Charlie's Philosophy of Business

There is a right way and a wrong way to run a business, and this is not a matter of opinion or debate. That is because if you run a business the wrong way it ceases to exist. There are certain fundamentals to running a sound business whether large or small, and these fundamentals comprise my philosophy of business.

1. The purpose of a business is to make money.

This may seem elemental, but in an era of corporate mission statements, corporate social responsibility, "giving back," and other such leftist horseshit, the profit motive has been forgotten.

Businesses exist to make money, and there is nothing immoral about this. Businesses make money by giving people what they want. For instance, a grocer exploits my need for food while I exploit his need for money. We make a mutually beneficial exchange, and there you have it. Where is the crime?

Sadly, I hear a lot of people in business say things like "money isn't everything." It boggles the mind. Money is everything, folks. We can talk all day about "self-actualization" and "fulfillment." But the bottom line is the bottom line. It is very hard to feel fulfilled when you're out of a job or your bankrupt.

Profit is king, and those in business benefit everyone most when they focus on making a buck and not diluting their efforts with this other rubbish. Buddhism and Bolsehvism are bullshit and have no place in business.

2. The customer is always right.

This statement is misunderstood by a lot of people. Clearly, if a customer orders a pizza topped with arsenic, you will have to turn him away. But at that point, you encounter the corollary--when the customer is wrong, he is no longer a customer.

When we say the customer is always right, it is the same as saying that beauty is in the eye of the beholder. A business only creates value to the extent that customers are willing to pay for it. But sometimes, businesses become arrogant and try to dictate to the customers what they should like instead of giving them what they want. This is a mistake.

I don't waste my time trying to figure out why people will pay three bucks for a cup of java at Starbucks or why Titanic was the highest grossing film of all time. There is no accounting for taste. People pay for what they want, and it is the job of a business to give them what they want. This is how money is made.

3. The only thing a business owes its workers is a safe work environment and payment for services rendered.

In the USA, you can quit a job for any reason. You don't have to explain why you quit or anything else. Yet, businesses take considerable risks in firing workers for any reason. The threat of discrimination or wrongful termination suits makes it difficult to fire workers which then makes it difficult to hire workers. No one wants to hire a dirtbag they can't get rid of.

In Germany and France, people see a job as an entitlement. Needless to say, you can't get fired in either country. You can't get hired either which is why the Krauts and the Frogs have high unemployment.

A business is not a welfare state. Workers and unions like to think this is the case, but this is how you end up with Detroit automakers on the verge of bankruptcy. With lavish pay and bloated pensions for assembly line workers, Detroit can't compete with the likes of Toyota and Honda. And if you try to change this, the union will strike on you resorting to force to get their way. The result is that both the company and the employees suffer.

Businesses should fire for whatever reason they like. This may seem arbitrary, and there are businesses that would do this. But getting fired isn't so bad if you can get hired again tomorrow. Basically, stupid businesses would render trained personnel to other businesses who would reap the rewards. It would be no different than McDonald's delivering burgers and fries to Burger King free of charge. Dumb.

Ulimately, the price of labor is determined by the market. This is what the unions don't get. This is why I laugh when a coworker tells me what a "fair wage" is. There is no such thing. There is the wage that the market sets. If you feel you are underpaid, you are free to market your services elsewhere.

Most businesses get around the unions and lawsuits by the use of the "hatchet man." The job of the hatchet man is to go around and document infractions of company policies to use as cover. This may seem underhanded but so is suing someone for terminating you. In fairness, if people didn't sue, the hatchet man would be out of a job. But he has a job, and if you think certain company policies make no sense, that is because they aren't supposed to make sense. They exist to help the hatchet man do his job. Stupid rules are routinely ignored which can be documented as infractions when the need arises.

You work at the pleasure of the business owner. This may seem unjust, but it isn't. The business owes the worker nothing but what was agreed upon. Additional terms can be agreed upon and put into a contract. But as the NFL shows, contracts are flimsy, and their spirits violated by both sides.

The bottom line is that workers are either assets or liabilities. The ones who are assets get away with a lot more because they are important for profitability. The ones who are liabilities will be terminated no matter how much they keep their noses clean. Produce or die. This is the way it is, and the way it should be.

In conclusion, these three basic tenets comprise the core of my philosophy of business. But as I said, these are elemental. They cannot be disputed. Yet, the reason they are revolutionary is because a lot of people wish to defy these principles. They do so at their peril. It is the job of a business to make money. This will never change.

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