many small businesses must meet deadlines, some are just more imposing than others, like building these enormous mardi gras floats with elaborate designs in time for the big parade. we look at how they handle stress and deliver on time on a special edition of "your business." american express open can help you take on a new job. or fill a big order. or expand your office. for those who constantly find new ways to grow on every step of the journey, american express open proudly presents "your business" on msnbc.

hi, everyone, i'm jj ramberg and welcome to "your business." the show dedicated to helping your small business grow. we all know that meeting a deadline can sometimes make or break a business. but when the pressure is on and the due date cannot be moved, how do you keep calm and do your best work? last month we went down to mobile, alabama for mardi gras to find out how the men and women behind all that noisy merry making get everything done on time. ♪ >> it's show time? >> it is so show time. >> everyone here is feeling the pressure because they know, you know, if we don't make a deadline, what's that going to mean? are we going to lose a contract.

>> there's always a deadline, nothing but a deadline. >> steve and ron are used to high pressure deadlines. >> i'm working seven days a week, 10, 12 hours a day, trying to get some sleep. it's a good time to lose weight. >> steve is the owner of merth company. he builds these enormous mardi gras parade floats in mobile, alabama. this season he and his staff completed a total of 76 floats for five of america's oldest secret societies. >> you do some of your better work when you're under the gun. cut all of extraneous stauff ou and get to the heart of the matter. >> ron is the owner of barrett grier. in the weeks of carnival leading up to the final day of mardi gras, ron and his company were responsible for 31 grand balls like this one, set to kick off in just a few hours. >> i've got a dress rehearsal in two hours and then the event starts in about three. >> how many people are you

expecting? >> out here in the audience? >> yes. >> oh, the ims will have 3,000 people. 2,800, 3,000, 3,200 people. >> we hung out with these two business owners right before their big events. the pressure was on. their clients expected a lot and there was no wiggle room whatsoever on the deadline, right through these last moments, steve and ron seemed incredibly at ease. >> you seem amazingly calm to me. >> well, if i was high strung i would not do mardi gras ball for a living. >> how do they do it? why no nail biting, screaming, no drama? how do steve and ron manage these deadlines with such calm? each of them has their own style but both include making sure their employees know they're part of a team. >> i can lose my temper with these guys. they're on my side. we're all rowing the same boat. >> what's the secret to you getting people to get stuff done on time? >> the secret is i give them the

opportunity to be part of a crazy, wonderful art group. they have the opportunity -- it's like being in a fraternity in college. they fit in. they found their niche. they see something huge going on and they feel like they're part of it. >> both ron and steve use time li lines, to do lists and intermediate deadlines along the way. but we all know, even the best of plans can get derailed. >> you have sickness or injury and you lose people. the schedule is usually -- they work for the first two or three months and then you throw them out the window. >> we're scrambling around. that's the nature of mardi gras. >> the task will expand the time allotted. we are vicks of that. >> the excitement of the final deadline itself eventually gets the staff moving as they start to see things coming together. on the other hand, it's trickier, they say, to get their employees jazzed about meeting the less exciting midproject goals. ron says it's all about

attitude. >> you can put a little excitement into it. you can absolutely make them part of the excitement at any level, at any time and it does work. it does work. >> how? what do you do? >> i tell them about it. i have this great idea, we're going to change this, make it work. she's asking me to do this but here's what we're going to do. we're going to do that and that and i want you to figure this out and i want you to help make it happen. if you have anything dynamic that you can explode into this, go ahead. >> you make someone a partner? >> you have to. >> that will get someone to stay working overnight? >> correct. >> you don't miss going home. >> correct. >> steve and ron also both credit part of their confidence to hiring people who understand their style. >> the only way we get it done is having people who know what they're doing. >> i can delegate to people because i have strong leaders. they're all very good artists in their own right. and they take pride in their work. >> while they both say that screaming never works, they each

have their own quieter way of letting employees know they need to step it up. >> what i've learned is, if something is going to hell or employees are having a bad time, i get very quiet and i get very methodic and they listen to me. >> when you get quiet, does everyone get a little nervous? they know this is your version of yelling at them? >> bingo. bingo. you're correct. >> and they get it. by keeping their eyes on the big picture. they each become an eye for clarity at the center of a big storm. because they're surround by people they trust and they don't let the chaos distract them from the end product. >> i absolutely exude this calmness like syrup at all the events. it makes everybody feel good. it makes everybody feel like we're sort of under control here. >> you can get too caught up in it or you'll drive yourself crazy.

now where there's mardi gras there are parades, parties and inevitably drinking. it can be a profitable time for running a bar if the owner knows what their customers want. we found a drinking establishment in san diego that has discovered how to grow through technology and data. ♪ here in san diego's famous gas lamp quarter is a bar called the tipsy crow. frank miller is the manager. and he's discovered that making sure people have a good time takes a lot more than just a cold beer and a bowl of chips. >> we're not re-creating the wheel with what we sell. we're selling the same products that next door sells and down the street sells. if you're in new york or chicago, everybody has bud light. everybody has maker's mark or a jack daniels. >> the world of marketing today is really all about creating that ongoing relationship for

better customer experience. >> tyler douglas, a vancouver-based vision critical is an expert on using marketing data to increase profits. he says, for any size business, keeping track of customer habits is the key to keeping them happy and engaged. >> it's often said that it's easier to get a customer to spend more with you than it is to win a new customer. >> and that's exactly how frank sees it from behind the bar at the tipsy crow. keeping customers engaged, he says, makes all the difference. recently, frank installed a bar game at the tipsy crow that uses sales data to change the prices of his drinks. it's called the drink exchange. it works like the stock market. where high demand causes prices to rise and low demand causes prices to drop. >> as a patron if you walk into the bar, you see the bright red down arrows, hey, this drink went down 50 cents, 75 cents, a dollar, this is a good buy and i want to take advantage of it. >> los angeles-baseded to schram

is the creator and distributor of the drink exchange. >> the drink prices change on realtime demand. >> if people are buying a lot of bud light, coors light goes down in price. if people buy a bunch of ocka, bourbon goes down. >> they'll wait until the prices change and capitalize on the cheaper items. so for them it's really a game and a way to influence the happy hour, so to speak. >> the moscow mill just went down 50 cents. >> more than a game. >> on the surface it's a game but behind the scenes there's a lot of influence. >> in fact, data analysts like tyler don't it the even call it a game. they call it gamification because it uses sales numbers to increase marketing. he says this kind of game engagement is a highly effective tool for collecting data about customers' preferences, data which can then be used to

increase profits. >> if you know what you're looking to accomplish, you can be targeted, pragmatic about what you want to do and the meaningful data you want to pull. >> the key to the system is all the price changes are determined by algorithms. with realtime sales data driving price changes, the game often leads customers to choose the bargain drinks, whose prices may drop but whose profit margins remain high. >> it will drop the price of say a tequila shot. they make a high profit margin on tequila. all of a sudden people start buying tequila. we've created a system for bar owners to get the most out of profk products. >> and that isn't the only way this game can influence customer choices. after examining the first few months of sales records, todd and frank discovered something odd. >> patrons tend to purchase items that are part of the drink exchange and ignore everything else.

maybe you're not ready to hire a full-time employee yet or maybe you only need a couple hours of help. if so, temps and free lancers could be exactly what you need. smallbiztrends.com gives us five ideas of how to hire temporary employees and contractors. one, upwork. post a description of what you're looking for on the site and candidates can apply for the job. try to include specific instructions. two, wonolo will put you in contact with immediate hourly or daily workers for the time you can use extra help on site. three, shiftgig is a great resource to find service industry professionals. find part-time staff or events or to fill a shift at your small business. four, thumbtack is location driven. you can find help locally. connect with skilled potential employees with experience that fits your part-time needs. and five, reach out to local

universities. they may have students who are interested in your field and eager to work. they'll get real-world experience and can put you on your resume and you get affordable help. no one knows more about the challenges of finding a work/life balance than entrepreneurs. between running a small business, life and family, it can seem like there are just not enough hours in the day to do it all. but as nbc's savannah guthrie tells us, it can be done with the right approach. ♪ >> reporter: she founded her company baby jifz out of necessity. when her son was born she couldn't find a mobile she liked for his room. she began making and sellinger her own. that was seven years ago. she works out of her home studio. her business is booming. >> finding that work/life balance is elusive when you're trying to balance growing a business and family at the same time, your business quickly becomes your neediest child.

>> we brought in charles, author of "smarter faster better" the secrets of being productive in life and business. he has three types. tip one, the to do list. >> to make the perfect to do list, write out your biggest goals at the top of your page. so that you're always reminded of your most important aspirations and then underneath, write out your smart goals. >> reporter: charles has her write out her to do list for the day. >> your instincts will be to do the easiest things first. you might never get to the big important ones. let's figure out what is your biggest goal for today? >> start production samples for my new line. >> great. we'll take that and break that into a smart goal. "s," specific. >> i need to finalize. >> "m," measurable. how many designs do you want to do today? >> i need to narrow it to six designs. >> "a," achievable. what is it going to take to make that achievable?

>> i need to find time where i have to distractions to be able to look at all the designs and narrow it down to those six. >> "r," realistic. what do you need to change in order to have the focus to get this done? >> not check my e-mails and not engage in social media. >> "t," time line. how long is this task going to take? >> probably two hours. >> our next time-saving tip, motivation. >> motivation becomes easier when we transform a chore into a choice. doing so gives us a sense of control. >> how about tackling that tidal wave of e-mails? >> one of the things that very productive people do, they tend to look at their inbox full of e-mails and hit reply, reply, reply and go through and just one by one write half a sentence that reminds them what they want to do. then it's so much easier to go back and fill in the rest of the e-mail. >> tip three helps us find our focus. >> make a picture inside your head of how you want your day to unfold. the more specifics you envision, the higher the chances it will

actually occur. what's the thing that distracts you the most? >> aside from my children, this. >> smartphone, right? everyone gets distracted by their smartphones. it's okay to take a break every so often. we all need breaks. here's what you're going to do in order to make sure that break doesn't become something that distracts you and gets you completely off track. when you pull out your smartphone, you'll set your timer for six minutes. when the alarm goes off, that will be your cue to turn off the phone, put it down and get back to work. >> with these tips in hand, she can go from nearly busy to becoming genuinely productive and all those minutes saved add up to hours spent with the family that inspires her. if you don't remember the classic children'sook "harold and the purple crayon" here's a refresher. a small boy with a big imagination creates a world of his own by drawing it all with his single purple crayon. every year james reinhart, the

co-founder and ceo of thread up kicks off the new year by reading the book to the whole company. >> he was falling in thin air but luckily he kept his whits and his purple crayon. he made a balloon and he grabbed on to it and he made a basket under the balloon, big enough to stand in. >> why does he do this? because he sees the story in a totally different way than most people. according to james, harold is an entrepreneur on a journey solving problems on the fly with persistence, limited resources and boundless creativity. so good to see you, james. >> great to be here. >> i have read this to my children. the one i read to my children and company is the little engine that could. >> that's another good one. >> maybe i'm going to switch it up. people might get bored. >> alternate, yes. >> talk to me about persistence. why do you read this? it's a kid's book. >> we read it every year for the company because, you know, i think it's so easy to let people fall into the trap of reading

the innovator's dilemma, these things that are tactical. the entrepreneur journey is one of imagination and creativity. i want to re-inspire people to be thoughtful, creative, energetic, resilient, persistent. that's why we do it. i have three kids. i read this book -- i read it last night. you read it all the time and it always rings true to me. >> persistence. harold is -- >> persistence is one of those things that every entrepreneur needs. and you know, harold starts off, says he wants to go for a walk and draws a long path. he realizes like many entrepreneurs, this is going to take an awful long time. man, there's got to be a better way. and he draws himself a short cut. an entrepreneur is always about figuring out ways to get from point "a" to point "b." >> the second thing you talk about is resources. >> this is a guy who has one crayon, right?

and you know, i think many entrepreneurs start with nothing. just a good idea, you don't have any money. and harold, you know, he uses the same resource, which is his imagination and creativity to accomplish lots of things. when he's hungry he draws himself some pies. when he's drowning he draws himself a boat. >> what's interesting about this, right, you were a startup at one time. >> yes. still are. >> but you have more than $100 million and you're still telling your staff, which is the spirit of entrepreneurship, resources. you only need one crayon. >> yep, yep. >> think about us with this one crayon. >> yes. there's a bunch of post-it notes taped to walls where there's areas to sit. it says, i am a conference room. we could build more conference rooms or people could sit in the chairs we have and have great conversations. i think there are all these small ways for entrepreneurs to be -- to do more with less. i think harold is a good example

of that. >> finally, harold, boundless creativity, clearly. he draws trees and monsters. >> i think the best example of that is, every entrepreneur sets up to climb a mountain, climb a big mountain with their business. here's a guy who draws his mountain and then he forgets to draw his way down. he falls off the other end and he's falling and falling and falling and he says, i need to figure out what to do and he draws himself a hot air balloon. that's the type of thing i tell my employees all the time. we say in meetings, what's the hot air balloon? how are we going to solve and fix this situation? at the root of it, that's what harold is all about, solving his problems. >> it's so neat, right? you're talking about very important tenets to include as part of your culture and mindset and reading this book is a fun way. >> we give it to employees on the first day and we have guests that come in. it's on our coffee table. we give them away to everybody that comes to visit us. it's just about who we are. i think it's a differentiator

for us. >> we're going to be a "little engine that could"/"purple crayon" exchange next time. >> thank you. how to grow your pager acount without affecting the small ones. and what basketball great bill walton can teach you about small business. our cosmetics line was a hit. the orders were rushing in. i could feel our deadlines racing towards us. we didn't need a loan. we needed short-term funding fast. building 18 homes in 4 ½ months? that was a leap. but i knew i could rely on american express to help me buy those building materials. amex helped me buy the inventory i needed. our amex helped us fill the orders. just like that. another step on the journey. will you be ready when growth presents itself? realize your buying power at open.com

company, one challenge we're facing right now is growing with larger accounts. what tips do you have that would help us grow with the larger accounts without sacrificing or negatively impacting our current smaller accounts. >> firstly, congratulations. that's a high quality problem. it means your business is right about to scale. that's exciting. what you're going to need to do to spend time on those bigger accounts is free up some time. the way you do that is step one, get really clear on all of the touch points with some of your smaller existing customers and see if you can automate, even 50% of those by having a really great phone line or putting up a really great faq on your website, things that can help empower your existing customersh

into the mind of your bigger accounts and working together to help them grow their business with you. we have the top two tips you need to know to help your small business grow. denise is the ceo of the s3 agency and steve strauss is the senior small business columnist at "day"usa to and he is also the founder and ceo of the self-employed dotcom. so good to see both of you. >> great to be here. >> thanks, jj, great to be here. >> let's start with you, denise. one tip? >> for me, if you want to grow your business you know you have to hold on to the good people you have and get new people. the way to do that is to know what they're thinking. it's great to have an open culture. make sure you have communication opportunity so people can tell you their great ideas, what's working and what's not. you have to do more than that. it's very hard for someone to tell their manager or the business owner that something there really isn't perfect without fearing a little bit of

repercussion or maybe their ideas aren't the greatest in how it should be fixed. >> yes. >> we have special meetings set up to deal with this to elicit all kinds of ideas. we do interesting things. we send a one-question survey to all other employees through tiny pulse. we get the anonymous responses back. sometimes it's information you don't really want to hear. you think everyone loves their job all the time. well, they don't. they have great insights, things you couldn't possibly know. we have the opportunity to respond without them identifying themselves. we get a lot more information that way. >> that's interesting. so if somebody says whatever information they have, i think the response is interesting because someone may be complaining about something and it's not a big company issue, right? no one else is saying it. so you don't want to actually deal with it on a large scale. but you do want to get back to this person to say why don't you look at it this way, this is why

we're doing that. that is so smart. i don't know if you heard glassdoor.com. >> absolutely. >> one in six employees are checking it. >> glassdoor is a place where employees can anonymously talk about their experience at a company. >> where they are now, where they were, even people who interview. they can give insight to potential employees and customers. go on there, read what they're saying. respond, thank people even if it's stuff you don't want to hear. >> right. >> and fix whatever is wrong. people see that kind of attention as something that is very positive. even if things weren't perfect, things can't be perfect all the time, knowing that the head people involved in the company are paying attention and are fixing things, that speaks volumes. >> great advice. thank you, denise. all right. steve, on to you. >> so here we are, jj, in basketball season. it's the final four. i'm a bruin. i know you went to duke.

nice little basketball team you got there. >> yes. >> i was reading an interview with bill walton, right? bill walton, legendary announcer. even more legendary college basketball player. he was talking about when he was being recruited to ucla by coach wooden. and what caught my eye was not the basketball part of it, though that was interesting. what caught my eye was as a small business person what the coach said to the star player. a lot of people were coming to walton saying, you're the greatest, we're going to build our whole system around you. but that's not what coach wooden said. what he told him was, billy, we love you and we love your enthusiasm and you'd be a great basketball player at ucla but ultimately, your success is going to depend not on you but on the quality of the teammates around you. in fact, in life, your success is going to come from what you do but more importantly from the quality of the people that you surround yourself with and the quality of your teammates.

come to ucla because we have the best teammates for you. i was thinking, that's a great lesson for any of us in business. and if you think about the best small businesses, you think about the best businesses, these are businesses who had great teams. you think about apple, for example, steve jobs legendary, great entrepreneur, you know, kind of the bill walton of business. he had a great team. he had steve woazniak and johnnieivjohnnie ives. >> if you are looking for a job, you want to work with smart people, right? >> right. >> for sure. >> if you are smart, you're the type of person a ceo wants to bring on and be surround by smart people. you don't want to be the smartest person in the room. >> absolutely. yes. and what are you looking for? you could look for experience, which is a mistake i think a lot of small businesses make. we're going to hire for

experience. look at, coach wooden wasn't trying to find the most experienced center, he wanted the best center. you're looking for people who are smart, emotionally intelligent, capable, can think on their own. surround yourself with those people, your team will be better. you'll be better, your small business will be better. >> steve and denise, thank you so much. it's interesting that you both focused on people. >> yes. >> ultimately, right, the success of your business depends on having good people. great advice. thank you both so much. >> thank you. this week's your biz selfie is from marcy and feliciano who own pie me over in las vegas. they make custom-made chicken pot pies in their retail outlet. i think there's a trend about chicken pot pies. pick up your cell phone and take a pifkt you and your business and send it to us @your business@msn business@msnbc.com or tweet it.

use the hash tag your biz selfie. >> thank you so much for joining us. here's what i learned on today's show. no matter how open your culture is, it is very hard for employees to criticize their manager and certainly hard for them to criticize the ceo or founder. you have to create a way where people think they can talk openly. i think denise had an interesting idea with the tiny pulse surveys. solicit honest feedback from people. if you have any questions or comments about today's show, if you'd like to share what you learned e-mail us at yourbusiness@msnbc.com. click on our website, openforum.com/yourbusiness. we've posted all of the segments from today's show plus a lot more. please don't forget to connect with us on our social and digital platforms. next week, an online service that connects pet owners with anim animal-loving sitters has found

a way to stay top of mind for potential clients and furry companions. >> often people need to hear about it more than once. they see an event and later a friend might mention it and they see an ad. those three things together say, okay, maybe this this is real. let's give it a shot. how hosting local events is helping this small business get new customers. until then, i'm jj ramberg. remember, we make "your business" our business. our cosmetics line was a hit. the orders were rushing in. i could feel our deadlines racing towards us. we didn't need a loan. we needed short-term funding fast. building 18 home in 4 ½ months? that was a leap. but i knew i could rely on american express to help me buy those building materials. amex helped me buy the inventory i needed.

our amex helped us fill the orders. just like that. another step on the journey. will you be ready when growth presents itself? realize your buying power at open.com . >> happy friday. we have kind of a great show planned for tonight's show, we are looking ahead to the wyoming caucuses tomorrow on the democratic side of the presidential case. bernie sanders has turned out really good at caucuses. ahead into wyoming there have been 12 caucuses overall on the democratic side. of the 12, hillary clinton won the first two in iowa and nevada. since then, bernie sanders won ten straight caucuses. so senator sanders is keeping an eye on wyoming. spacex miracsl