Cautiously Optimistic

The Feds have reduced the rates and are forecasted to do it again this week and the American Corporation and small business owner are to let out a big “sigh of relief”.
I can tell you from my experiences this past week that no one is breathing a “sigh of relief”. Companies have put some of their spending on hold, like training and development, marketing and promotional materials, and are continuing to focus on the costs and related expenses that can be reduced.

Why is it that we as business people tend to hide in our caves until the storm blows over instead of getting out in the mix and making the necessary adjustments so that everything is more in order to weather the storm than ever before?

The return on investment for training and development expenses can be measured and defined. Believe it or not, there is a system where behavioral change can even be measured over time so why is it that we don’t take a more aggressive approach to an external threat like economic conditions, especially the prospect of a recession?

One of the reasons we are not more aggressive when threats affect our businesses is that we have not strategically planned for this threat. Any company that did a strategic planning exercise using S.W.O.T. (Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats) analysis or similar exercise certainly came up with economic conditions as a potential threat in 2008. If you didn’t record economic conditions as a possible threat, please retire now and/or transition or sell your business. The problem I see is that most people use strategic planning to set action steps when the climate internally and externally is at its calmest and not as a vehicle to help them through the periods that get the roughest.

So, let’s sit back down and make sure our external resources in terms of opportunities and threats are well reflected in our planning as well as our internal strengths and weaknesses.
Effective organizational effectiveness can minimize the effect that an external event has on businesses and people can become totally engaged when they know what they need to do to overcome the external challenge.

Awareness, planning, implementation and results…it sure sounds like something that focuses everyone on the challenge, defines a plan to get somewhere, allows for mid-course correction if the weather changes, and focuses everyone on the results. I guess if we all do that I can become cautiously optimistic….but I am not.