I sometimes get a bit jaded by getting on a plane for a one-day meeting. But today is different. Today I am flying across the country to go and meet Mike Michalowicz and the rest of the Profit First Professional team. I get to spend a full day with these fantastic folks and am going to be meeting so many of the other Profit First Professionals from around the world. To say I’m excited is an understatement. You see, I am a Profit First Professional who learned to fall in love with my business after implementing the Profit First cash management system. I can sleep at night again. I love my company and brand again. Now I work with other small and micro companies to help them do the same. You should expect a business coach to have direct experience in navigating the challenges you're facing in your business. But how many coaches also drive your profitability as you surmount these challenges? That's what we do. We are a Profit First certified firm.
Just over a decade ago I left my high-paying - but pretty unfulfilling - corporate job to start my own company with a business partner. We had such huge dreams but before I knew it my life savings were almost gone, I wasn’t sleeping through the night, and I was at war daily with my now-ex-business partner. So that business failed. Yet based on our revenue numbers, the public profile of the brand, our global distribution of our beautiful products, and all of those other splashy - but ultimately meaningless - metrics, we were a darling in the media, intriguing in the eyes of the fashion world, a coveted brand among some of the world’s most prestigious retailers. But with every day adding more to the redness of the bottom line, I couldn’t stay. I had run out of money to put into it. So, we split and I started over. It was the most stressful time of my life. I hated every moment of it. How did this happen to me when my corporate career was so successful, my education was illustrious, my work ethic so strong? I was a failure. I was ashamed.
But when I started over, I was determined not to make the same mistakes. Many of them I didn’t. In fact, without tooting my horn too much, most of them I didn’t ... those were some horribly expensive mistakes the first time around! I now have a fantastic, lifestyle beauty brand that is respected (beauty editors and celebrities talk about my brand for free), global (selling in stores such as Selfridge’s, Harrod’s, C.O. Bigelow and Stanley Korshak), and with super loyal long term customers who tell their friends about my brand and products. But there was one mistake I made yet again ... and that was the idea that by not paying myself, by not taking profit distributions, by putting the company before me I was “investing” in the business and it would all magically pay off one day. It didn’t. It stressed me out every day ... and every night. I soon started hating my company, wishing I had just gone back to the corporate world when I split from my business partner back in 2008, second-guessing every decision I had made.
And then I listened to a book by Mike Michalowicz called “Profit First”. The ideas and systems in that book seemed so obvious and yet I hadn’t done any of them. I cried ... literally cried. And from that day on I implemented his system and I can say I am back in love with my business, it is profitable, it is thriving, I am paying myself a salary, I am taking quarterly profit distributions. And with those distributions I have just had the most amazing year of travel with my awesome guy (he took a sabbatical) all over the world all paid for with cash while the business kept rolling along doing its thing.
The Profit First cash management system has been such a game changer for not just how the business runs, but almost more importantly for how I feel about my company. And so I joined the incredible team at Profit First Professionals to become one so that I can work with you in your small business too to help you:
1. Get out of that daily struggle and stress of not knowing whether you will ever have a profitable company; one where you can pay yourself what you are worth;
2. Help you fall back in love with your business that you have poured so much into;
3. Implement a practical, easy cash flow management system that is truly a game changer.
Book a 20 minute session with me and by the end of our discussion you will be well equipped to boost your profits (fast). And to finally get a good night’s sleep! Email me at hello@thebeautyofprofitfirst.com and let's get chatting!
