Facts and Philosophy

We live in a world where numbers and statistics and big data rule. Over the weekend a friend of mine reminded me of that fact when I cornered him into a discussion about this blog over dinner with our wives. He’s been working with a venture capital fund and he’s all high right now on business plans, financial models, and return on investment. He’s also right. Especially in business, having a plan with good data and numbers that run the right direction is essential.  Ben Arment, who wrote the book Dream Year, captured the pith of this idea when he said:

A great idea is a spreadsheet with skin on. No dream can be sustained without a profitable financial model. And make no mistake – whether you’re profit or non-profit – the goal is to make a profit. Otherwise, it’s not a dream; it’s a hobby.

Ben’s right on to point out that if your numbers don’t make sense you’ll never get your business off the ground. Period.

The thing is, there are lots of really smart people who have written lots of really smart books, blogs and magazines about how to make your business become profitable and thrive. So while it’s important to learn and share as much of that stuff here, that’s not really what this blog is about.

Instead, I really hope to change the way you think about business. It’s the difference between facts and philosophy; between the data we use and how we use them. Another quote, this time from Henry Ford:

“Being greedy for money is the surest way not to get it, but when one serves for the sake of service—for the satisfaction of doing that which one believes to be right—then money abundantly takes care of itself.”

Now, there’s no question that Henry had a profitable product and a profitable business model. He helped usher in the age of the automobile, he relentlessly cut costs across his organization, and he made tons of money (quite literally). But he held tenaciously to the idea that he would be most successful by enabling his customers (and he viewed his employees as potential customers too) to easily afford his cars. He worked tirelessly to provide the best value to them he could, even if it meant he would take a bit less from every car he sold.

That idea’s at the heart of what I’m doing here. I know that profitability is essential if a business is going to work. But I want to harness the freedom and the power of profitable business so that we can do more with it. And the way to do that is to make sure that business serves owners, customers, and employees as much as it can.