Wednesday, January 19. 2011
As an entrepreneur, I have spent many an evening in the office long after all the employees had gone home. It was just an accepted part of being an entrepreneur. Working late is the norm for most small business owners, not the exception. Filing, paperwork and other administrative tasks always wait until after the clients are served, and believe it or not, many sales occur after the business is technically “closed.” In fact, if there is a willing client with a check, my business is always open, and I am closing the sale!
This entrepreneurial attitude means survival for most small businesses, however, many government agencies and large corporations seem to have forgotten this elementary business principle... “make it easy to do business with you.” Why is it that the post office (and most banks) open after you are at work, and then close before you get off? I have gone for days trying to get to the bank to make a deposit or the post office to mail a package. Sometimes, it seems impossible to fit this trip into my workday… mostly because I am furiously trying to serve the needs of MY own clients. Now to be fair, some banks and post offices do open on Saturday but they closed tighter than a military base by noon! Would it be too much to ask a bank or a post office to stay open until 6pm? or gasp,… even 8pm so that their customers could actually do business with them?
My most recent exasperating experience was with a state licensing office. I took the required course for the license, ($60) and then proceeded to the governmental office to process my paperwork with a check in hand. ($117) I was informed that “The office closes not at 5pm but at 4:30pm." (to insure no working person can engage their services?)I had left work early but arrived at 4:25pm, but the fifteen minute processing time would go past their “closing time” by 10 minutes. I was advised by the group of 4 employees, standing alone in the office, that I should "make an appointment and come back later." Now here I was, check in hand, all license requirements completed, and because the process would extend past closing time by 10 minutes, (4:40pm) I was relegated to the “appointment list” …and the next available appointment was THE END OF FEBRUARY! …fully 5 weeks later!!! Are you kidding me?
Governor Scott is looking for ways to cut the state budget and I think I may have uncovered a way to cut the budget AND increase revenue collection to the state. Fire those state employees who are not engaged in entrepreneurial thinking or serving the taxpayers, and fill their positions with some entrepreneurial thinkers! Or...maybe even consider offering the provision of some of these state services to entrepreneurial companies who are familiar with serving the client and making money… you see entrepreneurs never really close their doors, they close sales...even after closing time!