The Most Important Business Skill: Knowing When To Stop

The most important business skill that no one talks about is the ability to end a business successfully and move on. That does not mean that the business was a booming success and you have made millions of dollars or that you have an offer on the table to buy your business. This only means that you are able to see that the business model that you are using is not working and it is time to cut the losses and move on to the next idea.

This by far is the hardest of all the skills to master as an entrepreneur. As business owner, I can always make it work.

Is it because we are in a society that teaches us to:

• never give up,
• don’t throw in the towel and
• keep on trying?

When a business model, idea or venture is not working meaning not bringing in a profit to sustain itself, does it make good sense to keep throwing money at it.

Since I have been “out” in the real world. I worked started and stopped several businesses:

• Industrial Equipment
• Selling Software
• Webmaster
• Sales System Designer
• Public Speaker
• Radio Show Host
• Marketing Consultant
• Advertising Consultant
• Seminar Leader
• Investment Banker Advisor
• Internet Marketing Faculty
• Technical Editor

Notice that none of these “fit” together. The key as I reflect on all of these businesses is that I knew when it was time to slow down, quit or change direction. Not because, I didn’t like something.

But for the simple reason that business is called business because it produces a profit. And a business that is not making a profit is not a business it is a money drain.

Business is not:

• a passive sit-on-the-sidelines idea of riches
• a hope that “it will get better tomorrow.”
• empty promised of wealth without work
• some new trick or technique

Business is action. Pure and simple. At the very core business is profitable action. Providing value to the client or buyer. You will not get it right every time. But, if you keep moving you will not get it wrong all the time.

For me… Knowing when to stop and ask the question, “Is this working for me?” has been the most important skillet for my business. Otherwise I would still be in my old position, doing the same thing and hoping that the world would change around me.

That scenario was not for me and it should not be for you. Your business, like everything else, is a test. Try and test.

“Did it work” is the operative question.

– David Bullock