last year.
Financial analysis is always performed on a loan or refinance based on the accrual basis because your lender wants to be able to compare your books with similar businesses in the same industry.
At any moment and time in your business, you’ll be able to know where you stand in terms of profitability. You will have the control you need to make wise business decisions based on accurate financial information. You’ll know where to cut costs and where you should invest, which means you need to look at your financial reports on a regular basis.
Get Aligned With Your Business Performance
If you don’t understand the process, procedures, and software applications involved with accrual accounting, then you need to get help immediately. Accurate and timely financial accounting is about business survival.
You need to get a copy of my Business Survival Report right now to better understand the things you need to do for tracking your revenues and expenses effectively so you can get commercial finance for your business or a commercial property loan when you need it.
The other thing I recommend for you is to sign-up for my Financial Management Tune-Up consulting session. I’ll share with you my best practices and the step-by-step processes I recommend to better manage and get a good handle on your revenues and expenses in your business through accrual accounting.
Positive Affirmations Crack Hard Turtle Shells
Posted by: | CommentsPositive affirmations can protect you from negative phone calls and keep you from getting “stuck” in a downward spiral. I returned a call to a friend on Friday who had left me a voicemail a few days before. And his name is Bruce. You’ll get why he’s like a turtle in a second.
You know I typically don’t take personal calls during the day. But in this case I was cleaning up my office and decided to crack two “turtles with one stone.”
Hello Bruce,
How’s it going? “Their saying the economy was worse than they had previously stated.” Right off the bat, Bruce was spewing out negative thoughts.
I was like oh boy, here we go again. Bruce went on to tell me about a couple who purchased ten rentals in Los Vegas during the last real estate boom in the U.S and how his wife spent last weekend with the wife of the real estate couple.
He said “I ask my wife, did you ask them what happened to those ten houses? They were so smart back then but now look at them.” Bruce’s wife said “no I didn’t ask them that. That would have been rude.” Bruce said “I would have asked them. Because I bet they don’t have them anymore.” What a grumpy dude.
Let me just list a few of Bruce’s comments here to illustrate the point I want to make.
- Who’s going to hire a 50 year old man like me?
- If you aren’t a government worker or have a government pension then you’re not doing well in this economy
- My wife looks at me as if I’m a bum because my business is failing and I can’t find a job
- Who do you know that’s doing well right now?
I probably don’t have to tell you. The rest of my day was mostly unproductive. Truth be told, I had to take a nap after listening to Bruce’s negative junk. His crappy attitude really did affect me in the worse kind of way.
When I woke-up, I realized that the negative things he was saying was the first thing on my mind. And I quickly reminded myself that I don’t accept personal phone calls during the day, especially from Bruce. So I immediately began my success ritual to change my state of mind. You know you must fight for the state of mind you want to create for your business and life through positive affirmations.
Positive Affirmations Protect Your State of Being
I realize the reason Bruce rants on and on about how bad things are right now. He’s constructing protective walls like a turtle’s shell with the negative affirmations he makes so he has excuses for his lack of direction and action. Anytime something doesn’t go right or he fails, he can say it didn’t go his way because of the economy. But in reality, the conditions in the economy may have nothing to do with his failures.
Does this sound familiar in any way to you?
Now Bruce’s wife Pandora and kids have a very high “burn rate”, which means they like spending money on the latest gadgets, fashions, and eateries. And he says that his savings are dwindling fast.
When all his money is gone, Bruce will have constructed the story or built the “shell of excuses” around him before his “Rome” falls: It’s not my fault. It’s the government’s fault. It’s those crooks in Washington. They did it. They screwed the country.
Bruce Is Stuck
My point is when you don’t take responsibility for what happens in your life you dig a deeper whole for yourself. You can’t clearly evaluate results in your life and make good judgments if you play the blame game on the government or corporate greed.
Do you understand the nasty plot now? And it’s not pretty for anyone who chooses to give in like my friend Bruce. Now It’s almost impossible for Bruce to do the challenging work of figuring out what he can do next to move his life in a positive direction because he’s focused on things which are literally out of his control.
He’s “stuck.” And he’s not coachable either. And he creates his environment where “stuck” seems only logical. He constantly makes affirmations to keep himself focused on his negative goal of being “stuck”. But Bruce would probably say he’s closer to something which rimes with “stuck.” That’s right; goals can be negative or positive. And not actively setting positive goals can mean you’re allowing negative goals to get set for you.
Bruce has emotionally set-up conditions which justifies his lack of action. So his daily focus now is to validate or prove he’s right.
Then he watches the news everyday to find evidence he’s right about the fact that he has no control over being stuck. And there’s plenty of evidence to support his case. So there’s no reason for him to take action towards a positive goal you know.
Bruce constantly looks for corroborating evidence with his wife’s friends, his friends, and just wherever he can grab onto the facts to prove that he’s justified in taking no action.
Because if he took positive actions towards assessing viable options for making money, then he’d disprove his hypothesis that there’re no jobs out there or ways to make money in a business venture. Now he’s painted himself into a corner, which is going to be difficult for him to fight his way out of his hard “shell.”
We all do what Bruce does to a certain extent because it’s comfortable staying with in our protective “shells” like turtles. It seems like the easy thing to do which is to go and hide out if you will.
When we adopt this kind of mindset, we shut out viable opportunities because we can’t see them through our “shell.” And the downward spiral begins. It’s because we’re only looking to affirm our hypothesis. We set-up the emotional conditions to support our case and then find the facts to support it.
You know Bruce is able to find plenty of data points out there to prove his hypothesis that he can’t make money anymore. Right?
But I can find lots of proof points today to show Bruce’s hypothesis isn’t true as well.
Rely On Positive Affirmations to Change Your State of Mind
The only thing Bruce has control over all the negative excuses that Bruce brings up is his state of being. You need a daily success ritual to get you focused on opportunities and the positive side of things. So make a decision to focus on what’s positive right now. Then develop plans to win in this economy based on what you see as positive.
Don’t allow yourself to get “stuck” like Bruce in a negative emotional state where you just look for the facts to support your negative hypothesis. Because the evidence is there to support whatever you decide to focus on.
So here’s my formula for you. Leverage your past successes to get you into a winning state of mind. Relive times in your life when you overcame huge obstacles in your way. See what you saw at the time. Hear what the people around you were saying.
And most importantly, feel what you felt at the point when you were powerful. Stand the way you stood with the same smile you had on your face at the time.
Think of an occasion when you had completed a project or won a successful negotiation. Fully relive your experience in all of its glory.
Break Out of Your Shell
For a copy of my positive affirmations to help you get into massive action, email me and I will forward you my daily “shell” cracking success affirmations.
I offer two complementary coaching sessions per month. It’s always first come, first served. so get signed up right away.
And you know you can sign-up right now for a complementary Break Out of Your Shell coaching session with me to get more help on how to change your state and get moving and creating success in your business and life.
Relationship Coach Demystifies the Power of Connections
Posted by: | CommentsYour relationship coach can help you block your limiting associations and amplify the positive forces in your life which can give you the energy to propel you to a fast break success. Firstly, depending on the size of your vision or the complexity of your goals, you may need to develop new connections and structure new partnerships to create your vision or create your goals.
So on Tuesday, I wrote to you about how your “limiting beliefs” keep you stuck in business, your career development, and financially. I talked about how the star coach of the Los Angeles Lakers Phil Jackson can see what his players don’t see on the court. And that I can see what my clients don’t see on the court of life, career, and business.
Relationships is another fruitful area where your coach can help you gain power and synergy. As I discuss relationship coaching over the months to come, it won’t be limited to keeping or finding a mate or dating. I plan to mull over all aspects of business and personal connections you have in your world.
Your Relationship Coach Helps You Optimize Connections and
Helps You to
- Diagnose how people in your game of life (core team members) can make or break you financially
- Highlights the opposing factors and opponents who are literally trying to block you from reaching your goals and being successful
- Works with you to create a plan of action to optimize your relationships with your core team members (business and personal) and eliminating or blocking your opponents in your business, career, and life — and help you get on to creating new connections to help you win the wealth championship you desire
People Verses Task Orientation
Before we move into other articles which highlight the deeper aspects of relationships in your life, I want to address one challenge that a lot of you may be dealing with right now. Do you think of yourself as a “people person”? Or do you sometimes have challenges when it comes to creating and sustaining relationships?
You may have vast connections you’ve made in life. Then you’re what I call a ”people magnet.”
You can spot a people oriented person by the fact that they only talk about the people involved and what was said and who did what. They want to know who was in the meeting or involved in making the decision. And they are less likely to get into the details of actual tasks. Matter of fact their eyes glaze over when you give them too many details. They are best suited for sales positions.
But it’s very hard work for some of us to broaden our relationships in business. We know we need to make the phone calls, network with other business owners, and get connected online in social media.
And then do you find yourself slipping back into working on the tasks that need to get done and slowly the people oriented things just don’t get done? But you know connecting with people is where your money is made.
Some people are task oriented. And they don’t naturally focus on developing relationships. Well if your vision or dreams require you to influence others or partner with others to reach your goals, then you need to overcome this weakness.
You know the “people oriented” folks need you as much as you need them. They can’t see the “trees for the forest.” And that’s where you come in with your ability to plan and break things down into detail steps for them.
In the next article, I will discuss the plan of action your relationship coach can help you create to deal with your people connection situation. And for you task challenged folks, I’ll be getting to how you need to cope with your detail and task focus.
The goal of this article is to frame the discussion about the power of your connections and associations and discuss some aspects of relationship building. Watch for more articles from me on relationships and building and sustaining profitable connections because as you’ll see the subject is very complex and can be looked at from hundreds of angles.
Future Articles Will Discuss
- Who’s On Your Team?
- Who Are Your Opponents?
- What Are Your Opposing Forces?
Relationship coaches can help you sort out your present connections and develop valuable associations on the Court of business, career, and life when it comes to your team members and your opponents. And my goal in this article as a Master Coach is to show you how your destiny is impacted by every relationship in your life.
Team coaching and optimization Helps You eliminate and avoid Your Negative relationships and Increase Positive connections.
Negative Associations and Relationships Block Your Progress
Just one bad association or close relationship you know could lead your life in the direction you most want to avoid.
I say this because negative influences coming from the people on your job, or who are in your business or life stop you from taking forward action. They block your progress when your almost about to make the “three pointer” in your business, career, and financial decisions.
And they snatch the ball right out of your hands because you allow other people in your life to distract you from your dreams and goals.
And the scarry fact is many times you’re not consciously connected to what’s really going on in your life because these influences live at the subconscious level in your mind. And if you know what’s going on that’s holding you back you tend to not want to do anything about it because you don’t want to offend the people who are in the game of your life: bosses, customers, employees, partners, spouses, etc.
Relationships get really complicated sometimes as you already know. And you get stuck playing a game you know you can’t win without coaching.
Stay In the Connections Game
Get a relationship coach to help you master the art of “profitable relationships.” A relationship coach will help you sort out the positive and negative influences on your team which have direct influence over your finances.
And you have negative forces and opponents you need to watch out for which you’re not always conscious of their influence upon you. Your coach will help you block these negative forces and the opposing team’s negative behaviors and influences from getting to you financially.
I have two ways you can get more information about mastering your connections and core relationships:
1. I offer no obligation Optimizing Connection and Relationship Coaching sessions for you to get more information on how I can help you get ahead financially. It’s easy.
You can call me at (866) 323-9123 or email me right now to schedule your complementary session.
Or go to my complementary Optimizing Connections and Relationship Coaching page to enter your contact information and I’ll contact you to set-up your consulting session.
2. For business owners and real estate professionals, you can get my complementary financing report here: The Business Survival Report
Financial Coaching Is Like Phil Jackson Coaching Kobe Bryant
Posted by: | CommentsThe reason I say that financial coaching resembles the coaching practices that Phil Jackson goes through when he coaches Kobe Bryant is simple. Phil can see what Kobe can’t see on the court. And I can see what my clients like you can’t see on the court of life and business.
You know financial Coaches Are Your Eyes And Ears On the Court of business, career, and life. And my goal in this article as a Master Coach is to show you how your destiny is simply an accumulation of every moment of your life. So read on.
Financial Coaching helps you to
- Relate to investments and money in empowering ways by uncovering and transforming your negative beliefs about money
- Helps you identify the people in your life who negatively and positively influence your financial decisions and behaviors
- Works with you to create a plan of action to ease financial stress in your business, career, and life and get on to the road of creating the wealth championship you deserve
Coaching Helps You Minimize Your Negatives and Increase Your Positives
As we grow older in the game of life, we take on beliefs which may have served us well in our younger days. But those same beliefs are causing disruptions now in our business, career, and life — especially financially.
You’ve got to stop and pay attention to this sneaky one. Because it creeps in and corrupts your life in ways you couldn’t even imagine. So that thing we do is innocently believe what we hear in the news or read on the Internet. And we subconsciously begin to form beliefs about how the world is without critical evaluation of these ideas because they come from so called experts and our favorite politicians. . We want to:
Personally:
- Stop living month-to-month
- Pay off debt and cut-up your credit cards
- Make investments which creates wealth for you rather than disappearing on you when you most need good returns
Business and Career:
- Grow our sales
- Cut marketing costs
- Find stable employment
- Earn a promotion and increase our salary
But you don’t get what you want because you’re in conflict with beliefs from your past, including current negative beliefs about the economy. And many of you are working 60 hours a week now when you should be enjoying traveling to exotic places, driving a brand new car, and helping to invest in your children’s and grand kid’s education.
I know you understand the whole world has been impacted by the slowing economy. And this is the time when we really need to get a grip on our negative beliefs about the economy and business, career, and investments so we get back on the road of living our dreams.
Do you know What the negative beliefs are you have about money? Financial coaching will help you uncover and transform your limiting beliefs.
Phil Jackson gets into his player’s heads all the time. Phil thrives to prevent limiting beliefs from forming and causing his players to go cold on their shots. Phil can’t prevent every negative belief from taking hold in a player’s mind, but his coaching abilities keeps his players performing at a high enough level to win championships.
As a coach, the negative beliefs I’m hearing from people who are stuck today financially include:
- You know there’re no jobs out there
- I’m not good at sales
- It’s a bad time to start a business
- Banks are not lending so I can’t get a business loan
- I should wait until the economy gets better before purchasing anything
- I know the economy isn’t going to get any better for the next ten years
- The democrats are spending our future on “big government” and I just need to vote in the republicans
- And many more limiting beliefs are out there…
Limiting Beliefs Block Your Progress
I don’t know if you share any of these beliefs, but the fact is these beliefs have very little to do with what you need to do to make your personal future brighter. Just having one of these convictions or any negative idea as a core belief for you could lead your life in the direction you most want to avoid.
I say this because limiting belief such as the ones I just mentioned stop you from taking forward action. They block your progress when your almost about to make the “three pointer” in your business, career, and financial decisions.
And they snatch the ball right out of your hands because you allow other people in your life to distract you from your dreams and goals.
And the sad fact is many times you’re not consciously connected to what’s really going on in your life because these convictions live at the subconscious level in your mind. And if you know what’s going on that’s holding you back you tend to not want to do anything about it because you don’t want to offend the people who are in the game of your life: bosses, customers, employees, partners, spouses, etc.
Life gets really complicated sometimes as you already know. And you get stuck playing a game you know you can’t win without coaching.
Well my goal here is to share with you how your beliefs control every thing you do in life, what you have in life, and what you ultimately become in life. Your core beliefs creates your destiny: day by day, hour by hour, and minute by minute. Your destiny is simply an accumulation of every moment of your life. This is the key point to remember from this article.
Now in the next article, I will continue this very important and timely discussion with the two game points I sited above which included:
- Identify the people in your life who negatively and positively influence your financial decisions and behaviors
- Create a plan of action to ease financial stress in your business, career, and life and get on to the road of creating the wealth championship you deserve
Stay In the Game
I have two ways you can get more information:
1. I offer no obligation financial coaching sessions for you to get more information on how I can help you get ahead financially. It’s easy. You can call me at (866) 323-9123 or email me right now to schedule your complementary session.
Or go to my complementary consultation page to enter your contact information and I’ll contact you to set-up your consulting session.
2. For business owners and real estate professionals, you can get my complementary financing report here: The Business Survival Report
Why Keep Doing the Thing That’s Holding You Back?
Posted by: | CommentsAre You Sick of How Things Are Working Out Right Now?
I’m sitting in my home office in Silicon Valley today while writing my accountability blog post. The sun is shining through the window on my face and I feel pumped up! I want to share some life changing experiences with you I’ve had this week in my coaching practice.
Albert Einstein said the definition of insanity is “doing the same thing over and over and expecting different results.”
I’m sure you agree with Einstein. A little professional support can be the one thing to help you change your unproductive patterns and realize outcomes you want now to show-up in your life. I’m so excited about supporting my coaching clients in producing positive results in their lives which they wouldn’t be able to create without my support.
You see, I’m their accountability coach. I help them see their “blind” spots. I help them clearly define their goals and create measurement systems. Using my system, my clients know immediately if they get off track and when their goals are met. Do you realize that people don’t do what they don’t want to do even if it jeopardizes there goals and desires? This is mostly a subconscious phenomenon.
I’m convinced! Accountability coaching is such a huge factor in fine tuning my performance now that I see it in action. When you’re held accountable for your commitments, you learn so much about who you are and why you make the choices you make in business and life. Being straight with yourself helps to uncover the unconscious patterns of behavior in your life that are not serving you well.
Patterns are like software programs in the way we feel, behave, and how we respond to our commitments. You may be familiar with some of these situations:
- I’m afraid of what’s going to happen in the future if I don’t get my business generating money soon
- I’m always late to appointments and I look like I’m not really committed
- I hate making my calls, so my business suffers
- My affairs in business and life don’t work out like I want them to because, for some reason, I don’t spend the time to nurture my relationships
- My days go by and I don’t get to the most important things on my priority list
- My family and friends don’t recognize my value as a person
- I’m bored and life seems so limiting
I’m certainly familiar with all of these challenges. What about you?
The feelings you have when these thoughts dominate your thinking serve to warn you that you’re not meeting your needs and to do something about it. The reason why we continue to repeat these limiting “mental software programs” over and over is they do provide us value in some areas, but now we are in business and we are responsible for the bottom-line. We are responsible for what happens in our relationships and the results we experience.
These automatic ways of responding prevent us from having success with our most important goals. It so easy for us to convince ourselves we have valid reasons for missing the mark. A little accountability can reveal a big problem.
Who in your circle really holds you accountable for your goals? Whether it’s friends or family, no one will challenge you like your coach to stretch your talents and abilities to attain your goals. You only need a coach if what the coach does represents a significant value in your life beyond what you typically would do on your own. A stretch for one person may be routine for another.
The problem has been with us for a long time. It’s referred to in the New Testament by Apostle Paul in the book of Romans. Paul acknowledges he is faced with the same challenge of saying one thing and then doing another as I write about in this post. He then offers hope to those who believe there’s a way out. Paul’s solution is to come to the truth.
Can I get an amen! As your accountability “preacher,“ I also want to share with you a message of hope. Come to the truth about yourself and be a whole, fulfilled, and authentic person. Align your actions with your words. And then be willing to stand in account for any inconsistencies in your life. “The truth shall set you free.”
It’s our “blind” spots which we are not aware of that effect us the most. Where I am right now in my business and life, coaching is the thing that’s going to get me to the next level. Depending solely on learning from listening to CDs, DVDS, and reading books and course materials won’t get me to where I desire to be in the next 90 days to six months. I already have thousands of dollars worth of these inanimate resources sitting on my shelf. And I already know what I want and need to do! Studying a book won’t hold me accountable.
There must be a better way to fulfill your goals and dreams! I have coaches who help me with strategy, assessing my strengths and weaknesses, and I also have an accountability partner who I meet with every morning for 10 to 15 minutes and we help sculpt each other’s day in a powerful way.
You may be asking yourself why Coach Donald has coaches. It’s because I’m unable to uncover my own personal “blind” spots. Coaches realize this fact. Corporate executives rely on coaching to maximize their performance.
Time is my most valuable resource and I don’t want to waste it. Time is more valuable than money. We tend to hold on to our money but waste our time. It’s crazy! Isn’t it?
I need someone who can see through my “bull” and make me aware of how I’m sabotaging my own goals. I want to be held accountable for my “word”. And what I commit to I really want to accomplish in a timely way and with less stress.
Having a coach is like making an investment. You expect to see a return on the deal you put your money into. When you hire a coach, you should expect the same kinds of returns on your investment.
Do you have challenges doing what you don’t really want to do? If you’re tired of missing out on the things that are the most important to you in your life, and you need to get them done in the next 90 days to 6 months, keep on reading for the solution.
I want you to consider working with me as your business coach because I have the coaching expertise and business acumen to help you powerfully sculpt your future. You will learn so much about yourself because I will hold you accountable for your commitments and help you create new support patterns and systems to enable you to stay on track.
My Coaching Tune-Up sessions focus on helping you save time and money by supporting you in shaping the life you want. What is it you need to get done in the next 60 days to six months? It’s about getting you fined tuned to the way you want to show-up in your business and life.
Sign-up for a complimentary Coaching Tune-Up with me today to get some valuable coaching around your specific goals. I promise you will receive tremendous value during our complimentary session.
Let me share with you a little about where I’m focused on today. Fortunately, my business allows me to do 90% of my communications via the Internet, phone, email, and fax allowing me to engage in one of my passions: travel.
I’m realizing life is too short and I want to start living now while I have good health to enjoy some of the things I love to do. I love experiencing new cultures and learning new languages. I love great food, being by the ocean and walking on the beach. I love the smell of trees and the rustle of leaves in the wind.
My focus now is about having balance in my life. And I am held accountable by my coaches for producing these results for myself and family. I know the missing thing for me is I want to satisfy more of my meaningful desires.
I’m so excited about my journey to transform my self to do more and be more of what I want in life. Do you need support in getting those things done you know you won’t do? Call me today at (866) 323-9123 and I’ll give you a free coaching session so you can see how my support can help you to minimize your frustrations and move towards your goals and desires.
Business Coaching: Starting A Business On An Empty Tank
Posted by: | CommentsBusiness coaching you when you’re on an empty tank is like trying to launch a plane the runway on a tank of gas. Creatvivity and lots of prayer As a lender who works with entrepreneurs and start-up companies, my motto with them is always “show me the money!” When a prospect opens up their wallet and pays money for your product or service, then you can say you have a valid business. Until you have real customers who are credit worthy, most lenders and investors won’t give you funding for your business dream because you haven’t proven it works. I recommend to every business owner I coach to do everything you can to leverage your assets to put your firm in a strong position before you attempt to secure financing from outside sources.
Before you get your first sale, you only have an idea which could work. You don’t have a business. Being turned down for financing can be a good thing for you. This may sound counter intuitive since rejection doesn’t make you feel very good, but it’s truly a great source of valid feedback. It often means you need to do more work to prove your business plan. I get financing clients who procrastinate about writing their business and marketing plan, but they want me to help them get hundreds of thousands of dollars for their dream. Would you invest in an entrepreneur who hasn’t written a comprehensive plan? You should try to see it from your lender’s or investor’s point of view.
Whether you’re looking for financing or to raise money from an investor, your goal should be to make sales as early as possible to generate real revenues for your new venture.
Recent sales are the evidence I want to see at Donald Hunter Financial. Contracts, invoices, purchase orders, all show a market for your products or services. And you want to have well established customers with a great track record for paying their bills
A huge benefit of bootstrapping your way to profitability is the more products or services you sell early on, the less outside money you need to raise to make further investments to position your company for growth while at the same time securing your intellectual property and branding your products and services.
Generating cash flow through an actual sale may be the only option for service companies or businesses with few assets to secure financing. Bootstrapping means you will need to give away much less equity in your company to investors.
A Warning to Bootstrappers
Before I go further, I have one caveat for you. Leveraging your existing assets is a great goal, but you don’t want to run out of money trying to do it all yourself. Once you run out of money, no serious lender or investor will work with you. I say this because most financing sources want you to have current funds available to invest at the time they decide to approve you for funding. The amount you’ve already invested doesn’t matter. So keep a balanced approach when going it all alone!
Benefits of a Bootstrapping Mindset
- It keeps you focused on revenue generation
- You keep control over your idea
- You get to reap more of the financial rewards
- You learn to manage your limited resources efficiently
Types of Businesses Where Bootstrapping Make Sense
- The business relies on your proven personal talents and skills
- The business doesn’t require large sums of capital to get started on a small scale
- You already have good industry contacts
Type of Businesses Where Bootstrapping Doesn’t Make Sense
- Lots of R&D is required
- You need expensive equipment to deliver your product or service
- A prototype costs lots of money to build
- You have no prior experience serving the market
- Your business requires economies of scale and scope
As a business coach, I help business owners and entrepreneurs figure out whether they can start-up without outside capital. I guide them through the process of analyzing their sales model from the perspective of rapid revenue generation. My goal is to help them to construct a business model focused on producing a few quick sales as soon as possible.
Bootstrapping Tips
- Spend your funds only on marketing and sales activities directed at a well defined target market.
- Make sure your target customer is credit worthy.
- Create the lowest cost prototype which is good enough to make a sale (E.G., paper design or video).
- Develop the product only when you get a purchase order in-hand.
- Don’t go out and rent office space and purchase unnecessary equipment
There are lots of alternative ways I can help you to fund your business growth. If you generate invoices or purchase orders, you‘ll have access to fast, flexible financing options through my Money Tree Cash Flow program. And most importantly, your credit isn’t an issue with these funding alternatives. Invoices or purchase orders from a credit worthy customer allow you to get cash to fund daily operations and to manufacture your product. You won’t need a loan or capital from an investor to fund your operating costs in the start-up phase! You can rely on factoring or purchase order finance for immediate cash, which is not a loan. Sign up for a complimentary finance consultation to speak to me about ways in which I can help you fund your business.
Bootstrapping Consulting
Are you a “bootstrapper”? What are your top three goals you need some help with right now to start up your business? I can help you develop ways to target your customers to focus on generating immediate sales to prove your business idea meets a true customer need.
You’ll then be in an excellent position to seek funding to expand your business at a much faster pace. Then, I can help you get quick cash for your invoices and purchase orders through my Money Tree Cash Flow program.
Call me today at (866) 323-9123 or sign-up for a complimentary session in my Bootstrap to Profitability Coaching Tune-Up program. I’ll help you develop your business strategy to take advantage of your bootstrapping opportunities straightaway.
Donald Hunter
Make Your Business More Robust When You Rent A CFO!
Posted by: | CommentsFinancial Planning for Start-Up success
Rent your very own CFO for critical business decisions
Would you ever think about building a house without hiring an architect? Then, why would you ever think of starting business without first hiring a business financial planner to help you with the start-up phases of your business? After reading this post, you’ll realize a financial planner is one of the best professionals to guide you through the start-up phase. It’s like renting your own Chief Financial Officer (CFO).
My definition of start-ups below includes ventures led by entrepreneurs or brand new business owners. It also includes ongoing businesses who want to launch a new division. For example, I help out-of-state or international businesses who want to start-up operations in California.
Let’s define the type of financial planner who would be right for this CFO advisory role. Financial gurus who focus on stocks and mutual funds would not be your first choice. A planner who focuses on personal financial issues wouldn’t be your second choice either. An agent who focuses on selling insurance products may only give you a partial solution. You need a financial planner who works exclusively with businesses. Your best choice in this case is a financial planner who thinks like a CFO.
I’m sure you’d agree that starting up a business can be frustrating and confusing to make sure you’ve done everything you need to do to increase your chances for success. The rest of this post shares with you some key business areas in which your CFO planner can help your company.
I’m often asked what types of financial planning services I offer business owners. I typically reply that I help business owners cover their “assets.” Literally, that’s what a financial planner will do for you. In a “nut shell”, I help you:
- Make sure you don’t give away more value in your company than is required!
- Determine if you will make a profit.
- Capitalize your new venture.
- Minimize your personal and business taxes.
- Minimize risks (liability) to your business and to you personally.
- Incentivize your employees and key advisors.
Often, there are other start-up areas where a business owner wants me to help them save time and money. I help clients with setting up all aspects of the new venture. Here are a few bulleted categories to help you get a sense of what you must do to launch a business in the various phases of starting up and then growing your business.
Start-Up Business Services:
- Sign up for your business license
- File for your fictitious business name statement
- Help you develop your logo, letterhead, and business cards
Start-Up Marketing Services
- Define your vision, mission, and purpose
- Determine your target market
- Create your 30 second elevator pitch
- Identify where you need to network for generating leads and referral relationships
- Design your sales model
- Write powerful sales scripts
- Create your marketing plan
Online Marketing Services
- Create your social media plan
- Define your blogging plan
- Design your multimedia plan: podcasting, videos, and presentations
- Develop your lead generation strategy
- Create your sales pages
- Drive traffic to your online properties
Business Planning Services
- Write your comprehensive business plan
- Develop your financial model
- Conduct competitive analysis
- Prepare your financing package
- Construct your investor capital presentation
Financial Planning Services
- Decide how much to pay key advisors, board members, and employees, including incentives
- Understand tax advantages of how you bring capital into your business
- Determine the best organizational structure for your business (S corp., LLC, partnership, LLP, or incorporation)
- Decide on types of liability and business continuance risks and insurance
- How to buyout a partner upon dissolution of the partnership or death
- Depreciation recapture
- Buying and selling business use property (1231)
- Buying and selling depreciable personal property (1245)
- Buying and selling depreciable real property (1250)
- Taking section 179 expense
- Choose appropriate depreciation schedules
- Set up and plan for retirement plans for owners and employees
- Transfer of ownership strategies upon death or at retirement
Organizational Development
- Create your organizational chart
- Role development to make clear what you expect the role to produce
- Recruit key advisors and board members to fill your organizational chart
- Leverage hiring assessments to understand personality types and how interviewees will fit the role and the team
- Prepare interview checklists to discover interviewees’ strengths, weaknesses, goals, and personality fit
- Create recruiting strategies to locate superior talent
- Mentor employees to maximize their performance
Have you considered all of the various financial planning options I’ve laid out for you above? It is critical for you to think through all of these options to ensure you maximize your profits and minimize your costs and risks.
I snuck in some marketing and sales options for you too because without a clear marketing plan, it doesn’t matter how well your financial plan has been designed.
Organizational goals are important to get right the first time, as you grow your company. This is why I included the list of must do’s for hiring and team development.
There are many other steps to consider when defining and launching a new start-up company or division of an existing company. Seek expert advice to help you through this process to maximize your investment dollars and valuable time.
Rent A CFO
Rent me to get help on a business challenge you are currently facing. For more information on what I can do right now to help your business, you can call me at (866) 323-9123 or sign-up for a complimentary CFO Coaching Tune-Up session with me.
I developed a comprehensive financing report for business owners and entrepreneurs who need loans or investor capital. You can download my Business Survival report to get an overview of your financing options.
Donald Hunter Financial
