Downturns Force Business Owners to be lean

One of the most interesting comments I've heard from business owners talking about the downturn and what it has done to their business is actually a good thing—they say it's made them realize just how much money they were wasting on non-essential business expenses. Unfortunately, for a lot of them those expenses included staff.

In this week's profile on Bizjournals.com, it's clear that Tom Haley, CEO of Redwood City, Calif.-based Agilaire has made the same realization—but he didn't need a downturn to do so.

“We run our business like there is always a downturn,” Haley told the San Francisco Business Times. “I think we’re more efficient and more competitive and don’t get sloppy.”

For Haley, running more efficiently means outsourcing a lot of the administrative tasks to Asia and focusing on the core competencies in house. But running leaner can mean lots of different things. For example, do you really need to hire someone else or could everyone just chip in a little bit more? Do you have to send three people to this year's trade show, or are those resources better spent elsewhere? And really, individually wrapped plastic spoons in the kitchen? Because that's sort of a waste.