Decision-making is at the heart of running a company. As humans, we use our best judgment when we have an interest in making something work. Entrepreneurs - who tend to be especially motivated souls who view their companies as their babies - try to exact strategies that will grow and benefit their enterprises. Some entrepreneurs work single-handedly; others surround themselves with advisers. Either way, day-to-day business is like a chess match. Even inertia - doing nothing but the status quo - is a decision.
No matter how different one business is from another there are common threads when it comes to decision-making. An Internet start-up easily faces the same gauntlets as a healthy snack manufacturer. What goes on behind the execution of choices - both good and bad - supplies relevant and universal information to anyone who is running a company. For this reason the Hits & Misses column, which I've been writing for Crains New York Business for the past three years, has been a success. These poignant columns have been pulled together in this collection as a teaching tool for entrepreneurs.
Hits & Misses columns are short but incisive. In few words, readers connect with particular challenges businesses have faced. In the Hits section, business owners share prosperous strategies. In the Misses section they relate something even more important: their stumbles. In nearly every case, it is the stumble that has aided the company in pulling up its bootstraps and operating smarter and more efficiently. Lesson learning is part of being human. Humans run companies, after all.
