Mirror, Mirror on the Wall (Part I)

During challenging times people tend to want to brush by the not so pretty issues, but the only way to make significant improvements is to look at yourself and your business in the mirror and unabashedly evaluate your situation. This is the first of a three part series looking at Focus, Products and Services, and Customer Analysis.

A. Focus

The pace of business is so fast these days we often lose focus of the important because of the screams of the urgent and we lose focus of what are the right things to do in order to be successful. Recently, I watched a neighbor's dog running in circles chasing its tail repeatedly until it tired. I see business people do that as well and it's not near as funny to watch. Why do we chase our tails? Because we get caught up in the moment and forget what it is we should be focusing on.

To regain your focus for your business, ask the mirror, mirror the following questions:

Who are we?

Sounds silly I know, but General Motors forgot this on many levels to use an example of lost focus and if a large well-establish long-term company can lose focus, think how easy it is for a small business. Define your company. Define what the purpose of why your organization exists. Define how you measure success. Define the employee behaviors you recognize and reward. Define how your customers see you, treat you and respond to you. Once you honestly answer these questions, ask yourself the next question.

Where did the majority of our time and efforts focus get dedicated in the last year?
Now you see the mismatch. As a football team gets sidetracked by penalties and turnovers, businesses get sidetrack by fighting mistakes and wasted efforts. Your sales team spends what percentage of their time prospecting? On client maintenance? Developing new opportunities? Filling out paperwork? In meetings creating excuses to answer questions?

What about management? Are they developing and coaching new employees to strengthen the team? Are they looking to refine the processes of the employee's they manage?

Are they jumping from handling one problem to another and never getting much time to focus on the important company-progressing opportunities? Identify the "penalties and turnovers" that are sidetracking your efforts from being progressive and reaching the goals necessary to win.

Who do you want to be?

Great leaders whether they are from the world of sports or from government or from the business arena know where they want to get to. Realistically setting goals and targets is as important to getting great focus for your organization as reviewing the previous year's efforts. I've heard executives tell me their focus is "to just make it to 2010." Such a pessimistic approach will only infect a workforce into doing bare minimums and constantly acting out of a position of weakness.

Take your current analysis of the finished year and set realistic targets and goals for the coming year that have some reach! Tell your staff what the organizational success is going to look like. Get buy in, develop momentum and get everyone prepared to work hard. It is a given business will have to work harder to get the same results than they have in the past. Is there any other option to doing what it takes to be successful? No. Tough times provide the opportunity for the best to shine. With a good focus on where you are, where you want to be and a plan on how to get there everyone should have clarity of understanding of the focus of the organization.