Stop Doing Everything: How Entrepreneurs Build Businesses That Work Without Them

Product Description

STOP DOING EVERYTHINGYou started the business because you wanted to build something of your own.But somewhere along the way, you became responsible for everything.You find the customers. Make the sales. Deal with suppliers. Manage employees. Check the accounts. Solve operational problems. Approve every important decision.And when you finally step away, the business seems to slow down or stop.That may not be dedication. It may be dependency.Starting a business often requires the founder to do almost everything. Building a durable business requires something different: knowing what you must continue to own—and what you must learn to stop doing yourself.Stop Doing Everything is a practical guide to making that transition.The book explores the responsibilities that matter most to an entrepreneur: choosing the right direction, understanding customers, understanding the numbers, building systems, developing people, creating revenue, managing risk and making decisions that cannot simply be handed to someone else.Inside, you will learn how to:• Move from doing the work to building the organization• Decide what to eliminate, simplify, automate, outsource or delegate• Understand customers instead of relying entirely on reports from others• Distinguish revenue, profit and cash—and understand why the difference matters• Build repeatable systems instead of relying on memory and individual effort• Hire and develop people who can take real responsibility• Delegate without surrendering accountability• Stay connected to sales and the source of customer demand• Protect the business from avoidable financial and operational risks• Think about growth without confusing bigger with better• Build capabilities, relationships, reputation and systems that compound over timeYou can outsource bookkeeping.You can hire salespeople.You can delegate operations.You can automate repetitive work.You can bring in specialists.But you cannot outsource the responsibility for understanding your business.You cannot outsource judgment.You cannot outsource the decision about where the business is going.And you cannot outsource the responsibility of building an organization capable of functioning without your constant intervention.The goal is not to make the entrepreneur irrelevant.The goal is to stop making the entrepreneur responsible for everything.The real question is not, "How can I work harder?"It is, "What should I stop doing so I can focus on what only I can do?"That is the shift from simply working in a business to building one.Stop Doing Everything is for first-time entrepreneurs, small-business owners, founders, freelancers and anyone who wants to build a business rather than create another job for themselves.Stop doing everything.Start building the business. Read more