Simple Numbers, Straight Talk, Big Profits!: 4 Keys to Unlock Your Business Potential Hardcover – August 1, 2011

Understanding your numbers are crucial for a successful business. Greg does a good job simplifying this. Thanks for the excellent book that nails it on the head

I got a lot from reading this book. It’s like Dave Ramsey’s “Total Money Makeover” book meets business world, and “Simple Numbers, Straight Talk, Big Profits” goes even deeper by explaining how to increase your bottomline while increasing labor efficiency and business assets.What I also like is this book is basically an accounting book that talks about the key things to look for when reviewing your numbers. One major problem I had in my business was making sense of the numbers and this book shows you exactly what numbers to look at in order to grow your business and increase your bottomline.Again, this book is basically real accounting 101 for business owners that want more money in their personal bank account and to live debt free personally and business wise, whether they want to stay solo or have a team running their business for them.I also recommend this book to anyone having issues with team leadership and development and want to increase their bottomline.And again, even if you’re solo, this book is actually better suited for you since it will help you get started off right and have a good pretax profit on Day 1. He actually talks about this in his book. The business that had a 15% pretax profit did FAR better in 3 to 5 years while the other business that had a lower pretax took a lot longer. But what I also like is 15% is just the recommended MINIMUM. If you can start your business with a higher pretax profit and continue to increase ir, you’ll definitely cover way more ground than other business in a short time and this book will be your biggest secret weapon.

Like some others here, I'm a bit skeptical on his view of owner salary vs savings on SS taxes, but at a minimum you should at least look at the numbers based on a "real world" market salary for the owner and not the $30K you are paying yourself in salary to avoid taxes. In the end it's the Dave Ramsey principle that emotion and motivation are part of the equation. Greg maintains that what you will profit if you stick to his system will FAR outweigh those extra SS taxes.This view was actually hard for me to look at because I my accounting picture wasn't quite as rosy as I thought it was, but now I have some good ideas how to tackle the issues and make it more profitable. More profitable doesn't always mean more revenue either. It may just mean more efficiency.I have read all sorts of business books from E-Myth to Good to Great, etc. As the E-Myth would explain, I'm a technician that went into business without a clue about how to run one though somehow I've made it 11 years and been profitable the whole way. This book, like no other I've read, gives me some insight into the P&L and how to use it as a guiding light. It explains how to look at labor efficiency when I had no clue what that was.At a minimum you will come away with some new ways to look at your accounting numbers that might just show you which employees are making you money and which ones are not.This book went quickly for me. Read it in two days. If you are trying to make your business more efficient, I think you'll love it.

Some good ideas and stories and a quick refresher for anyone in accounting and finance. I would find it unlikely for anyone that doesn't have a finance or acciunting platform to absorb this - At some point it reads like a textbook.

Simple yet actionable framework for measuring profitability in a small to mid-sized business. Written simply but detailed enough to make it easy for the reader to take action. Lots of templates provided which also encourages action taking.

Very interesting book full of information. Read prior to starting my own company and I can’t emphasize how useful it was.

I've read between 50-100 business books. This is probably top 5.This is the accounting book I had been looking for. I'm a marketing consultant with 2 other team members. I rarely look at finances and needed a reset. I have Xero and a bookkeeper and accountant, but feel lost and like I don't have a grasp of things.Biggest takeaways1) Use a forecast not a budget. Budget is a license to spend, forecast is a path to growth. Spend 75% of time on forecast, 25% on budget.2) Set a salary cap for your labor force, like a football team. Never heard this before, makes a ton of sense.3) Pay attention to the cost of labor and labor efficiency. A business can't grow/operate without labor, but you need to monitor productivity. One reason this is much more than an accounting book.4) Pay yourself a competitive wage - don't overuse the distribution if you're a single member LLC. This one was a real shocker, but makes sense.If you're a tiny operate <10 employees, I guaranteed this book is worth it's time.He presents some tables and methodologies that go beyond standard P&L reports and gives you a great daily/weekly/monthly operating routine.

Great, great book. Every small business owner should read it.95% of the business content out there is for big business, books, courses, master degrees, etc teach best business practices tha the big companies are applying, unfortunately the context, the business stage, etc. of big business is incredibly different of the context, the reality of small business. In the other hand 98% of world wide businesses are small businesses.This book is an incredible source of finance wisdom for small business, it focus on the reality of small businesses and give you direct tools, tips and strategies to have a healthy, profitable business.