The Long Way Home - Chapter 11 - Gladstone Day 9

A person I admire in my quest for more knowledge is Jim Rohn (1930 – 2009). His concept of C.A.NE.I., Constant And Never Ending Improvement forms a huge part of the genre that is Jeff Banks.

This morning I had an early morning catch up with what is termed throughout the Business Blueprint Community, an organisation hell bent on the betterment of business owners, an A Team meeting. These meetings are scheduled throughout the periods between the quarterly Business Blueprint conferences are as much a check up as they are a catch up.

Our group, unlike many in the community who get together on a monthly basis, meet every fortnight. The discussion centres around the stress of business, the economy and how we are all going with what Business Blueprint calls the 90 Day Action Plan. This is a plan of five distinct actions needed to better our businesses in the face of the adversities confronting us.

For me, running three businesses, I have a set for each one, although at an A Team meeting I tend to only focus on the Property Portfolio Solutions business. The other “businesses” like writing a travel blog and uploading photos and the accounting practice are really only attempts to keep myself active.

I ran into Dale Beaumont the co-founder of Business Blueprint along with his wife Katherine in my presidency of Pittwater Business Limited (PBL), an organisation of businesses on the northern beaches of Sydney. Dale spoke at one of our breakfasts and I took him up on attending one of his free seminars called 52 Ways. The two day event opened my eyes to a lot of things I could be doing in my business to make it much better.

Now a piece of utter stupidity starts. I returned home armed with ideas and concepts that I was whirling around in my head ready to take on the world. Sitting down with my wife and business partner we took the view that we might not quite be ready and we should take some time, get the business ready to better engage in the strategies of Blueprint. 

The year we took believing we were getting ready was only put as a year behind.

Once we decided (after another visit to 52 Ways, we took the view that if we were going to be ultra serious about Blueprint we both needed to be a part, so we doubly subscribed. Finally a smart move.

We had already started down the line of the catch phrase “Not Your Ordinary Accountant” on the inference of our then business coach and previous PBL President Jon Dale. So now we had two Dale’s assisting us in our business activities. Nothing to do with accounting, business.

There is a huge difference between being a good practitioner (the accountant – good at what you do) and a businessperson (the entrepreneur – the ability to make money over and above simply a wage from your efforts) and both Dale’s very quickly showed this. The dilemma of many small business people is the “rabbit hole” itself. Stumbling around in the dark with no one to talk to, or unwilling to speak of issues we are all expected to know and understand. 

We went down the avenue of a business coach and were lucky to find Jon Dale as opposed to many coaches who simply open a text book and rote teach it. He saw very quickly by spending a large amount of time getting to know us, what our “real” issues were and attacked them. Business Blueprint brought extension to the issue concepts with real alternatives along with the instruction on how to use them.

We know we need to market but how, which and what? The Business Blueprint showed us the way.

We had spent money on a website, because everyone else had a website, but treating it as a marketing tool was a concept we had not taken into consideration. The investment in it prior to 

Business Blueprint was more expensive. Once the concept of marketing from it came apparent we were able to create content, become recognised and fulfil goals for growth. The cost was mitigated by new clients, turning that cost into something that created a return on our investment.

Four day conferences every three months, with day one being one where an expert would deep dive into their area of expertise, followed by two more days of talks by experts culminating in the setting of goals for the ensuing three months – the 90 Day Action Plan. Then there is day four, the round table day, where Dale and Katherine get a number of experts (sometimes as many as 40) to sit tables and allow Blueprinters the chance to take individual issues to them for discussion.

There is a cost to all this of course, but the returns on the investment are very measurable both subjectively and objectively. We took an accounting practice, struggling with cash flow issues, making barely wages for its principals to one which was engulfed by another for a high end multiple. That means we sold it for heaps. We learned our successes whilst seemingly insignificant for us, were major by others standards. There were also times when we were able to say “yes we stuff up like that” as well.

We are not alone, sometimes we just don’t know it. Our investment in Business Blueprint has continued for in excess of ten years and is just as important now as it was when we first started in the program. The continuing adherence to C.A.N.E.I. as well as managing the changing face of business keeps us there. We have made many long term new friends, visited overseas venues we would not have even considered (let alone afforded), including Hong Kong and Singapore in our time at Blueprint. 

But like most things it’s the regimentation that makes things work. The four conferences, the fortnightly A Team meetings, weekly “Dale Direct” and “Finish it Friday”, the enormous library of training videos and of course Dale and Katherine, beckoning leaders showing the way that would allow entrepreneurs like us to flower in the garden bed of business.

Yes this is a testimonial for Business Blueprint, I won’t deny it but we would certainly not be travelling around Australia in a caravan, with no monetary cares in the world without their influence for which we are grateful.We continue in businesses because, firstly we like to keep active, secondly because Robyn wants to be recognised for what she is – a pre eminent expert in the field of food labelling, thirdly because business for us is second nature but mostly because C.A.N.E.I. brought us here, it would be a shame to waste it.

Just as I finish the A Team meeting the caravan shudders violently. The park groundsman has been mowing this morning and has engulfed one of the tie downs for the awning with it. The tie itself has been completely destroyed, the toughened carabiner which held the tie to the coupling has been straightened beyond use and the 200cm screw and washer locking the tie down to the ground is nowhere to be seen.

I joke with him, although he is distraught at what he has done, this was payback for the bollard I bent on our arrival. A trip to Bunnings to replace the bits and pieces and everything is good as new. Unlike the reflective tie down we had previously there will be simply blue ones in future.

Cousin Bruce texts in to see how we are going and we discuss the Sunday Roast plan. He is looking to smoke a roast in his slow cooker and I have been suggesting we look at meat rubs to enhance the flavour. Sourcing such things in North Queensland seems to be an issue but I have contacted a friend who deals in thesis sorts of things and he gives us some options rather than just salt and pepper.

The day has been so so. Sun and rain. New neighbours which means new people to encounter.

Just another day in paradise really.