What makes a millionaire builder?

Most builders I meet would love to become millionaires – and some get there. You’ve heard the expression ‘failing to plan is planning to fail’; could it be that millionaires plan better than others?

It’s not that simple, everyone plans – it’s just the time scale they plan on is different.

Employees (often) plan for a day

Often, those who work for a boss don’t have to concern themselves too much with the business’ long-term goals – they have a plan for the day and, as long as they complete the work required, they can head home and not think any more about it.

Not all employees take that approach, particularly those who are looking to move up, but usually a perk of being an employee is you’re able to concentrate solely on the task at hand.

Managers plan for a week

Things change when the employee becomes a manager. It’s not quite as easy to get by on daily planning, and it’s harder to avoid taking work home with you.

Rather, since they are responsible for organising work for employees, managers need to be a step ahead. They need to plan at least a week in advance to ensure their employees have all the direction and resources necessary for efficient work day by day.

It’s harder to plan a week ahead, and not every manager succeeds. Have you ever watched a project manager who is still acting like an employee? They spends the day fighting fires, chasing up late deliveries and subcontractors.

Jobs run late. Materials run short. Subcontractors can’t turn up and variation and change orders get overlooked. Their projects run overtime and over-budget.

That’s simply because they haven’t yet learnt to plan far enough ahead. Successful managers plan at least a week ahead. Then, when something goes wrong, they have time to intervene, resolve the problem and get the project back on track. Managers learn to plan further ahead, and get paid more for doing so.

Business owners plan for the month

You might think that becoming a business owner is as simple as getting a client and working for yourself. It’s easy to start. But it’s not so easy to finish well, and a high percentage go back to working for someone else. Why?

Because owning your own business means that you need to think much further ahead than you did when you were an employee or a manager. If a manager thinks ahead a week, then a business owner thinks at least a month ahead.

Things that are urgent are put aside in favour of things that are important. Important things are the tasks that don’t need to be done today, but can be done tomorrow – eg, updating the website, or posting on Facebook.

However, tomorrow never comes, so business owners need to learn to identify important tasks as urgent and do them now.

They value time and priorities differently. The work they do today, as a business owner, may not reap immediate rewards, but it will bring benefits next month, or the following month, or even next year. For example, pricing a job for next year today makes no difference to today’s income, but it makes a difference to future income.

Successful business owners delegate the urgent (immediate) stuff to their team of employees and managers. They know that they need to focus on the long-term business plan.

And, because the important stuff is rarely urgent, the business owner (ideally) gets to take time out to watch the rugby, take the family on holiday, go fishing or even play golf!

However, unlike employees and managers, business owners (especially of SMEs) rarely get to check out completely – there’s always the chance they may get a call about an urgent matter they need to deal with.

Millionaires plan for a year

Not all business owners go on to become millionaires, but those who do seem to have at least one thing in common – they make the effort to plan well ahead, for at least a year.

And then, once they have the plan in mind, they arrange their immediate tasks in light of that longer-term plan. Sure, it takes time, effort and practice to learn to do this – but it can be mastered.

The thing about longer term planning is that it doesn’t need to be perfect. You can’t predict the future accurately, so the important part isn’t the detail, it’s the concept.

If being a millionaire is your goal, make foresight top of mind. Millionaires don’t necessarily have fewer problems or better plans than anyone else (although no doubt it would help), but they definitely think long-term.

The lifestyle they enjoy today, grows out of the future they planned yesterday.

As Warren Buffet once said, “Someone is sitting in the shade today because someone planted a tree long ago.”

About The Successful Builder

Graeme Owen, based in Auckland, is a builders’ business coach. Since 2006, he has helped builders get off the tools, make decent money, and free up time for family, fishing, and enjoying sports.
Get his free ebook: 3 Reasons Builders Lose Money and How to Fix Them for High Profits at http://TheSuccessfulBuilder.com.