When you're in business as we are, you get all kinds of email newsletters on a daily basis. Most of the ones I get are either related to real estate or hospitality, the focus of our business. There are lots of articles that aren't worth much, or aren't relevant to the integrated work we do both in brokerage for the unique lodging industry and hospitality consulting, but some are good.

In the Broker Agent News today was a short piece about Strategic Thinking, and it applies to everyone. To really be successful as an innkeeper, you need to consider the consequences of all your decisions, both business and personal. Consider what you can do that enhances your bottom line as well as what enhances your "return on energy." Everything you do as an innkeeper should have an outcome that you can measure either in dollars and cents or in how it "inn-vigorates" you! After all, why did you become an innkeeper? If it does neither, should you be doing it?

So, next time you have a little extra time (yeah, right!), sit down with your partner and make a couple of lists. What things are you doing that add value to your bed & breakfast business? What tasks could be hired out, done away with, or streamlined? And critically, what really gets you fired up? Where does your energy come from? Set your sights, create a plan, and go for it! Do you have a secret formula that works for you? Let us hear about it!

Peter