This is issue #2 of my blog series based on the 2011 edition of the Top Ten Small Business Trends from Small Business Labs. I’m analysing these trends as they apply to entrepreneurs whose companies are whale hunters.
Today we look at Trend #2: Variable Cost Business Models. The authors write “More small businesses will shift from fixed cost to variable cost business models, adopting a pay-as-you-go approach to minimize cash requirements and increase business agility.”
This trend has significant implications for whale hunting, which is a village-wide, collaborative activity. It’s great to use outsource partners, At The Whale Hunters company, we have external support for many needs including marketing, graphic design, research, editing, web design and maintenance, bookkeeping and accounting, and more. It would be prohibitive to have full-time personnel assigned to each of these responsibilities, yet we can’t grow our business without them. We also have a growing number of Certified Partners who represent The Whale Hunters in key markets throughout North America and Europe. We consider our outsource partners to be core members of our team, and we invest in their learning and understanding of the businessmodel for growth.
What that means for whale hunting is that we have to invite them to be part of a collaborative team and include them in collaborative learning and planning events. If they don’t fully understand what we are trying to accomplish as we grow our business, they can’t be “on the boat” and can’t help in the most productive ways.
So my thought for the day is to not only invest in great people who are not employees, but you need to invest a bit more in order to educate them about whale hunting and include them as members of your village.
What services are you outsourcing today? What are you thinking of doing?
