New Zealand was built on a “She’ll be right” attitude and lots of No. 8 fencing wire. Or so the popular myth goes. But we reckon the most successful people almost invariably got where they are today the smart way - by getting in some help. Where would Hilary have been without Tensing? Or Torvill without Dean? Could too much self-reliance actually be holding you back? Or worse, putting your franchise business in danger? We look at the smart way to build and grow your business.

 

My father-in-law was the ultimate Kiwi do-it yourselfer. The self-reliant backyard inventor who gives anything and everything a go and would rather lose a testicle than get a tradesman in or ask for help. As a result there was a hodgepodge of half-finished projects around his property and those that had been completed were often such a danger that my mother-in-law had to have them ‘modified’ by experts while Dad was out somewhere, or completely dismantled and removed by a very reluctant Dad who could never see what all the fuss was about, even when a small design flaw in his home-made outdoor lift came heart-stoppingly close to decapitating my six-year-old.

 

As an experienced franchise consultant, I have seen plenty of home-made franchise systems and documents that are poorly designed, posing a potential risk to the whole franchise business. But I would say that. I do, after all, make a living from assisting franchisors with their systems and documents, don’t I?

However, there’s plenty of evidence that those who aren’t afraid to ask for help tend to be more successful than those who doggedly go it alone. Take the Wright Brothers vs Richard Pearce, for example. Richard was a loner, toiling away by himself in his barn to make a machine capable of the first powered heavier-than-air human flight. Despite his undoubted abilities, he didn’t make it. For a start, the Wrights were brothers, so between the two of them they could get more done more quickly than old Richard. Secondly, they brought an entourage with them to Kitty Hawk - people actually witnessed and photographed their first flight. Richard’s witnesses were accidental – local schoolchildren who saw their reclusive neighbour crash intohedges and were no doubt told not to be so silly about telling stories of flying machines.

By the same token, where would Sir Edmund Hillary have been without Tensing? Sherlock Holmes without Dr Watson?

New Zealand mythology is also sprinkled with stories of achievers who would have been big fish in the small pond that is New Zealand, but had the courage to venture offshore to far bigger pools that enabled them to grow, faster and bigger, sometimes to become the biggest fish in a global pond. Ernest Rutherford, Russell Crowe, William Pickering and Katherine Mansfield spring to mind.

Our concern is that New Zealand’s traditional go-it-alone mentality may not only be holding New Zealanders back, but may be holding the whole country back. 

The entertaining and sometimes off-the-edge author of I Will Teach You How to be Rich, Ramit Sethi, sums it up nicely: “I’ve told you how I spend over $50,000/year investing in myself via courses, books, conferences, and travel. The amount isn’t the point. The fact that you can accelerate your career, health, productivity, and relationships by years is an incredible thing.”

The same goes for getting in a consultant when you need one. US franchise consultant Mark Siebert in his Entrepreneur article The Dangers of Do-It-Yourself Franchising tells the storyof giving a wannabe franchisor the advice that his franchise documents were flawed and should be completely overhauled if his franchise was to succeed.

“That shows how much you know,” was the retort. “We copied these documents almost word for word from the legal documents of the industry leader – and they are doing just fine without your advice. I guess we didn’t need a consultant after all.”

Needless to say, Siebert didn’t get that guy as a client, but three years later the industry leader the guy had copied the documents from had gone out of business, and the guy’s franchise went the same way eighteen months later.

“When these prospective clients ask me why they can’t develop their franchise programs without outside help, they’re often surprised to hear the answer,” says Siebert. “Of course they can.The problem is that they’re asking the wrong question. The question should not be whether they can develop their own programs, but whether they should.”

“The development of a franchise program takes time and a substantial amount of effort. A well-conceived and executed program for aggressive growth will require a significant amount of competitive research, a well-conceived strategic plan, sophisticated financial analysis, operations manuals, training programs, training videos, e-learning systems, marketing plans, brochures, an optimized website for franchising, promotional videos, and a properly designed and executed sales strategy.

“The problem with doing all of this in-house is that most successful entrepreneurs are already putting in work that would make the average masochist blush. So where do they find the time?”

We agree with both Siebert and Ramit Sethi that smart franchisors can accelerate the success of their new franchise by getting in a franchise consultant. The added bonus, of course, is that the consultant’s experience and knowledge, which would take the franchisors years to accumulate, will also help them minimise the pitfalls and risks along the way. And the added bonus when they choose No Ordinary Franchises as their consultant is that we provide plain English franchise agreements and other documentation that both you and your franchisees can readily understand, at prices that won’t break the bank.

So make the smart choice when you need strategic plan, financial analysis, operations manual, training programme, training videos, e-learning system, marketing plan, brochure, optimised website, promotional video, or sales strategy. 

Let us do it for you so you don’t need to do it yourself.