You’ve probably heard of the term Dead Air which refers to gaffes when a radio or television broadcast goes silent. It’s frustrating for you as the listener or viewer when you are in the middle of a news story or your favorite song when airwaves go silent. Both parties at each end of the broadcast (broadcast engineer and listener) say simultaneously, “what happened?”

Your business may experience periods of Dead Air when systems don’t exist to keep your message broadcasting. Have you ever experienced these examples of dead air?

1. Employees fail to show up for work and cause Dead Air in the general performance of your business that day.

2. Phone calls that are not returned to customers and vendors leave an uncomfortable dead air silence that damages relations.

3. Hit and miss marketing programs reduce effectiveness of the marketing message

4. Infrequent communication with employees causes lack of direction and feelings of uncertainty

5. Accounts Receivable, Accounts Payable, Inventory, and Jobs in Progress information is collected too slowly and is stale by the time it gets printed as a financial report.

Dead air is costly to the broadcast industry and to your own business. Eliminating the possibility of failed communication is easy when you develop systems to combat Dead Air. Avoid building systems that create endless communications that drone like white noise. They are no better than Dead Air. You'll get benefit from simple systems that keep communication flowing.

Try these ideas:

Create a back-up system for employees. When employees are not at work due to illness or vacation, who covers for each of them?

Build a system for returning phone calls and e-mail. What is an acceptable turn around time for responding to voice mail and e-mail varies from person to person. Don’t leave it up to everyone to interpret. Set your own policy.

Create a well-defined and targeted marketing strategy for the next 12 months. Do it now and stick to it.

Have a weekly staff meeting. Keep it short (ten minutes) and simple and cover the big picture for the business.

Assign the job of Communications Producer to one person to collect daily, weekly and monthly financial information for a regular management broadcast.

Eliminate Dead Air in your business by creating a plan for uninterrupted communication. Include in your plan an emergency back-up system.

Make your business more profitable by being live “On Air” every day.

"Opportunities are often missed because we are broadcasting when we should be listening." -- Author Unknown

"Life was simple before World War II. After that, we had systems." -- G. Hopper

"The most important thing in communication is to hear what isn't being said." -- Peter Drucker

Betsey has been moving horses around so much this summer I’ve had to put temporary name tags on the stall doors. Horses come and go frequently. Our favorite pony, Peaches, is happily being ridden and shown by an energetic 9 year old young man many miles away. Her presence in our barn is missed.
Peaches has an amiable disposition and gets along with all of the other horses in the barn. As she serves as the pasture buddy with the other horses, Betsey found another pony to fill Peaches’ role until she returns.

I was informed that Oliver, a pony on loan, would be staying with us as official companion horse. Betsey brought him home a week ago and when I first saw him, I thought she’d brought home yet another dog.

But, Oliver is no dog, just a very short horse. About 36” tall at the withers, he looks very vertically challenged next to his taller horse friends, but he holds his own at horseplay.

In the photo he is meeting our new horse Lola. And yes, she is a show girl; horse shows only.

If your business financial picture is a little blurry, then maybe it's time for a second opinion from the outside. Many of the business owners I work with tell me that looking at their business financial picture is like looking at an X-Ray film. They understand what a simple bone break looks like but beyond that, there is a lot of interpretation required.

And that's where it starts to get blurry, understanding how all of the numbers are related and what can be done to fix the problem areas. Just as frustrating as the interpretation is dealing with lenders who prefer to speak in bank jargon like: D.C.R, Loan to Value ratios and collateralization. Sometimes it can sound as if they are speaking a foreign language.

If you'd like some help with a Financial Physical for your business or creating a loan package for your lender give me a call. You'll find out that I can help you simplify your business finances with a financial physical.

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