BUSINESS COLUMN: Every business needs discipline to flourish

A successful business follows a strict diet of time, function and environment.

Too much or too little of these items can lead to poor health and habits in your business. We want your business to be happy and healthy. So here are a few tips on how to prepare you for potential business growth.

The basis for any good diet is preparation.

If you take the time to prepare your work in advance, this will give you the edge to clean up and strategically grow each area of your business. Cleaning up these scraps and leftovers may have you answering some questions on how you gained five pounds on your business scale. So when moving forward, remember no cheating, stick to the plan for a lean-mean-working machine.

Seriously though, plan each day with a priority plan.

For this to happen as with any successful 9 to 5 job, you must be able to commit. You have to be committed each day to set aside productive time for your business. Not time for candy-crunching games, texts, chats and emails.

If you want people to take your business seriously, you must as well. Start each business day with a time that works best for you and the business, a time that is going to be productive, a block of time dedicated to specific areas of business and only business-related activities during those blocks of time.

Next, but not in any particular order, is creating a work space conducive and functional. Your space has to be able to meet the needs of a streamlined business. Analyze the necessities of your business and make the tools (computers, fax, scanners, email list, prospect list etc.) and processes (call flow, scripts, quotas, calendars etc.) readily available.

When creating your environment think about what will make things simple enough for you to be the best, productive you. Make your work space happy, fresh and ready for success.

As with any diet your mental state is imperative. As the saying goes don’t mix business with pleasure.

Adopt this philosophy when it comes to your business environment. Don’t bring your personal life to your business life. Create a stress free, distraction free environment to ensure maximum productivity. Be ready and emotionally available to make planned choices, to work harder and smarter.

Being a business owner is a lot of fun and a lot of hard work. After you have established the basic foundation you can now see where the time spent is money earned. Keep track of your daily data, so you will be able to see what are you may now begin to delegate or change priority level.

Business is a continually evolving environment. But with the proper business diet plan you can build a champion brand.

These are just a few steps to help you create a strong foundation. It is crucial to start your business growth on the right path. Going back to get healthy is always a lot harder than doing it right the first time.

Still, it is never too late to stop and make the tough choices to align your business routines. Sometimes as a business owner doing the upfront work can make you feel like you are spinning your wheels. But this time spent will be well worth it.

In a few weeks’ time you and your business will be feeling the sweet rewards of a healthy lean business in the making.

Best wishes and happy business success to you.

Maricopa resident Kehinde Ogunjobi is owner with his wife, Brandi, of Ketalog Inc., an online marketing strategy firm.