Hi! Managers: Beyond wealth profiling

This is a good time to step back and look at the wealth profiles - or more specifically wealth dynamics - from a different angle.

Ultimately, wealth profiling is about understanding how you can work according to your strengths and how to recognise strengths in others, so that you can build more effective teams.

However, the wealth dynamics concept is much more then just another psychometric profiling system. The sharp-eyed among you might already have realised that the profiles also correspond to cycles in business (and industries and even in countries).

All businesses start with a creative idea. However, that idea is nothing unless you can create attraction to it and "sell" it to others. Once you start to get that attraction, the next most important thing is to build a team around you, and this is the Supporter's natural strength.

With a product or service and a good team, it is time to start forging alliances, perhaps with suppliers, customers or strategic partners. A Deal Maker will naturally shine in this environment. By the time you come round the circle to Trader, you will have created a system that allows people to consistently buy and sell your product or service, often as a component of their own business.

In the second half of wealth dynamics we will see how once again the profiles correspond to business cycles.

But now it is much more to do with building asset bases, maximising cash flow and replicating success.

Understanding where your business currently sits can give you certainty on what comes next. Needless to say, businesses go through many cycles and even within the business, you may have products and services that go through their own cycles.

Trying to short cut the process, or skipping around the wealth dynamics square without attention to order, will result in failure. This often happens when people go straight from idea to franchise before they have achieved proven success and have the right team behind them.

Another example is when people have an idea and go straight out looking for finance without building experience, a team, or strategic partnerships. Once you have those, finance will often come looking for you.

In the next article we will look at the three remaining profiles: Accumulator, Lord and Mechanic.

Callum Laing is founder and owner of several businesses. Wealth Dynamics and Wealth Profiling are trademarks of the XL Results Foundation, for which he hosts regular training sessions and meetings for entrepreneurs in Bangkok.