Match Up With A Mentor

   There’ve been a lot of mistakes; some just frustrating, some very expensive.  And last year, while considering the purchase of an edge machine, he secretly wondered if he’d learned enough to know that he was making the right decision.
   Since he was the guy holding it all together in the shop, everyone always came to him for answers.  But where could he go for answers?  How could he admit that he was not only nervous, but even a little panicked over the enormity of the edge-machine decision? 
   Who could he be completely honest with?  He couldn’t admit his concerns to his employees and neither his spouse nor his closest friends had ever been in his shoes. 
   He’d read somewhere about the value of having a mentor, but he bristled at the thought of someone telling him what to do again. 
   “Wasn’t that the reason I started this company in the first place?  And besides, I’m in charge here,” he muttered to himself.
   Then he remembered reading about how, in 1776, General George Washington found himself in a similar situation.  As the commander of the Continental Army fighting the Revolutionary War, Washington was responsible for making the decisions that would determine whether or not there ever was to be a United States of America.  And, despite being the most respected leader in the country, he had the character and foresight to assemble a council of war to advise him on military matters. 
   On several occasions that spring, Washington insisted they attack the British defending Boston.  On as many occasions, his council of war had advised him against it. It turned out that the British had made the city nearly impenetrable.  Had Washington ignored the council’s advice or never consulted them, he would have attacked Boston and his army would have been crushed. 
   Buying an edge machine doesn’t quite compare to saving the country, but Jim’s resistance to having a mentor faded when he realized even history’s greatest leaders needed and wanted advice.
   Jim had to find a mentor; he was finally ready to take the advice from someone who was qualified to give it.  And this someone didn’t need to be well-versed in the fabrication trade, but experienced in the basics of running and growing a successful business.
   Jim met Ed, his eventual mentor, at a most-unexpected place: the local chamber of commerce.  About all Jim knew about Ed was that he ran a big company and actually held the title of CEO. 
   It began informally, with the two of them meeting for coffee.  Ed had heard that Jim had his own business and was struggling, so he was happy to oblige when Jim asked him if he could buy him a cup so they could talk.
   Jim had been swimming in operations development and day-to-day business, as well as attempting to make a key decision that would affect the future of his business.  If it turned out to be the wrong decision or the wrong timing, it could ruin his company. Jim finally mustered the courage to ask Ed if he’d be willing to look over his numbers to see what he thought of the decision.
   As time went on, the meetings became a little more frequent.  Ed began to notice that Jim was different than many of the other business owners he’d met with and, at times, consulted: Jim actually took his advice and implemented it.  This was in stark contrast to the people he’d mentored who only wanted to hear what made them feel good. 
   Jim wasn’t interested in compliments on his fabrication skills, he was interested in building his business and making it successful, even at the expense of his pride.  It was refreshing for Ed to see someone really benefiting from the hard-won expertise and experience that he was sharing.
   Eventually, Ed began calling Jim to get updates on the fabrication shop and how Jim was doing.  Ed even suggested they get together to look at the numbers and would sometimes even buy the coffee.
   But Ed wasn’t the only one getting satisfaction out of the relationship.  Jim was beginning to see radical changes in his company and in himself.  Ed was teaching him how to manage.
   “Manage the company, don’t let it manage you!”  Ed would tell him.  Actually he’d pounded it in to him.  Ed was teaching him how to lead, and Jim’s leadership skills grew as Ed shared experiences on how to firmly – yet thoughtfully –  get the results from his staff.
    “Don’t confuse efforts with results!” was another one of Ed’s famous lines.  And getting those results were crucial to building a successful company – a company that would eventually operate in Jim’s absence. 
   Since Ed taught him to set a sales forecast and move heaven-and-earth to meet it, the wild month-to-month fluctuations in sales were gone.  When too much work came in, he delayed it or turned it down.  And when it looked like not enough was coming in, he jumped to make sure it did.  This brought consistency and regularity to his production schedule, reducing overtime and mistakes. 
   With the budget Ed helped him implement, Jim began watching his costs more carefully.  While he had always made pretty good financial decisions, some were poorly timed.  Some of the purchasing decisions he’d made could have been delayed or spaced out to coincide with his revenues and cash flow.  Up until then, he had no way of evaluating or systematically spending money and, because he was so busy, many of his decisions were made in haste. 
   Jim was always shocked at the end of the month, because his idea of the profits never lined up with his financial statements. When he established his budget (based on his sales forecasts) he became much-more-aware of how, when and why he was spending money.  This had a major impact on the bottom line and, for the first time, he realized his company was capable of really making money.
   In other words, Jim was getting immediate results from the experience that had taken Ed decades to accumulate. Today, when Jim looks back, he realizes that had he not mustered the courage to seek out a mentor and then listen to him, the likelihood of building and managing a successful business that could operate in his absence would’ve been very slim. 
   And, by the way, Jim did buy that edge machine.  Even though he was nervous at the time, he had made the decision with confidence, knowing that Ed, his mentor had not only reviewed it, but agreed it was the right move.
   Jim is now doing something that many of his competitors aren’t doing…managing a business.  The days of his business managing him and his life are becoming a thing of the past.  Jim is managing his sales, managing his costs, and managing his people to achieve the results he dreamed of when he first started his company four years ago – a better income and more free time.
   Now, like his mentor Ed, Jim runs a business that allows him to meet you for coffee and not only tell you how he built it – he can help you do it, too.
   Aaron Crowley is the founder and president of FabricatorsFriend.com and a prominent stone shop in Portland, Ore. He can be reached at aaroncgc@verizon.net.