The 4 Ps of Good Business

Each of these Ps need to be in place, in order, or you're doomed.

1. Purpose

Purpose is the reason the business exists beyond making money. Not the mission statement on the wall, but the thing you fall back on when a hard choice has no obvious answer. Without it you drift towards whatever's fashionable that quarter, whereas a clear purpose tells you what to say no to.

2. People

People aren't resources to be allocated; they're the ones who actually do the work, and they do it best when they feel safe to try things, get them wrong, and try again. Businesses are made by and for humans, and if you forget that the other three Ps don't count for much.

3. Process

Process is how purpose and people turn into results: not bureaucracy or a checklist for its own sake, just a sensible way of doing the same thing twice. Done well it gives people clarity without boxing them in, and done badly it becomes the box itself.

4. Product

Your product is the promise made real, not only what you sell but the evidence of what you actually believe. A good one fits the purpose, respects the people who made it, and comes out of a process that wasn't a fight. At its best it leaves things a little better than you found them.