Morning,

A friend of mine had to change his life to stay alive. The doctor told him surgeries and medication could help but there was no technical fix that could release him from his own responsibility for changing the habits of a lifetime (stop smoking and drinking too often; improving his diet, get walking and exercising, taking time to relax, breathing deeply, counting his blessings every morning and having his priorities for happiness set forth).

Now this guy used to kid me about my focus on health and wouldn’t listen to me but now he had to listen to his doctor. Really listen. The doctor had a leadership challenge. How do I mobilize and influence this great guy to make these critical changes? My friend had to figure out which specific changes to make and what habits and systems would need to be in place to make sure they became his new life.

A lot of Boomers are facing these similar health challenges.

Companies today face challenges similar to the ones my friend and his doctor face. To put it bluntly, we adapt or get smaller, maybe even die.

“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most

intelligent that survives. It is the one that is the most adaptable

to change.”

- Charles Darwin

With the recession, most markets have shrunk and everything is on hold with customers. Regardless of the economic times, the very structure of business has changed over the years to being a hyper-competitive, global, over-crowded marketplace. It’s difficult accessing customers; everyone seems to have the same old story and technology keeps changing everything.

We are forced to clarify our values, develop new business strategies, offering and story and learn new ways to operate. And like the doctor (the leader), the toughest thing to do is wake up your organization to the changes required and mobilize everyone to do adaptive work.

Adaptive work is required when our deeply held views and beliefs are challenged, when the values that made us successful become less relevant and when legitimate yet competing perspectives and desires emerge.

Companies are in transition (or should be) from their current state to a desired state, for example, going from customers finding them to having to find customers. This desired state should be thought out and presented clearly to your people. Then, you need to engage your people in figuring out the actual state and how to support the desired state with systems, actions and policies that give the necessary structure to support it. (ie. What would have to be in place and working if we were about finding customers.)

Usually some innovative thinking is needed when you discover you are structured to support the new desired state. You can piece by piece, change and implement what is required to support it. This is called structuring your business for success. Two weeks ago, I recommended that you get a team involved in figuring out what’s required.

For engaged, innovative groups, leaders need to develop a list of the most important questions and ask them and listen at a level beyond what they think they do. This is in contrast to thinking they have to have all the answers, do all the talking and have to solve everyone’s problems. They need to allow their people to feel the business reality so they can begin the adapting process. They need to draw out the issues and get people into action. Employees need to get into conversations that are required and keep their skepticism (here we go again), excessive doubting and frustrations at bay and allow creativity to exist.

In other words, you can actually innovate your way to a better future. Let’s say over the next 3 months you do this, by meeting with your key people who first become aligned with a desired future that you have kicked off a dialogue about (some might call this a vision - everyone needs a vision today). Then in another meeting, you get the team to describe the current reality in relationship to each part of the vision. (Now they see the contrast which creates the tension required to move forward and to see what’s needed.) Then you meet constantly (usually during non-productive time) to answer your big questions (i.e. who are your customers, what do they want today, what could we give them? How do we access them, what is our story? Etc.)

You can lead your business and help people adapt when you guide them through this process.

We help our clients go through this all of the time and have internal teams throughout our network going through this as well.

Is it a bit discerning to discover reality as challenging and difficult to actually think and create - for sure! With the pain, comes the gain. It is for my friend too. It sure is fun to see companies organizing their business so they can compete and win. It’s also exciting to see my friend create the life he deserves to stay alive.

Remember, “Red Fox” the comedian? Every time he was distressed, he used to hold his chest as if he was having a heart attack and say to his deceased wife up in the sky, “I’m coming Martha - the big one is here”. He was funny!

What the business world is facing is as funny as a heart attack. My friend did okay living as he did and so did your company but now is the time to adapt or die.

Actions:

1) Come on everyone! Take up the challenges of the market and rally a team together to figure out how to support what you want and in so doing, help them adapt. If nothing else, you’ll learn how well you can engage your people and you can create new ways to improve the business.

2) If it helps, we are acting as the surgeon / leader, and are organizing some groups to get going and growing. Check out our next Discovery Session: Thurs. Dec. 10th @ 3PM EST or call me directly: Kevin - 905-826-7300 ext. 223. Our Discovery Sessions are producing engaging conversations around where you need to focus to improve your business or team. We will also explain our various new offerings to help you. Join us for this week’s Discovery Session: Thursday, December 3rd @ 11AM.

Have a great week!

To your continued success,

Kevin D. Crone

CEO
Dale Carnegie Business Group
BusinessNext Inc.
Offering Dale Carnegie Throughout Canada
kevin@businessnext.ca

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