Talk Money Café

No, this is not a post about resolutions or starting a brand new year.  However, if you have the chance to start scratching my back, I might take the chance to start scratching yours.

All jesting aside, this is a valid question for individuals and businesses to ask.  How many of us would have loved to go back in time with the knowledge we have now?  It would appear advantageous to start anew and get things truly right the first time around.  Unfortunately, we live in the real world, and every fraction of a second that goes by becomes history.

If you’re looking to grow and make changes as a business, it’s important to take the time to step back, monitor your performance, and make a post-evaluation of your results.  This often involves comparing the actually achieved results with the previous estimates or predictions.  The main goal is to use this data or information to learn how to improve or how to handle the same situation when it arises again.  Like people, some businesses may learn from their mistakes the first time, while others may make the same mistakes repeatedly before eventually learning from their mistakes.  Samuel Smiles is quoted as stating:  We learn wisdom from failure much more than from success.

Every day is a gift, and it presents new challenges and opportunities.  As a business continues to grow, it must address issues of competition, labor, machine replacement, capital investment, taxes, economic conditions, and a host of other factors.  Each day provides an opportunity to invent new ideas to handle these ever-growing challenges.

If a business becomes complacent, takes things for granted, is resistant to change, dwells too much on the past, is insistent on following old practices or “protocol”, is held back by fear due to previous negative experiences … then this is a recipe for lethal stagnation.  Stagnation is simply not an option for a growing business.  If a river (or some other moving body of water) was to become stagnant, it would quickly evaporate in intense heat.  In a similar way, businesses could quickly evaporate or dissolve if they don’t adapt and make the proper adjustments, especially in the intense heat of today’s economy.

The world, marketplace, and consumers are constantly changing.  Thus, it’s important to have this mindset that every day is a new day.  Building a business is truly a never-ending journey.  It requires energy, foresight, wisdom, proactive measures, and determination to keep it pointed in the direction of its goal or mission.  A constant reinvention, renewal, and embracing of change is necessary in order to sustain the level of energy that is needed to drive the business.  At the same time, the vision must be clear and consistent with the goal or core mission of the company.  Nevertheless, a growing business is continuously adapting and being molded by new experiences and challenges.  Your work is far from done … it is as if it’s just beginning every day.