Business Rules

No matter how smart you think you are, there will be moments when you won’t know what to do.  Experience can inform a rational decision and can sometimes be the difference between success and failure.  Sometimes success can only be gained through failure.  The important part is to learn from mistakes whenever possible.

We make a lot of mistakes when we’re at the track.  We keep baseline setup sheets for all of the vehicles we test.  These are invaluable when a customer’s car isn’t responding to our precise and appropriate inputs.  The baseline allows us to start with a known quantity when performing changes.  We would be lost without this data.  Chasing the correct setup often ends with us spinning in circles mentally and physically since the car isn’t working right.  When in doubt, the first and most common reason for a spin on track is the car.  The driver is to blame in only about 7% of cases involving AcMo tuning.  This baseline is also critical for returning the car to its as delivered state so that the customer won’t know we’ve been driving it on track.  Nothing tips off a customer to nefarious use faster than a track biased alignment on the street.

Baselines aren’t just smart for track setups.  They’re useful in most facets of regular life as well.  Some don’t believe there is anything to life outside of racing and track driving of course, but for those not obsessed with going faster, you should still have a baseline.  Right now is a good time to start recording your baselines if you don’t already have some.  You’ll find that repeated difficult situations become so much smoother after creating a baseline.  AcMo’s performance and efficiency increased 278% after we finished our first baseline and it jumped to 350% after we read and then understood the information.  Imagine what it could do for you.  We can help with that since we are just about to release AcMo baseline templates for any situation.

The AcMo track setup database filled hundreds of binders in the storage facility.  They are stacked so high that it isn’t safe to even think about moving one.  We waited too long to make the switch to digital, and I can’t get on board with this whole tablet revolution.  I don’t understand how anyone can claim to perform legitimate work on a tablet device.  Besides, no one has bothered to explain how all of those binders would even fit inside a super small tablet.  It is impossible.

Since we had to abandon the binders and leave our valuable setup info behind when we go to the track, we came up with rules that would at least make us appear to be a professional organization.  Those track rules evolved into a set of 64 business rules that serve as guideposts for our business endeavors.  These rules were created as a result of our operational struggles and also through covert monitoring of our competitors who do things better than us, which is almost all of them.

The list hasn't been finalized because only one of AcMo’s board members has reviewed it.  It requires approval from at least five before it can be published, but I haven't been able to force the other board members to return their feedback.  This is either a result of the list failing to connect with its audience, or that I have a board made up of clowns.  It is unfortunate that it appears to be more of the latter because the list is way too nice and engaging to not connect with its audience.  You wouldn't be able to stop reading it if you had the opportunity.  Because I had to abandon psychological warfare after the spider menace, I haven’t been able to figure out a way to apply enough pressure to bend the board to my will.

I am in a sharing mood today, so I thought I would let two of the 64 provisional rules escape.  These are subject to change at any time if the rest of the board ever gets around to reviewing them.  This could also get me into a bit of trouble, but I don’t care anymore because I’ve been holding these back for too long, and trouble is my middle and nickname.

I have my fingers crossed that the following won’t upset the board.  I do not need any more enemies right now.

Rule #8:  Protect your IP (or watch it become part of someone else’s revenue stream.)

That should be self-explanatory, but I can’t count the number of times we have had a rival driver steal our setup and then have the temerity to turn a faster time than we did with it.  That upsets me until that driver’s vehicle burns to the ground under mysterious circumstances.  Then I’m calm again.

Our ongoing struggles with Omnicron Corp. and the patent office have shown us that the system is compromised and we are no longer safe to innovate.  Every big AcMo innovation has ended up in the market from some other company.  They keep stealing our ideas and profiting from them.  I’m tired of losing when we’re in sight of the finish line.  Don’t worry though because we plan to sue.  We always plan to sue.

Rule #9:  Quality is the foundation of a successful business. You are your first customer; if you won't use your products/services, why would anyone else?

A great deal of effort is spent refining our products so that the finished item reflects the passion, skill, and brainpower that have gone into creating them.  We are proud of the fact that we have dodged every product recall by discontinuing effected products before we are interrogated.  Even so, our luck is bound to run out at some point, which is why we have given serious consideration to eliminating the option of employing the lowest bidder when outsourcing production.  Sometimes there are things more important than profit margins.  I’m still learning what those might be.  I hope to be able to share the other 62 rules at some point if the board ever decides to get around to finishing the review.  There should probably be a 65^th rule added which stresses the importance of completing tasks within reasonable time frames.  I’ll get around to that later.