Turning Threats into Strategic Opportunities:
Most small businesses conduct strategy in their
businesses, but they are just not consciously organized and deliberate in
planning what class of strategic actions they end up engaged in – is your
strategic focus on Managerial leadership? Knowledge capital? Resources?
Operational fit? Business environment or industry? In most small businesses
strategic decisions and actions are usually the process of crisis management.
If you understand that strategy is the ability to for the business to manage
opportunities and threats in the environment. But sometimes the wisdom is in
the ability to turn your threats into opportunities. Give yourself time to
reevaluate what’s going on inside and outside of your business environment. Small
businesses are agile, quick to adapt and respond to threats at less cost and
seized opportunities in the environment.
Elements
of Strategic Success:
In closing I share with you that for your strategy to succeed there are other
elements that need to be in place, and they play a significant role in whether
your strategy results are great or average.
Leadership – be present in your business. Sometimes running a small
business can be exhausting and overwhelming, and its always great to delegate. However,
one function you can not delegate in your business is decision making. As the
owner of the business, you need to be present at all times even when you have
employees doing some of the functional tasks in the business. Provide
direction, guidance, oversight but you have to make the decisions necessary to
drive your business. It’s difficult to transition from chief operating office
to chief executive officer as your business grows but your business tells you
when you are ready to make these transitions
Know
your company’s DNA - Knowing
your business model is critical to business success. Many business owners fails
to realize that as the business grows, the business model shifts or sometime
completely changes. It is imperative to reassess and redefine your business
model in order to meet the growing pains and challenges of scaling the
business. This takes knowing that this business’s revenue formula is equivalent
to your business DNA! Your business model is how you create consistent value
and meet customer/needs regardless of how big your business grows!
Know
your business environments – Your
business environment is always changing and you as the business over have no
control over it. However, you can always reasonably anticipate change if you
are constantly scanning the environment, planning, tracking trends, regularly informing
yourself about what’s happening in your industry or marketplace, networking and
attending conference. Building your knowledge base is important for you as a
business owner to manage change in the environment.
Know
your customers – Customers are
everything, and they are also the best informants to tell you whether your
product or service is what they need. Creating interactive systems for customer
engagement, feedback of monitoring customer behavior is some of the strategies
you can implement to know your customers and your prospects.
Have
a strategic consciousness –
Strategic behavior is crucial to strategy management in a small business. It’s
always starts with the question Why? Follow by How? If you can always ask these
questions when analyzing what you are currently doing in your business or what
you plan to do in the future, you are already being strategic. Make it a habit.
Don’t just jump to implement ideas without first processing the reason for
doing it and understanding your capacity and capabilities to do it
successfully. In addition, define what success looks like because if you do not
have a vision of your return on investment you can not measure the success of
your strategic endeavors.
Act
deliberately and boldly. – Have an action plan and implement it.
Most small businesses will create the plan and shelf it! You might as well have
never bothered to put the plan on paper, You action plan whether it’s a
business plan; strategic plan; growth plan is a living document! It changes
with the reality of execution. This is the test or proof of your concept. You
can only learn the feasibility of your plan from experience, therefore, just be
bold and do it. Business is a contact sport© . All the bruises and cuts you get
are a testimony of the lessons learned as an entrepreneur. Thefore act
deliberately and boldly to ensure business success.
Republished May 2023; Copyright @ February 2011 Dr. Tendai D. Ndoro (DocNdoro) – CEO, EDCTrainers, LLC dba /SLIPPA; https://www.linkedin.com/in/docndoro/
