Business Transition Points

Rik coaches businesses through their most challenging transition points so they can jump to the next growth level and progressively realize the vision they have for their company. He can be contacted at RikVillegas@gmail.com.

Life throws at us a crazy series of challenges that allow us to grow and progress or shrink and regress. These challenges are transition points that occur at various times throughout our life to “test our mettle” and either make us or break us. Examples of these transition points are first, birth into the cold & cruel world, finishing school, starting a new career, finding the love of your life and getting married, having children and raising them, retiring, and then the final exit. Birth and death are given for those who are reading this now, some challenges are common to most people, and a few are unique to your situation.

All of the transition points offer the opportunity for progression – if one takes the challenge and perseveres in the face of obstacles. Most of the greatest books and movies center on the theme of a person or group successfully conquering a challenge. Progression through all transition points requires a new way of thinking, developing new skills, and implementing effective strategies to successfully navigate through them to enjoy a happy, fulfilled, and richer life.

Similarly, a business offers owners, managers and staff specific transition points that provide the opportunity for progression or regression. Those who do not have the skills, training, or strategies to successfully meet the numerous challenges that are thrown at them will feel stuck in a malaise of busyness, where there is too much to do, too little time to do it, and the feeling of just being stuck in a rut.

Your business transition points (BTP) can come from internal or external factors. These factors can include changes made by your competition that impact your business, technological advances, international or global events, legal or political policies, economic changes, environmental factors such as floods, tornadoes, or drought, and socio-cultural changes over time.

The external factors tend to be out of your control, or your influence is minimal. This means that as they occur, all the other businesses in your competitive category will also feel the same impact, so the degree of impact and your ability to adapt to the changes will either help or hinder your business. The slow will go, and the fast will last. Your awareness of these changes and the direct and indirect affect it will have on your business can give you a competitive advantage, while being unaware of these changes creates uncertainty and confusion as your business revenues drop.

Now let’s consider the internal factors that can impact your business and create transition points in your organization. These are typically unique to your business and you have more control over them. The personal growth of you and your staff will directly affect the growth of your business. The personal relationships and habits of you and your staff at home can carry over into the workplace. One factor that business textbooks often leave out as a reason for business failure is the failure of the owner to maintain important personal relationships at home. Many businesses have failed or struggled, not because of the products, market, or external conditions, but because of a lack of personal life balance that deteriorated the important personal relationship in the business owner’s life.

There are numerous BTPs that occur as a business owner grows from a start-up to the point where employees are hired and the business starts to expand. These “growing pains” are opportunities if the owner is able to learn from the experience or get outside help from someone who can help them take a bird’s eye view of their business and identify the correct path to take to master a particular transition point and progress towards the vision they have for their company. Far too often, the owner of the business feels stuck as they approach the numerous transition points that require new ways of thinking, new strategies, and the implementation of effective systems.

There are four key multipliers that you can apply as you move your business to the next level of growth. These all start with “P” and they are: 1) Purpose-Driven, 2) Productivity, 3) Profitability, and 4) Predictability.

Let me briefly discuss the value of each of these multipliers and I’ll elaborate on them in future articles because if you fully utilize them, you will find yourself dealing with each challenge as an opportunity to grow and become better and more viable.

First, you must identify the purpose of your business and then center every decision on achieving that purpose. This allows your company to be extremely effective as it achieves the goals that produce the results, which then achieves the purpose and vision of your company. The purpose of a business is often found in the mission statement and the core set of values it is committed to live. Too often, though, the mission statement was created by a consultant or committee to sound good, but it does not truly reflect the values and vision of the owner or staff. In fact, most mission statements are so generic that if you took the name of the business out of it, it could be a mission statement for practically any business.

Second, you must achieve a level of productivity through the efficient use of resources. This includes learning how to master the use of your time, and knowing how to get things done in the best and fastest way possible with the least use of limited resources.

Third, if you’ve mastered productivity, then it becomes much easier to achieve profitability. Profit can be used to measure the value you offer to your customers. If they find value in what you offer them, they will return that value in the form of monetary transactions, continued loyalty, and joyful interactions.

The last multiplier looks at creating predictability through systems, policies and procedures in the operation of your business. It shouldn’t matter which employee serves a customer, the customer should have a predictable experience each time.

As you apply the four multipliers, it will give you greater clarity, focus, and confidence to conquer each business transition challenge, and to achieve sustainable growth toward your vision.