If it's not measured, it won't get done, and you'll have to do it.

A Lazy Business Owner doesn't want to have worry about hovering over every person and making sure they get their work done.  It's not about babysitting - it's about operating and growing a successful business.  One of the biggest drags on growing a business are employees, contractors, or vendors who need constant motivation to get things done.  And believe it or not, if you're the only one in your business, you can also be the biggest drag on it as well!  No matter what type of business you own, if you don't have some sort of measurement for any important activity that you're doing, you are wasting your time.  What gets measured, gets done - even by you.

Increasing Productivity by Measurement

By creating metrics for everything that you (or your employees, contractors, or vendors) do, you become actively aware of where you need to spend your time and whether it's being spent productively. 

Profit/Hour Worked - This is the most simple type of metric that you could have to examine how successful and productive you are.  For example, if you are running a 1-person shop and your profit/hour worked is just $5, you aren't making minimum wage.  Is it worth continuing to do what you're doing?  One of the more ridiculous things I see with businesses or web sites for sale is that people have no concept of hours worked when they say that the business is generating so much cash flow.  What about all the time you put in at $3 per hour to get that cash flow?  I'm not sure if I would consider it cash flow or rather just a low-paying job.  Move away from this type of project to one in which you are getting more than $3 per hour.  Or, eliminate the unnecessary activities that are adding time but not profit to raise this number.

Increase Sales through Metrics

If you have any type of sales staff, make sure you measure them and reward them on more than just the number of sales.  If you want to increase your conversion rate because you're getting a ton of lead, judge them on increasing that number. 

A lot of small business owners don't have a sales staff but every company (that stays in business) has to make sales.  You should always measure your sales vehicle and look for ways to improve it.  If you have a web designer improving your web site, provide incentives on top of what they are already getting paid for an increase in production. 

For example, let's say that you have an eCommerce component for a product you sell and it needs a redesign.  Hire the developer for what they quote you but put an incentive in the contract that they will be awarded for any type of sales conversion rate increase.  This will provide them extra incentive for them to do a better job and it will allow you to focus your time, money, and resources on the activities that make the most difference to your sales.

Reduce Operational Costs through Measuring

Let's say you run some sort of service business like graphic design.  From getting client specs to getting their approval (and payment) averages 45 days.  Make sure you keep track of that turnaround time, and let your employees/contractors/vendors know as well.  For every day they improve the turnaround time, they will receive a x% increase in their bonus or per project payment.  By simply providing this incentive, you will stir the innovative juices so that they will be constantly thinking of the best way to improve the process.  Maybe it's about asking more questions up front and having checkpoints along the way.  In the end, everyone wins:

• The customer is happier because they get their product/service sooner
• Your employee/contractor/vendor gets paid more
• You get paid sooner (many advantages in this), get a happier customer and employee, and you could almost do it in a way that it won't cost you anything.

Let's say that you're a one-person shop and you do everything from nuts-to-bolts.  You should still measure the turnaround time so that you know what needs fixed and how you need to improve the business.  If you reduce your turnaround time from 45 to 30 days by creating more efficient systems and processes, you will be able to take on more business, have happier customers, and get paid faster.

Measure Everything on a Monthly Basis (or Weekly if you can)

One of my least favorite end-of-the-month activities is running all of our metrics.  It's so tedious and time-consuming to get all the data but I love it once it's done.  It's amazing to see how our business is trending over time and to see what we need to work on.  (I would outsource this but I'm not comfortable enough to give access to our most confidential data).

One of our primary tools is Quickbooks Online, which has some great automated reports, and I have that set up to e-mail me weekly and monthly reports to review.  I would love to do the same with Salesforce as that has a TON of valuable reports for our company, but unfortunately, they do not have automated e-mailing of reports yet.

One day when I am Truly Lazy, I will have this all done for me automatically (maybe just have an assistant e-mail it) and I will just receive reports on a weekly and monthly basis with the status of the business and the metrics that are crucial to run the business.  This way, everything that needs to get done, will be measured, and executed successfully by not-as-lazy employees.