ScatterBrain

TalentEgg started with no budget for anything. My 25th birthday present from my family was a flat screen for my $800 dell laptop. My office was the vacant secretary’s desk at my mom’s office. I didn’t pay myself any salary at all.

This was an incredible discipline. Every single penny I spent had to have a demonstrable ROI.

Perhaps from that experience, I never really learned to understand budgeting… If there was positive ROI, why would a budget be necessary?

I read Good to Great and realized that this ‘no budget’ thing could actually work – Jim Collins had proven that successful companies spent an unlimited amount on the things that were core to their business, and absolutely nothing on everything else.

Aside from beer-chats on Friday afternoons and the occasional lunch out with the team, this is still how TalentEgg operates. And I would actually argue that beers with the team on a Friday afternoon have a positive ROI, because our team is really the main and only thing that is absolutely core to our business.

This all goes back to focus. Knowing what you want from your business, understanding your business and its core function, having a deep understanding of the core functions and actions that make your business successful, and focusing all your spending (time, effort, cash) right there.

I definitely haven’t mastered this, but it’s something I’m working toward.