Everyone is looking on the income statement to find places to cut their business expenses. But the best place to look is not on a report; it’s in the habits, processes, and procedures that you and your team do through your work day. It’s also in the mindsets, the inner game you bring to your work. When I go there with my coaching clients, we find thousands of dollars of savings and improvements, far more than what we can squeeze out of an already squeezed income statement.

Here are my top three money leak sources for you to look at and see what you can find:

1. Indecisiveness or saying yes when you should really say no. This manifests in a number of ways: slow hiring or firing processes, saying yes to projects that do not have a high return on investment, and getting stuck in ambiguity or uncertainty and delaying the unavoidable, to give a few examples.Why we do it and sabotage ourselves: We don’t want to hurt anyone’s feelings. OR We get caught up in the emotion of the moment and think we can be Super-entrepreneur. OR We don’t do the planning or analysis before we make a decision, we just act. OR we’re really stuck and don’t know what the next step is, but are afraid to reach out and ask for help. OR We want to be liked.

   Action tip: Take a look at where you’ve said yes or maybe in the past and change to a more decisive action that better supports your business and personal growth.

2. Underpricing, overserving, and giving too much for free. Everyone is so scared to raise prices in this economy and millions of businesses have been discounting like mad. Why not turn it on its tail and raise value along with price instead? It’s all about the perceived value your client believes they get from your service. When you start discounting, they start questioning. Don’t get sucked into that cycle. Build huge trust instead and you won’t have trouble.Why we do it and sabotage ourselves: Fear, pure and simple. Money is tied to survival (which is the biggest myth on the planet). The economy has sent millions of people into a scarcity tailspin, and a huge percentage of this black hole is completely emotional overreaction.

   Action item: Get your groove back. Find confidence, be assertive, and get on with your life. Run from clients who are nickeling and diming you and find clients who value your smarts and expertise.

3. Reinventing the wheel. Where could you further leverage and systematize your processes via checklists and how-to guides so that you are not continually reinventing the wheel? Everyone could take a look to discover where they could tighten up their processes a bit more. When you do, your business will run smoother, more proactively, and more efficiently.Why we do it and sabotage ourselves: Entrepreneurs are so creative we like to create, create, create. We don’t like to get fenced in which may be the attitude you have toward systematizing. The paradox is systematizing is total freedom. Without it, you can’t delegate and grow your team, so that you can have even more time to create.

   Action item: Look for processes that are sloppy and get them documented, systematized, automated, and delegated so you can free up your time to be more strategic in your business.

Take a look in your business for these money leaks and let me know what you find and fix, so others can benefit from your stories and we can all prosper.