[Click Here to register for my Friday Webinar on 
the “7 Keys to Business Plan Success”]
Happy September! For many of us, this week is a turning of the page - from the slower, vacation and family-focused summer months - to the full-on business sprint to the end of the year.
In financial markets, the window between Labor Day and Thanksgiving is often referred to as "Capital-Raising Season," as it is a very active time for companies and investors to connect, to diligence each other, and to do deals.
I call it the "No Excuses" time of year.
Summer is over, the holidays are far away, tax season further, so now is the time to get deals done - growth financings, strategic partnerships, big new customer sales, key new hires you name it - if a mission critical deal is to be done, this is the time of year to do it.
You see, good deal makers get good deals done. Great dealmakers get great deals done fast.
So let’s all set a goal this fall to do twice the number of deals, in half the time, while maintaining and even improving quality. Here's how:
#5. Use the 20% Rule. In a previous post, I described The 20% Rule, whereby improving four key business processes by just 20% each leads to results doubling.
Simply identify four components of your deal-making process - for example 1) marketing-to-lead conversion 2) lead-to-proposal conversion 3) proposal-to-sale conversion and 4) repurchase rate, and then work to improve each by just 20%.
I run through the math here, with the net result of revenue increasing by 2.4X via these “cascading” 20% improvements.
#4. Build a One Month “Micro Plan.” While longer time horizons - 1, 3, 5 years - are powerful and necessary for more “global” business and strategic planning - for many mission critical projects shorter timeframes can be invigorating and catalytic.
For example, let’s look at how to raise capital in one month, a process that is not unusual to stretch out for six months, a year, or longer. To get it done in one month would require:
i. the business plan and all investor presentation materials to be completed in a week to ten days;
ii. a well vetted and relationship-based prospective investor assembled in parallel;
iii. contact with / promotion made to these investors within 7-10 days after completion of the plan;
iv. detailed diligence provided and talked through with those showing interest within an additional 7-10 days; and,
v. respectful yet urgency - driven “closing” done with the most interested prospective parties over just a few days.
Is this an “aspirational” timeline? Sure, but whether or not we actually get it done this fast the act of setting a timeline like this and then working like heck to meet it is in itself transformative.
And you just might surprise yourself and raise money far faster than you thought possible!
#3. Enlist Help. In modern business the old aphorism of “Many Hands Make Little Work” needs to be updated with the caveats that “Many Well Led Hands get High Quality, Important Work Done Fast.”
It is so awesome that modern executives have with just a click of a button access to high quality, on-demand resources of all types: marketing copywriters, graphic and website designers, telemarketing sales help, contract fulfillment and customer service and the list goes on and on...
...for any business process there is quite likely an outsourced provider that can do it better, faster, and cheaper than in-house.
The key is having the know-how to source the right vendors and then leading them such that they seamlessly work together as to “de facto” become in their aggregate part of a full-time, in house team.
Hard to pull off? Well, if you feel this way, then hire an outsourced firm to manage the outsourcers!
This may seem like a Dilbertian Skit, but the reality is that the tools of virtual communication and collaboration are now so good that building a fully outsourced, on demand work model like this often makes far better business sense than the old “all under one roof” W-2 model.
#2. Work Harder. There are actually 168 hours in a week, not 40, and by working both longer hours ourselves along with orchestrating a global team per the above, we can get things done four times as fast as under the old "9 to 5" model.
I like to re-frame working longer hours as a blessing, as the vast majority of people just don't have the opportunity to work hard on challenging and remunerative projects like those of us in the Knowledge Economy.
And oh yeah, in addition to the “it is its own reward” nature of hard work, just plain old outworking the competition is the most tried and true strategy of winning deals in multiple bidder/vendor dynamics.
#1. Recognize that There are No Rules. There are no longer any rules whatsoever as to how long things should take.
Like Amazon making deliveries in 2 hours or less, Uber bringing a driver to your door in a few minutes, and Google giving us detailed answers to the most esoteric and niche questions in just a few milliseconds, the great technologists and innovators among us are constantly resetting the frame as to what fast is.
Let’s bring this “speed sensitivity” to our businesses these next two months.
Identify those areas where incremental (20%!) improvements can have a big cumulative effect, design “micro plans” to make those improvements, get help everywhere and anywhere, work hard, hard, hard, and let go of any pre-conceived notions as to how long things should take.
Do all this and we can rename this “No Excuses” season as the one of “Big Business Breakthroughs” for all of us!