Guest Writer: Greg Grimaud "Do you know where your breakeven is?"

In our monthly franchisee meetings we always cover the breakeven graph and discuss it’s truth’s. Point “B” on the graph is the place where all your dreams start to become possible. You’ve paid off your fixed expenses for the month such as that annoying rent payment, factored in your parts cost and other variables, and now you are poised to take home some cash for every dollar above point “B” that you bring in.

Only one problem, you have no idea what that dollar amount is. Not knowing what this number is, is the equivalent of going duck hunting blindfolded and expecting a bird to fall out of the sky. Like Jim Carrey said in the movie “Dumb and Dumber” when he asked the girl, “what are my chances of going out with you?” Her response was, “not good… …one in a million.” His response, “so you’re saying there’s a chance!”

This is not the kind of chance that you want to risk your entire business on. You can greatly improve your odds of success by not guessing on issues like not knowing your breakeven.
Knowing where your breakeven is, is knowing when you’re making money or losing money. It’s the day in the week when momentum changes. Because my partner and I know where our breakeven is, we know at which point we begin making money. I’ll talk about this more next week, but in the meantime, take a look at the graph below. — Greg Grimaud

Start Acting Like a Four Year Old.

Interestingly enough, children are often the best teachers. Jesus encourages us to be more like children in our relationship with Him.

My son AJ is four years old. He is a pre-k student at Northern Hills Elementary. As I was picking him up yesterday, one of the assistant teachers said. All of this other kids really like AJ. She went on to say he makes new friends everyday with kids that are in kindergarten and first grade. (Remember, he is in pre-kindergarten.) I also noticed him hug several boys and girls as he was leaving his group to get in our mini-van.

AJ may be a little more social than other children. He is our number five child and has had a lot of opportunity to interact with his siblings. The truth is, children can teach us tons about developing new relationships. You can bring almost any child to a playground and in ten minutes they can and will introduce you to four new friends.

I was stuck on a elevator one time for about fifteen minutes with six other people. Even though we experienced something a bit scary and closter-phobic together, I didn’t learn any of their names or anything about them that day. For some reason, we adults are guarded and don’t build relationships as easy as children. I am sure there are a thousand psychological reasons for this. The main reason is fear. We are afraid of the unknown and new people are unknowns.

I heard a great quote yesterday. “Right in the middle of your fears is where your greatest future growth lies.”

I encourage you to become more childlike with your customers this year. Dive into hundreds of new friendships in 2010. Get to know them by spending time asking them questions about their world. You’ve heard it a thousand times… “People don’t care how much you know, until they know how much you care.”

Business runs on relationships, relationships take time.

If you are in the OKC area, join us for one of our Christmas services this year at LifeChurch.tv Edmond!