“If it wasn’t for the bad economy, I could grow my business.”
Is the economy the problem here?
Perhaps not. When the economy was good, was it the reason your business was not doing too great or growing?
My position is that the economy has very little to do with how and when you can grow your business. It is certainly a factor in which you have no control over. I think the culprit is irresponsibility of: “if-then thinking”.
What is “if-then” thinking?
Some examples of if-then thinking includes:
1) If I could just find two more really great sales people then all of my sales challenges would disappear.
2) If the economy would just turn around my customers would buy more from me.
3) If my competitors would just stop giving me so much grief, I could make more profits.
4) If the younger generation just wanted to work harder, I could hire more of them.
In summary, the if-then thinking says:
“If the rest of world would just do what I want it to do, then everything would be great.”
So, how is that working for you?
There is a solution to this problem.
If you liken the if-then thinking problem to; “If the seas would just always be calm, I could sail smoothly across a blue ocean.” then the solution is to prepare your ship for all circumstances of weather. In other words, build a business that can grow by focusing on the things you can control and stop focusing on the things you can’t.
If we look at the previous if-then examples I gave, here is the all-weather solution:
1) Sales – We need to plan for attrition in the sales team. We always need to be looking for potential hires and invest in sales systems and product knowledge training.
2) Since we can’t control the economy, let’s focus on what our best customers need from us and give them that.
3) Since I can’t control what my competitors do, so let’s focus on differentiating ourselves from them.
4) There are lots of young and energetic people looking for work. The reason myself and my growing clients are able to find them is because we actively look for them.
In summary, it’s not the economy.
