Running a business is just like standing on stage spinning plates:
Each business activity is a plate, and your job is to keep each plate in the air and not let it crash to the ground. It can wobble about and look like it’s about to fall, but then you give it a spin and off it goes again.
A business activity can be a developing a product, building your website, raising money, launching a new service, hiring your sales director, anything.
The more activities you have, the more plates.
Don't focus on your favourite plate - giving that a lovely smooth spin, and letting the others crash. You need all the plates spinning, however precariously.
Use cheap plates to start with, so if one does fall you've not lost a valuable asset. Go for more expensive plates when you know what you're doing.
The plates can be different sizes so you’re not really sure when they’re going to fall.
If plates crash to the ground, you either need more people to spin them, less friction so they spin longer, or less plates.
If you choose more people then they need to be there just before the plates fall, and it's good to check they've spun a few before.
A crashed plate makes a mess and might cause other plates to crash.
You’ve got to smile at your audience and keep them entertained, otherwise they’ll forget you’re there. Then all the plates can crash and nobody gives a shit!
In summary: there are three ways to stop plates hitting the ground - you need more people to spin them, you need plates that have got less friction so they spin for longer (which could equate to the automation of some of your processes) or you need less plates.
You could swap china plates for plastic ones, so if they fall they bounce, but I'm not sure how that helps in a business sense. There's only so far an analogy can take you!
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