How to Grow a Small Business

Looking for actionable steps on how to grow a small business?

In this episode of the Process Breakdown Podcast Michael E. Gerber, a business thought-leader and best selling author reveals the steps to take to grow your small business so that it lasts longer, is successful, and easy to replicate.

He gives the example of how McDonald’s grew from a small business into a global empire, and how other small businesses can learn from their journey. He also talks about how he started down his own path, how he came about writing his first book, and his plans to impact economic development worldwide.

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Key Resource List:

* Radical U

Show Notes:

0:06 – Introduction

0:43 – Dr. Jeremy Weisz talks about past guests on the show.

0:53 – Dr. Weisz talks about the sponsor of the show, SweetProcess, and shares the best solution for documenting standard operating procedures, highlighting a 14-day free trial.

2:01 – The guest speaker, Michael E. Gerber, is introduced.

2:57 – Michael shares his opinion on why small businesses usually fail, and how most small businesses are a product of dissatisfaction, which is wrong.

4:24 – Michael talks about roles in a company, and also about how companies should understand what their goals are and work towards them.

8:05 – Michael talks about how our primary role as human beings is to create for good, and how we’re falling short of that.

9:05 – The guest speaker talks about steps the owner of a small business in the technician role in a company should take if they want to grow the company.

14:18 – Michael tells some of his favorite stories over the years of businesses, talking about books he’s written, the E-Myth library, and his goals and vision.

17:45 – He tells the story about Ken Goodrich, co-author of The E-Myth HVAC Contractor, how he took over and destroyed his father’s business, but after reading The E-Myth Revisited multiple times, rebuilt the company and sold it, and made career out of doing that. 

20:49 – Michael explains how McDonald’s became the most successful small business in the world by building and perfecting a prototype and replicating it until it was perfect.

24:10 – He tells a story about how his book, The E-Myth Attorney, came about.

27:25 – Gerber tells the number of Vertical books he has to get done, and how he goes about writing them, describing how each chapter in each book is exactly the same.

29:30 – He explains how people who complain that every Vertical book variant is exactly the same are missing the point. He also talks about the Eightfold Path.