That’s great, what they need to ask themselves is whether it’s realistic at the current stage of their business.

There’s nothing wrong with aspirations at all. However, using goals to try and achieve them in the short-term (by that I mean a year) can be counterproductive.

After all aspirations by their very nature tend to be out of our comfort zone and more difficult to achieve.

So in order to get around the problem of mixing aspirations with goals I like to use a 3 year target so that I can show my aspirations developing over three years.

Aspirational Target

For example maybe I want to have an office in Australia. However, there are a number of things I need to do before I can achieve that. So it makes sense to put the project "opening an Australian office" into year 2 of my target. Year 1 might contain things like increase profit by £250,000 to £750,000 and recruit a new sales person.

So in the target picture the numbers 80 to 60 would represent year 1 (this year), 50 to 40 year 2 (next year) and 30 to 10 year 3 (the following year).

Then on the target you’d write down your aspirations as a line leading from the centre. Then along that line you’d write what could be achieved in each of the 3 year rings.

The net result is that I can show my aspirations being achieved over three years. And obviously each year I create a new aspirational target.

The good thing about doing it this way is that it’s a visual prompt to your brain that reinforces your aspirations and what you want to achieve over the next three years.

Vital Few Goals

Now I have my aspirational target I can look at those I believe can be achieved, or part achieved, this year. Then I decide what are the 3 or 4 Vital Few Goals I need to meet to move forward on those aspirations

I list those down and then brainstorm projects that can help move me forward on one, or preferably more than one, of the vital few.

I assign project deadlines for each project and also a measurement of how I’ll know that I’ve succeeded.

Then I breakdown the projects into steps I need to take to achieve each one.

As I work on each of the projects I know I’m working towards completing them. In completing them I’m meeting the Vital Few Goals and in doing that moving forward with my aspirations.

Ultimately those aspirations are what makes a company grow and prosper.

And this approach is part of what is incorporated into my time management workshops.

Unfortunately from long and sometimes bitter experience I can attest to the fact that there are very few people who are great presenters from the day they start.

I’ve actually sat through presentations where the presenter simply read from their notes, without looking in their audiences direction. One presenter I saw even got so befuddled with their notes they had to stop and go off stage in a fluster. Others wind their way round to the point they’re making and take so long  that it feels like you’re sliding down an old-fashioned helter-skelter.

At other times I’ve witnessed presenters who obviously thought they were the cream of the presenting crop and yet lack of rehearsal meant they inflicted pain on their audience. That pain was from the obvious fact that they didn’t know which slide was coming up or whether the questions they were asked came up in a later section of the slides.

And of course we’ve all seen presentations where the presenter is so taken with their company that they waste a lot of air talking about their business, their history, their clients, their success and worst of all make their audience sit through the company video.

So if you’re looking to improve a little on your presentation skills learn from what others get wrong…

Presentation technology

It really doesn’t matter how you do the presentation: webinar, Powerpoint slides, flipchart, video or simply standing on a stage. Never blame the technology if you fail to deliver your objectives for your presentation.

The oft-quoted “Death by Powerpoint” is not Powerpoint’s fault. It’s the fault of the wielder of the technology. The types of issues you tend to get with people who use Powerpoint as a crutch are as follows:

1) They start off running without any introductory slide or estimate of how long they’ll take

2) They don’t investigate what their audience is interested in

3) They deliver the same canned content to different audiences (related to previous point)

4) They have slide after slide of text with no images to break it up

5) They have more than about 5 bullets per slide and/or they have long sentences on the slide

6) They read from the slide verbatim without adding any thoughts related to the slide content

7) They spend too much time on each slide, or one particular one they think is important and no one else does

They don’t look at their audience, rather looking at the screen or their notes

9) They have large amounts of data and/or text on a slide, which tends to mean an impossible to read font

The Presentation itself

When it comes to the presentation there are aspects which only the presenter can do. And if they fail to do them a dire result is inevitable.

The issues presenters have include:

1) Not rehearsing so they’re struggling for words or ways to phrase what they’re talking about

2) Going on about them, their company or their product. Instead of talking about the things the people they’re presenting to are interested in: themselves, their company, their issues

3) Not keeping the pace of the slides reasonably fast so that people read ahead and get bored

4) Not varying their tone, pitch and energy levels during the presentation

5) Not having appropriate images to illustrate most slides, even though they’ve heard more information is retained with image and text together than just text alone

6) Not rehearsing the whole thing OUT LOUD, that way they’ll see whether they trip on words they think they say well when they’re rehearsing internally

7) Not looking at their audience or engaging them in some way

Post Presentation thoughts

A bad presenter considers themselves to be an expert and if the feedback is that some of their content wasn’t clear, well it was the fault of the audience. Others might be complacent, because the audience really liked the content and yet they know they could do better. In reality they should go back to their presentation and polish it so that it is better. Particularly so if it’s being emailed out to one or more audience members.

They never sit back with a trusted friend and see what they could have done better.

Does any of that describe you? I must admit to one or two of them, but having learnt by trial and error I’m better now! The thing is you don’t need to learn by trial and error. Learn from this. And thanks to some of the people before I’ve trained them in Presentation mastery and in the horrible pitches I’ve sometimes had to sit through for giving me these ugly examples of presentation hell!

And yet, we’re only human, we need someone to talk these worries through with.

Someone we can trust to not dig the knife or start to stir up a worry with the intention of undermining us.

What about when we “know” in our water we should be in a new market and everyone else around us has their own agenda and doesn’t want to “chance” it?

Maybe they’re worried it could affect their own shareholding, or make it harder for them to jump ship if they need to. Or it might entail a lot of hard work that they don’t want to do!

Different Viewpoints Are OK Too

And there’s actually nothing wrong with different viewpoints. However, it’s better for the chief executive to be able to use a sounding board who has no company agenda and simply wants to help the business grow.

And as I’ve been going round doing my executive coaching I’ve noticed there are CEOs who are looking for the opportunity to sound out what they’re thinking, without it being a career limiting move.

In reality that sort of confidential sharing can’t happen until the CEO and mentor have reached the right level of trust. And of course the CEO must know that those confidences are held strictly against the chest of the mentor and never divulged.

CEOs Are People Too!

I’ve discovered that the managing directors or CEOs who’ve used me as a sounding board or as “old and wise counsel” (hopefully wise!) have really come up with very interesting points of view. And they themselves can be very different to the perceptions of them held by others in their own company.

So, my recommendation, is for you to look out for someone who you can unburden yourself to, someone who won’t share the confidence with anyone and who has a good understanding of business. That way you can thrash out ideas and worries before they become too entrenched or bothersome and before fellow directors, or owners, are presented with them.

Well here we are…

If you scored

1-5 and you’re the Blind Entrepreneur. You started the business. You work incredibly hard and long hours. You probably never thought the term “work-life balance” applied to people in real life.  And in reality you’ve just swapped your job for another job with a tougher boss – you.

6-12 and you’re the Complacent Entrepreneur. Yes you’re doing well. And that’s why you know that you and your business can instantly react to any change in customer behaviour or market conditions. Boom and bust, it’ll never happen to us is your thinking.

13-18 and you’re the Blame-Free Entrepreneur. Your business reflects your industry. If it’s doing well your business does well. And the reason you give is all down to the economy, or maybe the banks, or your competitors or worse still your customers.

19-20 makes you The Active Entrepreneur. You know that you don’t know everything. You’ll try and find ways of bringing people in to help. And you’ll try out different ways of getting and retaining customers.

Obviously this quiz was just a little bit of fun. However, it does have a semi-serious message. And that is that people from all walks of life start different businesses. And just because they start them doesn’t mean they can get them to a million in turnover. And even if they can do that it doesn’t mean they can take it to 10 million in turnover.

And the reason is that they may be missing one of the 12 vital ingredients that go to make up the super successful entrepreneur or company director.

We both agreed that the common trap entrepreneurs seem to fall into is making excuses for their business. After all it’s their baby. And it can be very hard for any parent to see that their baby isn’t well and needs some medicine.

We’d just returned from our nephew Ben’s 21st birthday party and we were unwinding with a glass of wine and a cup of tea for me ( I still had a bit of a drive back to Manchester).

And it suddenly struck me that there are several different types of entrepreneur. In fact after coming home I identified 4 entrepreneur types.

So I’ve compiled a fun little quiz to see what sort of entrepreneur you are. Simply record for each question the answer letter and then we’ll score it.

What Entrepreneur Questions

Question 1: You’ve realised that your profits are down this month. Do you

a) start telling the sales people to sell more
b) look at all the reasons why profits are down
c) ignore it as a temporary blip
d) Ring the bank and ask to extend your overdraft

Question 2: You bring in a web consultant and they advise you to change your web site. Do you

a) agree, but it’s low on your priority list and is unlikely to happen
b) examine each recommendation and decide whether it makes sense before using them
c) You’ve paid for the advice so you implement every recommendation
d) implement each one using split testing

Question 3: Your whole team is professionally trained in presentation skills for free Do you

a) think “that it’s a great motivator for the team and it means they’ll work harder”
b) think “it was fun, but it was free so it probably wasn’t that good” 
c) think “we didn’t learn much as the team were already fully trained”
d) think “I can’t see how we could possibly use these new skills to make a difference in the business”

Question 4: Your best customer tells you that they wont be renewing their contract in 2 months, do you

a) urge them to stay and offer large discounts to really make it difficult for them to leave
b) say, “we don’t need your business"
c) Work out whether redundancies are needed
d) Tell the sales people to sell more

Question 5: Another business is being offered for sale very cheaply, do you

a) buy it because its cheap
b) investigate the reason for the business being sold cheaply
c) say, “it’s cheap so there’s probably a flaw in it so I shouldn’t buy it” and ignore it
d) say, “we don’t need to grow any bigger”

Now to the scoring:

Question 1: a=1, b=4, c=3, d=2
Question 2: a=1, b=2, c=3, d=4
Question 3: a=4, b=1, c=3, d=2
Question 4: a=1, b=, c=3, d=4
Question 5: a=1, b=4, c=3, d=2

Now record your total score and tomorrow I’ll give you the type of entrepreneur you are along with a description of what you’re like. And remember this is just a bit of summer holiday fun!

For a start he believes that one of his key skills is the ability to delegate. And to grow a business that’s the key point most entrepreneurs need to understand and do! Certainly from my own project management experience delegating can sometimes be worrying but usually people come through. If things go wrong when you delegate you need to learn from it and asses how you would ensure that problem didn’t crop up again.

Bannatyne’s book is a brisk take on what you need to start, run, grow and ultimately sell your business.

The First Step For A New Business

The first step is the idea, the second to check whether you’re cut-out for business with an interesting test that he provides in the book. Just so you know 4 of my key strengths according to the test are ‘B’, ‘A’, ‘D’, ‘F.’ So when you read the book you can compare your results to someone else! And why not comment about them too?

The book contains interesting little case studies of other successful business people and asks key questions such as “what’s the best advice you’ve ever had” and “what do you wish you’d known from the start?”

Will It Wake You Up?

It’s unlikely that Bannatyne’s book wakes you with a start as something amazing hits you. That said it is a mine of useful and pragmatic business advice that new business owners would benefit from dipping into from time to time.

It is an interesting read and it certainly helps you understand Duncan Bannatyne the businessman, and if you want to go on Dragon’s Den a very helpful primer.

Paul Merker (joint company owner) said they were pleased with the deal they picked, although if they’d thought more about it they would have negotiated with the Dragons rather than just accepting one of the deals on offer. As it was they ended up with two of the Dragons.

On Dragon’s Den

Originally it was co-owner Jerry Matalvanos’ partner who filled in the form that got the company into Dragon’s Den. Ben Armstrong rang them and said he was a producer on Dragon’s Den. He asked them in for a screen test at BBC Manchester.

At first Jerry and Paul thought it was a wind-up and rang the BBC and asked for Ben confident in the knowledge that he didn’t exist. They were immediately put through and their screen test arranged. The test was a bit of fun and took about two or three hours. Afterwards they were told they’d probably hear in 10 to 12 weeks if they’d been picked to be on the show. Instead one week later they were asked to go down to Pinewood for filming.

Paul said that ideas and companies were appraised as quickly as it looks on the TV screen. However, there were some companies were the Dragons delved into great detail. And JPM Eco Logistics was one of them, in all they spent 2 and a quarter hours being grilled and discovered exactly what the Dragons look for in a pitch!

JPM Eco Logistics Birth

Roughly 7 years ago Paul and Jerry met whilst working for different divisions of the transport company DTS. Paul was a driver with 17 years experience and Jerry was a transport manager working in a different division also with 17 years experience.

Paul helped set up the distribution network for Next when DTS won their transportr contract. When Next took its transport back in-house Paul was transferred with it under TUPE.

Paul wasn’t happy at Next and he’d kept in contact with Jerry who’d moved to an engineering company by that time.

Together they discussed ways of getting a green transport company started that would have a very small carbon footprint.

They trawled the Internet looking for a suitable company to buy. And at the same time they wanted to make sure they were as environmentally responsible as possible, partly to be different to all the other haulage companies.

In the end they couldn’t find the right company so they set-up JPM Eco Logistics from scratch. They wanted their company vehicles running on bio-diesel and without charging customers a premium for the fuel.

They talked to all the vehicle manufacturers to find out if their lorries would run on bio fuel. They discovered that Scania could use bio fuel provided it met the EN14214 standard fuel. However, as it turned out they didn’t go with the Scania lorries.

The company finally started operations in September 2007 with 6 full time drivers recruited from the Rochdale and Middleton areas and based in a yard in Rochdale.

By the time you read this the company will have moved to other premises.

The Bio Fuel

The fuel is made from rapeseed, which is grown by a Lincolnshire farmer.

The company buys direct from the farmer who grows his own rape seed, encouraged by the EU. He presses the seed to obtain the oil and refines it. He also composts the residue runs his own tractors with the bio fuel.

The result is a carbon footprint, which is Euro5 compliant (the best you can get). That means that carbon dioxide emissions are cut by 50%.

When the company has a lorry in the farmers area they schedule the return journey so they can pick up a 1,000 litres of fuel to maintain their stocks at the yard.

A Useful Business Lesson

After Paul and Jerry’s initial enquiry to vehicle manufacturers Volvo kept in touch every week to see how things were progressing. Then in July 2007 the Volvo technical director rang and agreed to supply vehicles under contract/hire with full warranty using bio fuel.

The business lesson was that Volvo sold 6 contracts for vehicles by keeping in constant contact with the company even whilst the company was considering another company – Scania.

In fact, Volvo were so interested they’re looking at designing their lorries with the bio fuel capability as a retro-fit. JPM Eco Logistics lorries are fitted with the filter and pipe work for using bio fuel during assembly.

In The Fast Lane To Growth

JPM Eco Logistics is servicing companies including:

• TDG – Corus steel contract
• TDG – just started curtain side trailer work (at Carrington and Warrington)
• Bibby Distribution – based in Chadderton
• Sellers Engineering – based at Oldham

Business increases led Paul and Jerry to move their operation to the previous Seddon Atkinson lorry manufacturing plant in Oldham. It has an excellent yard where Paul and Jerry plan to install a bio fuel tank, to allow them to collect larger amounts of fuel with a tanker. The extensive offices will allow for the company’s future expansion.

Don’t Get Burnt In The Dragon’s Den

The one quality that Paul suggests is paramount for the Dragons is honesty.

Then if you’ve a reasonable idea they’ll quiz you on your cashflow, as cash is vital, particularly to a new and growing business. They’ll ask about your exit strategy, because their investment needs to come out of the business within about 5 years.

The Dragons are also keen on learning of how your own experiences qualify you for running with your business idea. The Dragons Paul and Jerry went with were Deborah Meaden and Theo Paphitis. They’ve met both of them a couple of times and Deborah Meaden has been particularly pro-active with her help.

The original £100,000 the Dragons invested came in handy for taxing the vehicles and to maintain the cashflow and to invest in a further 6 lorries.

IceRocket tags: Bio Fuel, JPM Eco Logistics, Dragon’s Den, Euro5, diesel replacement, Jerry Matalvanos, Paul Merker

BuzzNet tags: Bio Fuel, JPM Eco Logistics, Dragon’s Den, Euro5, diesel replacement, Jerry Matalvanos, Paul Merker

Technorati tags: Bio Fuel, JPM Eco Logistics, Dragon’s Den, Euro5, diesel replacement, Jerry Matalvanos, Paul Merker

del.icio.us tags: Bio Fuel, JPM Eco Logistics, Dragon’s Den, Euro5, diesel replacement, Jerry Matalvanos, Paul Merker

And of course the answer is yes!

There could be many reasons why someone would want to buy that business, for example:

• It has patents that another company could use or develop to make profits with
• The company order book has plenty of orders another company could fulfil
• It has a customer list that another business wants to get to
• It has physical assets that can be used or sold to make profits
• It has intellectual rights to material (video, audio, printed works) that can be used to profit from

If the business goes down without being sold the likelihood of anyone else getting exclusive use of any asset is minimal.

Obviously there is the possibility of buying it or bits of it from a receiver. However, their interest is in getting the maximum amount of money from the sale of the whole business or its assets and you’re unlikely to get it at a good price.

Although you can buy a loss making business you really need to understand why it’s got into a loss-making state.

Causes can include:

• poor management
• poor quality products or services
• poorly forecast and over optimistic cashflow forecasts
• excessive returns
• no innovations in product or service
• unqualified and/or unmotivated  staff

Once you understand the issue(s) then you can decide whether to buy the business as an ongoing enterprise or simply to make an offer for a chunk of it or for an asset you think would help you business.

“You’ve gotta’ dance like there’s nobody watching,
Love like you’ll never be hurt.
Sing like there’s nobody listening,
And live like it’s heaven on earth.”

– William W Purkey

And often, “Work like you don’t need the money” is the first line that people who use and quote this add.

In business you need to do exactly what Purkey suggests. Life zips by and if you’re immersed in something you hate doing you’re in “The mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation. What is called resignation is confirmed desperation….” (Henry David Thoreau, 1854).

Equally, even with a successful business you love you can become so entangled in it that you can’t sell it or leave from it because you’re the lynch pin.

Remember no one else is going to point all this out to you because nobody, except you, knows your ambitions for your life. That’s why I love coaching I love to help people release themselves from their quiet desperation. Even when sometimes they’re in so deep they don’t realise their life is passing them by.

I also love to coach people who’ve discovered their true ambition and live their life full of the joys of spring.

People have commented how they rarely see me without a smile. That’s because I love what I’m doing and I’m singing like nobody’s listening!

Find your own ambition, the one you were born for, get to it before it’s too late. If you’ve found it, well done I applaud you for discovering what so many don’t.

If you fit the bill you should sign up for the contest to find “Bank of Scotland Corporate Entrepreneur of the Year.”

It’s got a certain ring to it hasn’t it?

And even better you get potential access to a 3 year zero percent interest £5million loan. In fact at their discretion they can loan particularly deserving cases more than £5million. Equally, they reserve the right to award less than £5 million.

And what’s even better, in my opinion, you get the chance to be mentored by one of the UKs “best known entrepreneurs.”

Now who could that be I wonder? And more to the point will Bank of Scotland have the great good sense to film the company’s progress as they make use of the loan and the entrepreneur’s advice?