1. Be like the mouse and anticipate the Change
You've probably read the book 'Who Moved My Cheese'. But if you haven't, do yourself a BIG favour and get it.
Change is part of life. Yet despite knowing this, most people have BIG difficulty with it.
Without spoiling the story for you (just in case), it's about 4 mice who live in a maze where cheese appears at different points. The story tells the different reaction of the mice based on their attitude to life and how, despite change, some of the mice thrive, yet others who refuse to adapt, get hurt.
Today, there's no doubt that the cheese has been moved in many areas of business, but like the mice in the story you have a choice on how you react to it.
Yes, you may have to make changes. But that is part of the adventure of business and life. As the saying goes 'The only thing certain about life is that it will change.'
2. Remember to Focus on what's REALLY important to you.
Yes, there have been major changes in the economies of the world over the past few months, but if you ALLOW yourself to get too caught up with the 'doom and gloom', you could find that you're blocking opportunities.
And there are plenty of opportunities to be had still. Think about it like this. Whether the economy is doing well or doing badly, somebody somewhere is still making money.
So if you take a deep breath, take a step back and give yourself a reality check by, just for a moment, taking the time to focus on what's important to you:
This could be:
1. My family and their well being
2. My health and wellbeing
3. What I have in my life that maybe I'm not appreciating
I have a client that got very bad news recently. Most people would have given up with what happened to her. Her approach was the complete opposite to most.
She went out to dinner with her partner and enjoyed a beautiful and expensive meal in a top restaurant.
Why?
Well, her view was that she wanted to get herself back into 'a positive frame of mind', so that she would see how to make the right moves needed.
She realized that while the news she had received wasn't' great, there were ways around it. And 2 days later she SAW a simple way of increasing business. She maintains that it's only because she REFUSED to let herself get 'down'.
3. Get real with your financials NOW.
To make the right decisions all depends on getting the right information that is, it's up to date, it's correct and it's relevant!
Working with over a 100 business owners closely over the past 7 years, I've always been amazed at how many don't prioritise getting up to date financial information. When you don't have it, it's like driving in the dark with no lights on.
One of the big benefits of a 'tighter' economic time is that it FORCES you to watch your overheads much more closely, where before you may have been more wasteful.
No more than knowing how the health of your body is by getting certain test results (Body fat, weight, cholesterol etc.), the health of your business is measured by things such as sales, gross margin/profit, overheads, net profit etc.
You'd be surprised how many business owners don't know the key figures for their business when they should. It's asking for trouble to be getting your business management accounts months after the business occurred.
If you're not on top of this area, do yourself a favour and prioritise it for the next month. Getting up to date accounts either weekly or at the very latest monthly is vital to making the right decisions.
Talk to your accountant about speeding up the information access they should be happy, it may well be extra business for them but it'll be worth it.
If you'd like to get the complete pdf of this article, go to http://www.shanecradock.com, subscribe to the free weekly inspirational e-mail and you'll get the complete article in pdf for free. Shane Cradock is a leading business coach & consultant.
Tags: business, small business, profit, growth, boost