As I have written before, in mountaineering you don’t always reach the summit you’re attempting. Failure can be attributed to weather, fitness or training issues, or any number of issues that arise on the ascent.
Interestingly enough, there are parallels in business when you are not achieving your strategy. Things that can affect your lack of strategic achievement include insufficient capital, inability of the team to execute, or simply that the goal you were striving for was just too big and audacious.
When do you know when to give up the summit when climbing? Certainly when there’s a white-out… you’re not going to make it anywhere, potentially even down the mountain! It could be a case of altitude sickness, or perhaps a leg injury of some sort.
My experience in the business world has also shown there are many reasons why people and companies do not achieve the goals they’ve set. I can tell you that in mountaineering, ego, and the sheer cost of the expedition itself, are two main reasons why people want to press on to the summit when they really shouldn’t. Ironically, it’s also ego and the sheer investment that makes business people continue when they should cease and find a new path to their goals. Learning to avoid this tendency is a critical skill to master, even when your internal grit is saying, “I don’t want to fail at anything!”
Let’s forget mountaineering for a second and focus on solid business concepts. What are the indicators that our strategy is failing? For starters, we are simply not getting the revenue or productivity results that we had planned for. In this day and age of Big Data,we all have plenty of information that tells us what our results are, or what they are not. Even if we’re getting the revenues we desired, what if our costs are much higher then anticipated? Great, we have a market.. we have demand… sadly, we are not making money. And, here is one of the worst situations … The quality of our product or service is so poor post-purchase that we are not getting any repeat purchases and are upsetting our loyal base of customers. This is a harbinger of bad things to come.
Just as the TSA signs say in the security line at the airport, “if you see something, say something!” All too often we just keep “running harder in to the wall” instead of acknowledging our plan is flawed, and likely not going to work.
The plan isn’t working…. Now what? Modify your plan, or conceive a new one!
If you, your boss, and your company find the strength to do this , then be sure to think through all of the potential pitfalls that may play out in the new strategy and plan you intend to put in place. In many cases, planning discussions focus only on the good things that will happen. Problems occur in everything, and you should “go there” to think about downside issues, and how do deal with them. It’s healthy to decide to pursue a new line of business because your competitor is starting to see some success there, or because there’s a great new market opportunity. But shouldn’t we ask ourselves the following questions:
- Do I have the financial resources to enter into this new endeavor?
- Are my employees able to make the pivot and transition?
- Can I support my current core business while I am making this transition? The bills still have to be paid.
- What about the perception of my existing customers? Will they see my company as a viable option in this new market opportunity? Being relevant is critical.
- And most importantly, can you make a reasonable profit for the business?
Chances are that at least one of these questions will be answered with a no!
When faced with challenges, are you willing to give up the summit on something else you’re already doing? It may be required to make your new endeavor successful. Or, are you going to do what 99% of American businesses do, which is to try to do everything already in motion PLUS your new strategy, even though you know it is highly unlikely that all plans will possibly be achieved. This is arguably a huge problem in today’s Attention Deficit world. We will often rationalize the need for all these different plans to be in place because we think it mitigates our business risk. Does it really?
We all know of the saying “an inch deep and a mile wide.” Meaning we do a lot of things but we don’t necessarily do any one thing well. Experience tells me this is where you have to give up the summit and give up the strategies that are not working. This is a hard thing to do. You have to push your ego aside… you have to realize that your investment may be all for naught, and you may even be at risk of losing your job because your boss expected a return from all the money you spent on your last brainchild!!
Save yourself, your shareholders, and your employees the heartache. Stop your floundering and create a new plan. Pack up, head down the mountain back to base camp, and determine if you’re going to make another summit attempt that day…. tomorrow…. or never. Most of the time you decide to fight for the summit some other day. Often though, you decide that this summit is more than you probably should have taken on, so you make plans to attempt some other summit, someplace else.
In the end, you must know what you can and cannot get done. Since nothing in life is 100% assured, this means you must also take some risk. That’s okay, just make sure you ask yourself all of the questions previously mentioned. Even if one or two of the answers are no, that’s okay, too. Work through them to see if they can be almost a yes. Create your plan with goals and metrics and milestones, monitoring it frequently, adjusting if necessary, and then set a drop dead date where you are willing to give up the strategy because it is simply not working.
Suffice to say, it is always wise to have a contingency plan / plan B ready to go should plan A fail. Just as mountaineers will immediately think about the next mountain they’re going to climb after giving up a summit, your boss will want to know what new summit you are going to take the company to should it be necessary.
Don’t fear giving up the strategy… learn from it to reach greater heights with something else. Sometimes it’s not what we’re doing that makes us successful…. It’s what we’re not going to do any longer!!
Have faith and strength. See you at the top!
