One Millionaire's Secret to Success in Business

By: Rod Alan Richadson

A few years back I attended a meeting where a man who had created a successful business that was now selling goods to countries all over the world shared with us his 3 key steps to success. Although his points somewhat challenge traditional thinking, you must remember that he was successful by living this formula. These are his three key steps to success along with my thoughts:

1. The people who do the work get the reward. What a novel thought! When nearly all of us create a business, we divide up the stock and rest on our laurels! The man thought it was better to observe who the players were going to be and measure the ownership based on the amount of value the individuals contributed.

Even though this approach may work well if you're self-funding your company, there are possible problems in this strategy that you will want to be aware of. You'll want to be certain you have a solid relationship with the people you're in business with. There is nothing like somebody else determining your value. You may not be able to see eye-to-eye when it actually comes to delegating equity. I've used this principle myself to some degree. I prefer letting a business come together prior to dividing ownership up. I have had way too many partners fall away prematurely or do not exhibit the skills, contacts and drive they claimed to have.

2. Keep everything in-house. Normally, I recommend outsourcing everything you possibly can. It allows for greater flexibility and lets business owners scale rapidly both forward and backward. The successful business man's believed that you should generate profit on as many points as possible - particularly in the initial stages. If you outsource, you are outsourcing the profit.

I can see a lot of wisdom in his ideas. He demonstrated this idea well. He had a smaller manufacturing plant and did everything down to screen printing his own T-shirts. His pay was $20,000 a month.

3. Concentrate on accruing income. This point is the true pearl. Most budding businesses get lost in product development and lose sight of generating money and creating profitable transactions. The successful man's idea was to create your merchandise, in your basement if you have to, and then sell it for more than it cost you to build. efficiently ran his business out of his garage for a long time before he began renting commercial facilities.

I've observied that the businesses that I've launched this way grew risk-free to heights of profitability.

When the meeting was over, I folded up the paper and stuffed it in my pocket. I had concluded that this man's recipe for success, even though I might not agree with the whole philosophy, was certainly working for him.