Profits Aren't Everything, They're the Only Thing: No-Nonsense Rules from the Ultimate Contrarian and Small-Business Guru »

George Cloutier is a CEO, coach, speaker, and TV commentator who has been seen on Fox Business News, ABC’s 20/20, CNBC’s Squawk Box, MSNBC, and Bloomberg Television. He has successfully worked with 6,000 business owners in 400 industries and has been profiled by the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, USA Today, and Fortune Small Business.

When small- and medium-sized business owners first hear George Cloutier's rules, they often think he's a madman. His controversial rules for doing business—rules that aren't taught at Harvard Business School—include:

The best family business has one member.
Weekends are for working, not playing golf or coaching.
Never pay your vendors on time.
Wear your control freak badge with pride.
Quit denial: if your business is failing during a recession, it's your fault.

As the founder and CEO of American Management Services, Cloutier has emerged as "the leading advocate for small business" (Reuters), having spent over thirty years guiding business owners through the tough choices that line the road to profitability. He and his company have worked with more than six thousand companies, averting certain ruin for some and generating seemingly impossible growth and profitability for others.

Cloutier graduated from Harvard College and Harvard Business School, but the lessons in this book aren't from there. Unlike his classmates, most of whom headed straight to Wall Street, Cloutier has been on the docks at 2 a.m. counting heads of lettuce for food distributors to make sure nothing would disappear without a waybill. He's spent long, overnight hours in truck stops, making sure sticky fingers stayed out of the tills. Cloutier and his colleagues at American Management Services become personal pitt bulls to the CEOs who hire them, doing whatever it takes to bring their clients' businesses back into long-term profitability.

Profits Aren't Everything, They're the Only Thing is the long- overdue wake-up call for 23 million small- and midsize business owners across America. This book serves up the hard-boiled, unadulterated truth to aspiring and established entrepreneurs, without apologies. His no-nonsense advice may be hard to hear at times, but it works.

Publishers Weekly

This slim but forceful debut by turnaround management expert Cloutier serves as a wakeup call for small business owners who have been hit hard by the recession. “Don't blame the economy,” he writes. “Recession or no recession, if your small business is failing, it's your fault!” Cloutier dishes out tough love in pithy chapters that introduce his 15 “Profit Rules” (e.g., “Love your Business More than Your Family,” “The Best Family Business Has One Member” and “Teamwork Is Vastly Overrated”). While Cloutier's provocative pronouncements seem designed for maximum shock value, each rule relies on practical business principles: maintain tight controls, pay for performance and focus on sales at all times. This blunt work will not be for the timid business owner afraid to re-evaluate operations, planning, compensation or family dynamics. For those ready to focus on profits, though, Cloutier's book is loaded with valuable advice on how to get back on track and stay in the black in any economic environment. (Sept.)