Acquainting You, Your Business, and Your Product is essential for independent service providers. Think of it as a service sector boot camp. From here, you can better leverage your opportunities and overcome the challenges you face in the service industry.
The objectives are:
- To understand the growing significance that service providers are playing in the World
- To understand why most independent service providers fail and how you can thrive
- To understand how you as an individual can build a healthier and more prosperous relationship with your business and service products
- To holistically identify and balance business roles in order to achieve greater success
- To understand specific service product challenges and strategies that you can use to over come them.
Introduction
I must have missed orientation day because my life has been a series of on-the-job trainings. As a result, I am always thankful to have a manual or a trail map. With that in mind, I wrote an introduction to the Art of Service called Acquainting You, Your Business, and Your Product. This chapter will give you an overview of the service world. Think of it as a service sector boot camp, a place where you can gain clarity between you, your job, and your product. From there, you can better leverage your opportunities and overcome the challenges you might face in the service industry.
Welcome to the Service Revolution
The economic landscape is changing, and you are standing on an evolutionary frontier. This may be difficult to see from a single lifetime perspective. So, let us expand the time line. At the end of the 2nd Ice Age, more than 10,000 years ago, an innovative group of our hunting and gathering ancestors started the agriculture revolution. Several millennia later, in the 18th and 19th centuries, other innovators began what became know as the industrial revolution. A relatively short time later, in the late 1900s, economists identified the growing importance of services to the Gross National Product (GNP). “But,†you snicker “Service is the oldest profession.†I will side step that landmine and acknowledge that services have been around since the dawn of mankind, but their economic importance has only been documented recently. From medical schools to massage schools, the art of service as a business has essentially been overlooked. There is not a Farmers Almanac or handbook of best practices for services. Today, customer service course exist, but only nestled in the marketing department of business colleges. If you expect to succeed on the leading edge of this service revolution, you must wipe away your business naïveté and study the Art of Service. Let us begin.
The service industry now accounts for a greater percentage of the US and global economy than it did 20 years ago. “Why?†Because consumers value services, and successful service providers are hard to find. In the late 1980’s researchers began paying more attention to the service sector. They found service products just as challenging to study as providers find them difficult to produce or market and as consumer find them difficult to purchase or evaluate. Much has been learned, but the field is still in its infancy.
Beat the Odds and Thrive
Independent service providers are the bull riders and sky divers of the business world. They tight rope walk without a net. Interestingly enough, small business owners do not see themselves as risk takers. They are confident that they will succeed; nonetheless, statistically most will fail. The National Federation of Independent Business' Education Foundation estimates that 40% of small businesses make a profit, 30% just breakeven, and 30% loose money. The Small Business Association (SBA) reports that more than 50% of small businesses (< 100 employees) fail by their 5th year, and independent service providers are the smallest of small businesses. Despite these odds, a growing percentage of new businesses are sole propriatorships. Either out of necessity or choice, more and more individuals are openning their own small business.
The SBA lists the top 3 reasons why small businesses fail:
1. Poor cash flow and financial management
2. Poor goals
3. Poor time management
The Art of Service series addresses each of these issues to help you beat the odds and thrive.
