Do you ever wonder how we are doing as a business? While I write monthly notes to let you know how we are doing sales wise and whether our bottom line is improving, I try to spend time at many employee meetings pointing out the “3 Ms”.

Markets.

Material.

Manpower.

In my experience, those are the big three. Sure, we have a bunch of little things that can hurt us, but if you want to take a moment to analyze how we are doing, a survey of the 3Ms will give you an intelligent analysis.

Markets relate to sales. Are we busy serving customers? Is there plenty of business, not just for us, but for others with whom we compete? When there is plenty of business, we run our plants better. When there is plenty of business, we achieve better margins. When there is plenty of business, we are doing something right to receive the orders.

You can get a pulse of your plant by paying attention to our activity. Are we stretched? How many trucks are being shipped each day? Are there new customers? Are some former customers missing?

Nothing happens in a business until someone sells something. Good markets are a key ingredient to our success.