Biggest takeaways from reading Business Made Simple and why you must read it

This podcast features a fascinating conversation I had with Stefani Thatcher and Austin Christensen about Donald Miller’s book, “Business Made Simple”. Below, you’ll find many of the highlights we talk about so you can follow along.

At age 51, Donald Miller is an inspiration. 

He’s hugely successful and living a purposeful life guided by his Christian faith. Starting in publishing at 21, he has written over a dozen best-selling books, served on the President’s Advisory Council, and started charitable organizations to help young people. In his book, “Business Made Simple”, he shares business tips to help others succeed in an authentic, respectful, and efficient way. 

Here’s a breakdown of our favorite lessons from his book and some of our insights as well:

INVEST IN YOURSELF

Increase your value to your employer or your own business by focusing on essential character traits of value-driven professionals, who:

• know how a business really works
• have a clear and compelling leader 
• are personally productive 
• know how to clarify a message 
• understand how to build a marketing campaign 
• can sell 
• are great communicators
• are good negotiators
• are good managers
• know how to run and how to execute a system. 

The book is full of amazing tips to help you develop these traits. Basically, you could apply one thing every day for 60 days and then have a business that’s made simple. 

In the upcoming weeks, we will try to implement things that we learn inside the book.

ENERGY

It’s important to give people a return on their energy and money. Find ways to recharge, maybe by doing something you’re passionate about or getting help with something you’re struggling with so you can move forward.

ACCOUNTABILITY

Miller encourages seeing yourself as a proactive hero, instead of a reactive victim.

When things don’t go our way, accept that it’s happened but take accountability and learn from it.

Ambition always meets opposition. You have to be selective with who you share your ideas because the ideas can die before they even come to fruition if you receive only criticism and doubt. 

As an entrepreneur, you are willing to try new things whereas others might not have that mindset or be as determined as you.

Once we start to own our shortcomings, weaknesses, or the things that trip us up, it helps us gain control, make a change, overcome them, and do something different.

But if we continue making excuses, we will always be stuck. 

THE HERO OF THE STORY

All stories need a hero. We watch them make mistakes, learn from them, and move forward, rather than hiding in a corner. 

You have to be able to switch positions, sometimes from hero to guide.

In business, you are the guide: someone who has professional knowledge and allows your clients or customers to be a hero in their own stories.

RESILIENCE

Those who journey the farthest will arrive with the most strength. When you overcome your obstacles, you will look back to where you were years ago and be grateful that you kept fighting and didn’t quit.

Flip the script: for any obstacle or opportunity that you encounter, even though it might be miserable or painful, ask yourself, “What can I learn from this to avoid getting the same results next time?”

One of the things we can control is being able to troubleshoot the situation. We can’t figure out what DOES work unless we figure out what doesn’t. 

MOVE BEYOND THE CONFUSION

Invite clarity rather than confusion.

When people feel confused about what they need to do, they’re choosing to be confused as an excuse to avoid doing what they are scared to do.

Most of the time, we know what we need to do – we just don’t want to do it. 

We overthink it rather than trying it and seeing if it works.  

After you’ve spent plenty of time and energy analyzing and studying the pros and cons, what is the decision that you’re ultimately going to make? 

Simply make that decision now and save yourself time and trouble. 

Instead of prolonging the confusion, follow your instincts and step away from the confusion. Choose immediate clarity. 

OPTIMISM

Be relentlessly optimistic even when faced with obstacles. 

Manifest positive vibes throughout the difficult moments and you will start seeing the solutions more clearly. 

It’s almost like we have a defense mechanism to protect ourselves from heartache when something doesn’t work out. And we predetermine it in that effect, but only to cushion the blow of not putting in the effort. 

Identify and avoid energy vampires, who discourage you from taking the risks you want and following through on your goals.

FIND THE STORY

Everything should follow a story narrative, especially when you want to connect with your customer or your audience.

It starts as a hook and focuses on the danger or obstacles that the hero has to overcome. That can be applied to everything, as part of your mission statement.

Learn how to effectively tell the story without overcomplicating it. It has to be tailored to your audience, to get them excited and keep their interest. Our customer or our audience has to see themselves in the story. They can’t just be reading our story about us.

When you’re speaking to your audience, remember that they’re actually the hero and you’re guiding them through the plot and all the obstacles they face.

The product that you’re offering is the solution to their problem.

KEEP IT SIMPLE

Communicate a clear message but do not detract from what you’ve said by adding excessive explanations or by repeating yourself.

WALKAWAY POWER

In negotiation, the client must feel like they have the power, even though you are accepting of whatever the end result is. It’s important to detach yourself emotionally from the desired outcome.

Miller gives advice if you’re a natural collaborative negotiator and you find yourself in a competitive negotiation:

Normally if you’re with a collaborative person, it’s a win-win for each of you. But if you’re in the competitive one, you have to get to a place where the other party feels like they are winning; otherwise, the negotiation will never end.

When you’re emotionally invested, you’ll make drastic, unwise choices. By taking the emotion out, you’ll be able to find alternative solutions. And those alternative solutions may actually be better solutions. 

QUALIFIED LEAD

When you qualify your leads first, the selling will come naturally and there is no pressure on either side. They have a problem that you can solve, and you are genuinely trying to help them.

By only selling to qualified leads, you can build a stronger, more authentic relationship with your client, leading to possible referrals in the future.

THE AIRPLANE ANALOGY

Donald Miller devised a visual of an airplane to help people understand how to achieve balance in their business. 

Here are a few key points:

Keep overhead costs low

He explains that all your overhead costs are the body or the fuselage of the aircraft. 

And that’s what you need to support.

Your products and services, what you offer, are the wings of your aircraft. If they’re too small and too few, then you won’t generate enough lift. 

The plane won’t fly, and you won’t be able to support all of your important overhead costs.

Balance various costs

Depending on your budget, you should also be open to having both a marketing and a sales department. It’s a careful balance but will help you get further.

Fuel with cash

Your cash flow is the fuel. Without a consistent supply of cash, your business will not take off.

Be flexible and open-minded

Adjust as you go along. You should be comfortable tweaking your plans and recalibrating for any unforeseen results instead of being discouraged. 

Have an accountability partner

Find someone that you trust to give you their honest opinion to help you grow, make important changes, and be willing to accept your feedback as well.

Choose someone who is in your field of business or faces similar challenges as you, and can understand your struggles, but can look at them objectively.

There is a huge trap that we can fall into as entrepreneurs, where you create your own little safety bubble, and you don’t want anyone to burst it. You’re keeping it all close to you instead of letting people in and getting that outside opinion.

Have your accountability partner look at your operations and expenses. There might be an expense that you decide to cut after meeting with your partner. It can save you a lot of money. And if you later realize you do rely on a certain expense, at least you will know that it’s necessary for your business. 

ASSESSING YOUR TEAM

Give your team the tools to self-audit, examine their purpose, how they are adding value to the business, how their results are being measured, and so on. They’re not just filling a seat, but they’re actually producing good results. 

Focus more on lead indicators rather than lag indicators. Many people base their decisions on metrics that are just lag indicators, results that have already happened, instead of lead indicators, or the results that drive the result. 

Be specific

Make sure to track and celebrate success by clearly defining what success looks like for our employees or ourselves.

Stand-up meetings

Have daily standup meetings that last only 15 minutes. 

If you only meet once a month, then you might have a month’s worth of problems that you have to solve. You’ve gone off track by a month’s worth of work. 

But if you meet at least once a week, you have a week’s worth of redirection if necessary.

Everybody knows exactly what the topics are that they need to bring to this meeting. They can share highlights and priorities, and answer the following questions:

1. What has each team member finished? 
2. What is each team member going to do next? 
3. What’s blocking any team member from making progress? 

Understand your value to the company

As a value-driven professional, align yourself with your company’s goals and consider how the work you do can contribute to those goals. This mindset will help you stand out and improve your chances for a promotion or raise.

Helping in other ways

If people trust that you are genuinely interested in solving their problem, it has a huge impact. 

Even if you’re not in a position to help them directly or they’re not a good fit for your services, simply guiding them in the right direction or to someone who can help them is also valuable.

Miller encourages you to be more than a cheerleader. Step up to the role of a coach. 

Share your expectations

Set expectations with your employees, even part-time hires. 

Provide useful feedback to let them know how they’re doing. Give them a chance to adjust and reset if they’re not performing as expected, instead of abruptly letting them go.

Productive conflict

Miller explains the concept of productive conflict as a healthy confrontation that’s hopeful, free of negative emotion, and respectful of the other person’s feelings.

If we put our hearts into it and are genuinely interested in other people succeeding in life or in business, then we will always approach them in any situation from a place of adding value to their lives, even if it’s a perceived conflict.

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HOW TO IMPLEMENT

Overall, this was a fabulous book, filled with incredibly useful information that we will be putting into action in our businesses in the weeks ahead. 

Here’s our plan so far:

• We’re implementing them in the next two months
• Some of us will listen or read the book again and take notes to compile a checklist
• Sign up online for free daily videos and/or subscribe to his YouTube channel.

Even if you do not have a business yet, build your list or template from all of his advice so you’ll have something to refer to when you’re ready to go.

Finally, we will be accountable to and share feedback with each other. Come along with us on this journey and help plan your goals for next year!

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