Late last week I ran two half day workshops on how to create a Thriving Procedure Manual. I was extolling the virtues of documenting systems: the efficiencies, the productivity, how much better life is for yourself, your staff and your clients.

Fast forward to this week. End of the financial year ... time to get my super in order for the year. I have a self managed super fund through my financial planner ... and I know I have the account details somewhere, but I'm not sure where. So I ring him up, speak to a very helpful woman in accounts who gives me the details, and tells me what I need to write in the letter. I write up the letters saying this is an employer contribution etc etc, and make the payment.

Then I had a stroke of genius ...

Last week I met the owner of what looked to be a very successful small business - let's call him Frank. Their income was well over a million dollars, profit margins were very healthy and their customers were happy.

However Frank wasn't loving his business. He was exhausted ... and scared that if things didn't change he would lose his commitment and his drive. He was working long days, 6–7 day weeks and asking his staff to do the same.

Thank you to everyone who came along on Wednesday night ... and apologies to those who missed out. It was the first time we've had to turn people away because we ran out of space ... which shows the the great response we had. 

I had an awesome night. Great venue, some inspiring stories from members and guests at various stages along the journey from survival to thriving, and an masterful and moving guest speaker - Robert Rabbin. 

He said it much better than I could "Thank you so much for inviting me to speak at and participate in your extraordinary LOVE event last night. Deanne and I were enchanted with every single atom of the evening!".

Here are some photos of the night. 

I was sent a great email last week (thanks David) with four questions to ask your team twice a month.

I gave them a test run yesterday, and recommend it. Simple and effective. The questions are:

The kids (and the techies) use the internet very differently than we do.

If you have a look on the right hand side of the address bar of your browser (to the right of www.loveyourbusiness.com) you'll see a little RSS symbol. This allows you to do some pretty cool stuff. It allows for a much more efficient use of the internet.

I could try and explain how it works, but I've been shown a little video that does a much better job of it than I could.

A month ago I had never heard of social enterprise.

Then a couple of weeks ago a friend invited me to the launch of The End of Charity - Time for Social Enterprise by Nic Frances.

Last week I met a very impressive woman who founded a very successful coaching company ten years ago. She is now pulling back from her business to focus on ... you guessed it ... social enterprise.

Earlier this week another friend gave me a copy of The End of Charity (which was lucky because I couldn't make the launch). As the twilight zone music faded into the background I concluded that the universe is trying to tell me something here.

So what is social enterprise?

I know loving my business is a good idea. I believe that it is the key to having my business thrive. I really do. And in a way I don't have a choice ... I'm the CEO of Love Your Business, I have to love my business.

But sometimes loving your business is easier said than done.

I have a coaching client who runs a web development business – let’s call him John.

At the start of the year his business had three major issues:

• Sales. John was effective at selling when he felt confident, but as soon as he felt a bit anxious or down, he wasn’t successful.
• Cash flow. Like many small business owners, John had cash flow challenges. This mainly stemmed from clients who were slow payers. Of course this added to his anxiety which in turn impacted his sales.
• Managing clients. To build a website John and his team need content from their clients at certain points in the development life cycle. Often he had to spend time chasing this content. Apart from not really enjoying this, it spread the projects out, made them less efficient and less profitable, and delayed when he finished the sites and got paid. Which also impacted cash flow.

Is standing for love in business just a nice idea, or does it make business sense? Does it add to your bottom line?

I want to make the case for the latter… I believe that standing for love is the best (and perhaps the only) way to truly thrive in business. Which is a good thing given that’s what we ask of all our community members.

So the challenge was thrown down last week, to write a blog that referred to penguins! So “what does business and penguins have in common?” I hear you say, well let me tell you a story about a little penguin who couldn’t sing but wow could he dance. Ok you got me, it’s already been done. Having two young stepchildren I’ve seen Happy Feet, oh a million times. So how does Happy Feet, and more importantly, the story of Mumble relate to business?