Are You Moving Fast Enough?

As I was perusing my online news sources, I came across this headline:

While we’re watching “creative destruction” at its best/worst playing out in front of us, I wonder how many small and mid-size business owners are making the very same mistakes as GM and Chrysler have.

Stories of success and failure are always written in hindsight – and in hindsight, the cues of success and failure are obvious.  It’s easy to see where the auto companies screwed up.  It’s easy to compare them to Honda and Toyota, whose sustainability is not being questioned.

But, I wonder, how would you look under the glare of the microscope that the autos are under?  Are you moving fast enough – or are you incrementalizing like the auto manufactures did?

The absolute worst thing you can do today is to make incremental changes.  The market will not respond to incrementalization.  You must act big and move boldly.  You must accept today for what it is.  Determine where you business is now.  Determine who are most likely to be your best customers tomorrow and focus maniacally on solving their problems better than anyone else – and I mean anyone else.  Discover which revenue streams are taking more resources than they are worth, and reallocate your resources to those areas of revenue that will be profitable tomorrow.  You must train your people to perform differently - and that means increasing their business acumen.

If you fail to move fast enough, you don’t have to worry about the President commenting on it – but then again, you probably won’t have a golden parachute like the auto executives have either.