I’ve always been one for supporting healthy, new beginnings; especially when they are brought about without avoidance of past events, but rather through healthy acknowledgement of the valuable lessons learned instead. The passing of 2008 into the rear view mirror and the coming of 2009 into view through the front windscreen brings just that type of opportunity.
I’m not talking about the make a reoslution, break a resolution type of thing. I’m talking more about the figure out what it is your not doing to your own standards and begin to improve on it type of thing. Make it methodical. Make it a process. Take steps, even if it’s only one at a time and sooner or later, you’ll have made a positive habit out of whatever it is that wasn’t quite up to your standards.
In business the concept is similar. What is it that has been inefficient, self-defeating, less than successful in your 2008? How can you take steps to change that in your 2009? I’ve heard from multiple sources that Albert Einstein (my company’s unofficial ‘mascot’) said something like ‘the definition of insanity is doing the same thing, the same way over and over again and expecting a different outcome’, so why is it that so many businesses continue to do the same things, the same ways, year in and year out? Even if these things have worked in the past there are few guarantees in today’s business climate (especially) that they will continue to work – there is just too much change around any business today for the same process or approach to remain static AND successful for too long.
If one focuses on business processes, there’s a great opportunity to gain ground in this down economy; to prepare for an offensive even while on the defensive. It’s the positive moves, successful changes and forward-thinking transformations you put in place NOW that will have the largest impact on your business when your market goes again from wherever it is now to outperform. Those who are stagnant during this period are less likely to be the best competitors as we move through 2009 and beyond. Those who make the right moves, no matter how subtle, are most likely to reap the rewards of leadership.
One of the easiest steps to take now is in the area of technology. It used to be that business technology or line of business solutions were very costly, capital intensive endeavors. With the advent and popularization of ‘cloud computing’, ’software as a service’, ’software plus services’ or whatever you want to call it (in the 90’s it was ‘ASP’, before that ’service bureau’ – for those of us who remember, ‘everything old is new again’) this is ABSOLUTELY no longer the case.
Businesses small and large can pay as they go for new capabilities, whether these are trying a CRM system to stay in closer touch with customers, implementing web analytics to get a view into the digital buying signals of our online visitors, deploying real-time monitoring and alerting to keep our systems online proactively or something else – businesses of all sizes clearly have the opportunity now in 2009 to try a little bit here and a little bit there without fully dedicating resources to a single course of action and precious cash in large amounts to one vendor.
The end result? USE 2009 AND PAY AS YOU GO SOFTWARE SERVICES AS YOUR OWN PERSONAL BUSINESS R&D LABORATORY. Get out there, get dirty, play ’sandlot business’ again and tinker. If your customers aren’t calling as much because they are clutching your cash, invest 1/2 of your newfound time in reaching out to them and the other 1/2 in testing new online software and services to keep them coming back forever more. If your cash flow is down and times are tight, look into buying one seat per month of something instead of enough for a whole army – at least until you are compfortable enough with whatever it does to help your bottom line to make your army march to it in unison.
The short and long of it is this – DON’T DO THINGS THE SAME WAY in 2009, at least not in everything you do. As much as I would love to get your business locked into contributing to my businesses’ revenue stream, more importantly I (and many other vendors out there) would prefer you bite off what you can chew, rather than more; would prefer to work with you to help you incorporate new, sustainable capabilities into your business that help create relationships between us, rather than transactions alone; would like to insure that you receive the benefit of our experience as a trusted advisor rather than to sell you a license of something for a one time ‘hit’.
Technology, particularly business technology, has caught up with the imaginations of millions of business innovators and their natural tendency to clutch cash in this economy, now successfully able to meet both needs. Make sure you are one of the innovators as well. Take as many samples as you can – virtualization, unified communications, hosted CRM, marketing analytics, managed services – whatever you fancy. Don’t limit yourself to technology alone – expose yourself and your team to new ways of thinking, ‘thought leadership’ as well.
Whatever you do JUST DON’T let your competition use this time to get a foothold leaving you wishing you had thought of that or tried something more over the years ahead. Business isn’t rocket science and you shouldn’t need someone like Einstein on your staff to be the catalyst for your new beginning.
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