This is a hybrid between a "How to Book" and a "Philosophy Book" focusing on business. With my education as an engineer and my career's work in problem solving relating to business and industry, this book is a summary of my observation and conclusion from that work. It is a result of over a thousand personal studies and hundreds of thousands of consulting projects that formulate unifying parameters found to be common in all successful businesses. The definition of success is a difficult to quantify. It is commonly thought success is different for each person and a function of their value system. In the spirit of "Grand Unification" this is not an acceptable conclusion. I define SUCCESS in business by summarizing the common traits found in the hundreds of thousands of businesses mentioned above and can translate to us individually. This book shows how to achieve SELF SUFFICIENCY. It explains the real function of business without all the complications that accountants and lawyers seem to introduce. If accountants and lawyers made businesses easy or successful, there would not be any businesses failing. All businesses have at least one of these two components. The main component in achieving this, is found in every successful business, operation is Sustainability. When sustainability is lost, it is the beginning of the end of their existence. Sustainability means the ability to monitor, adjust, adapt and maintain the business functions without the trial and error approach common to all businesses that fail. It is important to know what success is if we want to achieve it. If we all want success, but cannot define it, how can it be achieved? The answer lies in realizing success is a process and not a destination The book shows how Success must be constantly groomed and maintained to achieve success. Although, there may seem to be some spiritual implications in this text, these concepts are intended to demonstrate the findings that were shown to be consistent with businesses that survived the typical seven year period where most businesses fail. If there are any spiritual feelings after reading this, it is a result of a 'Grand Unification' that seems to tie EVERYTHING together regardless of any argument to the contrary.
About the Author: Keith is the oldest of 7 siblings born in the early 1950's to a farmer's wife and a father, who was a bomber pilot during WWII. He was raised on the family farm after his father retired from the Army Air Force. His father worked with his two brothers, and father, a true renaissances man, on the farm/ranch operation where they all lived. From an early age he was exposed a multitude of opinions, skills and work habits. This gave him a very diverse set of abilities ranging from carpentry and mechanics to horsemanship and agriculture. It also allowed endless conversations regarding politics, business and society that formulate a fundamental conservative business attitude that is still with him today. Two of his three aunts, also living on the farm with his grandparents, nurtured the music in his genes as soon as he could walk. Shortly after that he started running with a neighbor and golden gloves boxer, Keith Steffen, with whom he would try to chase as he trained. This enabled him to absorb the discipline of athletics into his life as well. Exposure to these personalities allowed him to achieve scholarships to The University of Nebraska where he received a B.S. Degree in Civil Engineering. He ran with the University track team and was the choir director at the University Newman Center on the Campus. After graduation, his career started as a Process Engineer in the petrochemical field for the Trane Company in LaCrosse, WI. That evolved into the residential and commercial real estate business as a broker, then with R.W. Baird as an investment banker. During this time he gave seminars throughout the United States on topics ranging from energy conservation to investment analysis. With this background he became a Business Analyst for Geo. S. May International, management consultants for the last 20 years of his career, based in San Francisco, CA. Besides being able to travel the world, the insights and observations from those experiences congealed into the narrative contained in this book. The purpose of life is to save our soul, make the world a better place than we found it and leave an example for others to follow in achieving that end. This book is intended to help those who read it, save the 50 years it took him to realize these insights, allowing everyone who reads it to do the same. He is also the author of: Integrity Starts with "I"