1. We’re losing money on every sale, but making it up in volume. If we run deals at deep discounts or even a loss with the intent of creating exposure or capturing new customers, we need to consider what impact the increased volume and reduced margins will have.  Remember, a businesses is an interconnected web of causation.  We can’t increase lead generation and conversion without influencing other areas.  So, we need to ferret out these impacts and make sure that, on balance, our great group deal will translate into great results.
2. Look we’ve sold 1000 (wow!)… 10,000 (uh oh!)… 100,000 (gulp!) deals. More is not always better and selling too many deals at once can ruin a small company.  We need to think carefully about what sort of volume we can handle and limit the number of available deals to something manageable.  In the same vein, we need to give careful thought to when our deal expires.
3. Hey we just doubled our customers on this deal… or did we? Well, that depends on what type of customers we’re targeting.  My favorite are the evangelical, repeat kind — those who shouts our praises from the rooftops and uses our products and/or services whenever they can.  Will the customers clamoring for our $50 deal stay customers when they have to pay $100 for the same products or service?  Will they be raving fans to other ideal customers?
4. Let the deals flow (our operations are scalable, right?). If 500 customers take us up on our deal and want fulfillment within the next three weeks, can we accomodate them?  If so, will the quality of what we provide remain consistent?  While satisfied deal takers may not build our business the way we expect (see previous item), dissatisfied ones will almost certainly have a negative impact.
5. Our existing customers just love us, so the deal takers will, too. Again, deal takers may not be as similar to our existing customers as we might like to think.  We need to have systems in place, prior to deal execution, that elicit feedback from deal takers and allow us to compare with feedback from existing customers (we do have feedback from existing customer’s, right?).  Similarly,we need to make sure that we have a plan for maintaining a relationship with this influx of new customers.
6. Hey, someone mentioned existing customers.  Yea, what about those guys? When we launch such initiatives designed to quickly build our customer base (our eyes are apt to fill with visions of deals and dollar signs), meanwhile, there’s a real risk of hurting or alienating our existing customers.  If fulfilling these deals is going to impact our ability to service current customers, or leave them feeling mistreated since others are getting an amazing deal that they didn’t, we need to carefully consider and address these issues before we execute the deal.

Again, I am not against group deals as a rule, simply concerned that for many businesses, the consequences of success may not be fully understood or adequately anticipated.

That’s what I think, what do you think?  Have you run a deal?  If so, what were the positive and negative impacts to your business?  If you’re just thinking about running a deal, what are your motivations and reservations?  Please post your comments below.

- Archbishop Temple

I frequently find that the best business wisdom isn’t.  That’s because wisdom, regardless of where it originates, tends to have broad application.

In that vein, I was struck a few years back by the insight in this quote by Archbishop Temple, which places the spirit and caliber of our earnest effort over the ends for which we strive.  Shouldn’t we be thinking about business this way?

Riding the Archbishop’s coattails, we might say:  

The right relationship between continuous improvements and results is not that results are supremely important and continuous improvements may help them, but that continuous improvements are supremely important and results test them.

Viewed this way, results are merely the litmus test of the quality and effectiveness of our continuous improvement efforts. This may not seem revelatory if you are part of the quality crowd, but in my experience it is not the predominant view held in business.  We hear individuals described as results-oriented, but how often are they said to be improvement-oriented or growth-oriented?

The implementation of defined retrospective loops, where we inspect our practices and adapt based on our outcomes is something that we tend to forgo, believing that it is takes time and effort away from the business of achieving results.  But, investing our energies in relevant personal and organizational improvement, learning, and growth does not detract from our ability to produce.  Rather, these activities enrich us as individuals and organizations, while enabling more effective production and higher quality output.  Perhaps that’s why W. Edwards Deming, the famous statistician and business consultant, stated “Learning is not compulsory… neither is survival.”

Finally, while this “paradigm shift” is wholly justified by it’s ability to enhance our returns, it appeals to me for one additional reason.  It further humanizes business by compelling us to focus on activities that support our self-actualization.  Talk about  a win-win.

- Herr Hunt, my third grade German teacher

When I was in third grade, my teacher invited a guest instructor, Herr Hunt, to come in for a few weeks and teach us a bit about Germany and the German language.  While I’ve forgotten most everything from that experience, save how to count to twenty in German, there was one comment made by our instructor which has never left me.

Whenever Herr Hunt would see that we were afraid to answer a question, he would say, “A man who never makes a mistake never makes anything.”

You mean that it’s OK to make mistakes?

Wait…Wait… You’re not just saying mistakes are OK, you’re saying they’re necessary?

The idea was a revelation, and ultimately a valuable counterbalance to my already overdeveloped perfectionist tendencies.  Yes, even at that tender age.

You don’t have to be a recovering perfectionist, like me, to have been tainted with our society’s pervasive contempt for mistakes.  How often has your significant other commended you for a mistake?  How frequently have you witnessed a grade raised or bonus increased on the grounds of a mistake?

Don’t get me wrong.  I’m not saying that we necessarily have to reward mistakes, but in our culture we are on the other end of the spectrum.  We seem to be at war with mistakes, and in that war we are largely unaware of the collateral damage to innovation, learning, and our ability to improve.  Fear of making mistakes stifles our collective creativity, risk taking and, ultimately, our growth.

As business owners and leaders, we have a responsibility to our businesses and our stakeholders to maximize value.  Doing so means getting the most out of each relationship.  One way to quickly add value to our organizations is to normalize our perception of mistakes, by turning them into tools for learning and growth.

I suggest starting with:

• Education – Raise awareness as to the vital role mistakes play in achieving successful outcomes.  From idea generation and selection to planning and implementation we must leverage our mistakes to reach desired outcomes.
• Encouragement – Encourage communication and acceptance of mistakes.  Remove any stigma of shame associated with mistakes, get them out into the light of day and encourage everyone to learn from them.
• Integration – Integrate acceptance of mistakes into your processes.  When brainstorming, value all ideas regardless of which you pursue.  When implementing, record and discuss blind alleys and wrong turns that you’ve made, as a way to share learning.
• Commitment – Don’t stop.  Many things that are simple, are not easy.  Old habits take time and repetition to eliminate.  Stay committed.
• Tempering – While we don’t want to demonize mistakes, we’re not trying to encourage a proliferation of mistakes for their own sake, either.  Rather than a culture of “make no mistakes” or one of “make lots of mistakes”, strive for a culture of “we embrace and learn from our mistakes”.  Redirect the energy spent condemning mistakes into energy dedicated to learning from them and codifying their lessons into your collective business knowledge, processes and wisdom.

Over the years I’ve come to realize that for those who can graciously accept their charity, nothing pays more handsomely than a mistake.  May you accept and prosper from yours.

If you want to learn how coaching can help you achieve top business performance, increase your personal satisfaction and achieve your dreams, please contact me for a Free One-Hour Strategy Session.

In it Bud shares a simple, but very insightful venn diagram that shows the overlaps between your business strengths (What We Do Well), satisfaction (What We Want To Do) and ability to earn (What We Can Be Paid To Do).  From the diagram, we can infer that if you hit the trifecta (meet all three criteria) – Hooray!  You’ve found the formula for business happiness – getting paid to do what you are both passionate about and excel at.  If, instead, you are only firing on two of these cylinders, Bud provides succinct advice on how to increase your happiness.

What I really like about the diagram is the obvious importance of the What We Want To Do piece.  As a business owner or leader your satisfaction, and that of your employees, requires that you be doing what you want to do.  While doing so does not guarantee business success, failing to do so guarantees consistent dissatisfaction and likely a failure to thrive.  Life is too short to not follow your passion.  Right?  Right!

This diagram really resonates with me because I’m committed to working with my coaching client to improve not just their business performance, but also their satisfaction both professionally and personally.  If you want to learn more about how business coaching can help you reach your potential and achieve your dreams, please contact me for a Free One-Hour Strategy Session.

Finally, mad kudos to Bud Caddell for boiling down many business books worth of insight and wisdom into a single, consize visual.

Every famous athlete, every famous performer has somebody who’s a coach.  Somebody who can watch what they’re doing and say, “Is that what you really meant?  Did you really do that?”  They can give them perspective. The one thing people are never good at is seeing themselves as others see them.  A coach really, really helps.

Here, he strikes on one of the key benefits that business leaders experience from coaching – unbiased feedback.  Others include: brainstorming partner, growth, accountability, and encouragement.

It sounds like, Mr. Schmidt started working with his coach back around 2002, so if you already have a coach, it looks like you’re in good company.  Of course, I think it’s a given that business leaders need coaches, but then I’m a little biased.

I’d be interested to know what you think in the comments?

- Henry David Thoreau

After reading Part 1 and Part 2 of this series, we realize that most challenges and opportunities can be viewed in terms of alignment.   So, how can we take advantage of this realization?

Well, let’s look at a handful of opportunities (business speak for challenges) frequently experienced by business leaders of small and medium sized organizations:

• Feeling drained by interactions with certain employees or clients
• Attracting your desired clients
• Experiencing high employee turnover
• Finding that you no longer see eye-to-eye with your  business partner or can’t reach closure on decisions
• Discovering that your business is no longer personally fulfilling

In most businesses, these opportunities would be perceived and addressed individually.  However, if we view these situations in the context of alignment, we begin to see their similarities and thus the opportunity to apply consistent methods across the set.  For example, in my Absolute Alignment Framework we participate in a practice called Living Authentic Values.  By Living Authentic Values we formally establish our personal and business value systems and consistently communicate them to the world, via our words and actions.   Further, they guide our behavior and become the litmus tests for everything we say or do.  Let’s see how embracing this single alignment practice can benefit us in the various situations above.

By consistently embodying our value systems we send out overt and subtle messages that clearly communicate who we are and how we operate.  This provide others with an opportunity to choose their level of engagement and alignment with us.  At first this may sound a little frightening.  What if we fail to win a prospective client?  What if we can’t keep a skilled employee?  If we recognize that healthy and prosperous relationships are those that are of mutual interest and benefit, we see that if we lose clients or employees because they don’t resonate with our value system, then the only thing we’ve truly lost is friction.  And, like mechanical friction, while the effects are not always immediately clear, it wears us down through a variety of costs and consumption of our life energies.  In fact, the sooner we realize this, the better.  All parties suffer less.

Let’s look at the situation above where there’s friction between ourselves and our business partner.  Have we effectively communicated our personal values to one another?  Did we create a set of values upon which to operate our business and are they consistent with our individual values?    Have our values and those of our partner changed over time?  Have those changes been communicated?  A misalignment of this sort may not be the only source of troubles, but it certainly could be one aspect.  By ensuring that we’re both on the same page, we maximize the chance of transforming this frictious situation into a more harmonious one.

Finally, what if our business is no longer feeding us personally?  Have we recently evaluated our values?  What about those of the business?  Are both in alignment?  Well established and internalized values, drive culture.  If our personal values are in conflict with those of our business, our personal fulfillment will suffer.  Recognizing such misalignment provides opportunities to realign, or in more extreme cases to align ourselves with a new business.

While Living Authentic Values is just one alignment practice, it demonstrates how a single element of the alignment framework can have far reaching impacts on our businesses and our lives.  If you want to learn more about Absolute Alignment Coaching, I hope you’ll contact me with any questions.  Meanwhile, I’d love to hear all your thoughts on alignment, via the comments.