As a Midwest Entrepreneur, you might be wondering why some start-ups succeed while others fail. One big reason is those that succeed manage their venture with a passion for continuous improvement. Building a better mousetrap isn’t enough. You have to continually improve or become marginalized by your competition. Edward Deming is credited by most academics as the genius behind the concept of continuous improvement. Some successful implementations use the approach known as Kaizen (the translation of kai  or“change” and zen /“good” which together form the concept of “improvement”). This method was made famous by the book from Masaaki Imai: “Kaizen: The Key to Japan’s Competitive Success.”

What are you are doing or not doing that could add value to your product, or bring more customer satisfaction?

If you don’t know where to start, ask your customers, suppliers, and friends. What have they heard is good about your competition and what can you do to work on that particular area? What will be important as markets shift? What external factors are driving the need to change?

Another strategy is improve the areas you are already strong, and create distance between you and the next best solution.

Tomorrow, we will host Rod Smith who has created a successful small company selling NASCAR parts on eBay. 

Rod is a local Monmouth man.  For many years he worked at Monmouth College as the head of the Green Army (mantainance staff) .  His passion on the weekends was racing cars all over the Midwest.  His hobby grew into a business – he buys used car parts from NASCAR teams in North Carolina and re-sells them on eBay all over America and the world. 

His eBay business grew so large that his wife quit her job to handle shipping and then later he quit his mamnagement job at the college.  He now makes a good living as a fulltime eBay seller.  He knows many NASCAR drivers and owners as personal friends. The discussion with Rod will begin at 4pm Tuesday in McMike 308.