Posted on March 4, 2009 - by Greg Poulos
Warren Buffett’s 4 goals
Eben Pagan posted a link to Warren Buffett’s new report just published last week to Berkshire shareholders. It’s a pretty interesting read, but I found one part of special interest to anyone interested in growing their business.
On page 4, he says, “In good years & bad, Charlie [his partner] & I simply focus on four goals:
1. Maintaining Berkshire’s Gibraltar-like financial position, which features huge amounts of excess liquidity, near-term obligations that are modest, and dozens of sources of earnings and cash;
2. Widening the “moats” around our operating businesses that give them durable competitive advantages;
3. Acquiring and developing new and varied streams of earnings;
4. Expanding and nurturing the cadre of outstanding operating managers who, over the years, have delivered Berkshire exceptional results.”
This is fascinating, and these 4 goals tie directly into a lot of the marketing education taught by many of the “gurus”.
Here’s my simple marketing-mind translation of these goals:
1. Have ready access to cash, and borrow as little as possible.
2. Keep adding to your competitive advantages.
3. Bring on new sources of income streams (new affiliate relationships, new products in your funnel, etc.)
4. Hire STARS for your team.
I would also add that you as the business owner should focus your time on strategizing around these 4 tasks, and getting yourself out of doing the actual work as quickly as possible.
I first started to taste the success of working like this last year when one of our business partners started to wire weekly payments directly to one of our bank accounts. My time involved in making this money was almost nonexistent AFTER the initial hard work was done upfront.
So I continue to figure out ways to get myself out of the picture and bring in smart people that end up doing a better job than I ever did with specific tasks, and then rewarding them accordingly.
To your success,
Greg Poulos
