We’re going on a treasure hunt today. The prize is finding the beauty in our business. Beauty is everywhere. That building across the street, in the walk you have just been on. The book you have just read, in the lunch you have just eaten, or the photo you just took. Perhaps even in the person you have just met for the first time who blew your mind! Yet we rarely seek it out in business.

You might discover it in design, a product, even in the new customer process you just implemented that works like a dream. It could be in that revolution you are creating. Sometimes you can’t even imagine it until you see it. Then its that WOW moment, it has impact, it distinguishes itself and life isn’t quite the same again. Not in true beauty anyway.

When beauty is present, it makes you think deeper, it raises emotions perhaps long buried and it definitely makes you think differently. Beauty usually leads us to be more explorative, because once you find it, you just want more. It can often push you to another paradigm.

In business, we need to give close attention to those things that extol beauty in our business. Once we do that, it changes. You set the rhythm, you convey elegance, even charm. Believe me its there. Your business is doing something really beautiful right now! Once we know where it is, what it is and why, we can learn about how to do it more.

As Evelyn Underhill said “For lack of attention a thousand forms of loveliness elude us everyday.”

It’s easier to maintain the status quo and kill a business, than to change it. The term ‘don’t disrupt for disruptions sake’ just doesn’t hold anymore. Who gets to say that anyway, the boss, who often can’t see the wood for the trees?

Unless you do something, you don’t know whether it will work. Often its the things you can’t see that are the aspects that will cause you problems in the future. Disruption is about finding innovation and innovation is about constantly finding new, improved ways of doing stuff.

Do you spend you’re time fixing things rather than disrupting the core? And what is more healthy; consistently being disruptive, or consistently holding onto what you’ve got? Expect to, in the future, be leading highly talented people who live in creative chaos, rather than the trudging towards synergy.

There needs to be overall coherence to your business but not the routine of sameness. Disruption can bring your brand’s character alive and stimulate the entrepreneurial spirit we all desperately need. Your business is a bubbling cauldron (or it should be) of ideas, thoughts and messing about with ideas. That’s being disruptive.

If it isn’t broken, disrupt it. If you don’t someone else will! Guaranteed.

But can you bring yourself to do it? Pushing the boundaries is something some of us are good at. However, never before have we been asked to push them even further. As well as learning something everyday, we are having to unlearn stuff too.

There seems to be a lot of hype around how things are changing say some. Its not hype, its reality. If you’re feeling it then its real. And, if you’re not feeling it right now you will be soon.

1. A database does not create a community around your business that faithfully loves what you do.
2. Relationships are the strength that drives a business forward both with customers and employees.
3. Its no good being recognised (profile) if you’re reputation (integrity) doesn’t back it up.
4. Move from us believing we want to control to the participation of sharing.
5. Removing aspects that are exhausting and revitalise/introduce those elements that focus on passion and purpose.

The emphasis has changed. Old models are dying and new ones emerging. Decision making, innovation, customer and performance processes are being overturned in order to cope with a new paradigm.

Its fascinating to watch, but I guess that’s my job. However, its hurting people, its hurting businesses that are not responding. Too many people following, too many businesses ignoring. If there is one last thing you do this week, seek out someone who can help you see your way through these shifts.

Some people, in fact more than we would like to admit, are underestimating the scale and the power of non financial motivations. This is also true of freedom to express oneself too. I recently had a delegate offer ” why on earth would my employees want to express themselves?”

The web is not a separate world, so far in the distant, too difficult to reach and understand. It really isn’t Jupiter. It’s actually just a different one that is presenting a different set of rules, a change in the way we do things and allowing us to connect in a way we have never experienced before. It’s unprecedented.

A lot of us are having to unlearn things, lots of things. For those of you who think the web is isolating and responsible for a generation of people who don’t communicate with each other, think about this; all of us watching the Winter Olympics around the world at the moment, in our own living rooms, passive, one way, broadcast stuff, now who’s isolated?

Failure to adapt to shifting customer trends – Customer expectations have changed, however, most businesses are failing to respond to this. The traditional differentiators have almost disappeared; product, price, place etc. Social media is heavily influencing the agenda. We are a lot less impressed with average stuff and customers can find you easier than you can find them! When all things are equal what is it that people buy?

Mass marketing and weak universal appeal are dead, yet we still need to create and develop a loyal customer base. That means developing a new relationship with existing customers and those prospects that are showing signs of being great future ones.

Not all customers are equal. Businesses that succeed recognise that and organise their business accordingly. It requires two simple strategies. Customer acquisition where you are trying to change the prospects mind and customer retention where you are trying to maintain the mindset. The two need a slightly different approach. Any proactive marketing and customer loyalty programs need to focus on the great customers not attracting the poor ones.

It’s a case of not fearing customer rejection but customer indifference.

1. There was no internet

2. There were no mobile phones

3. You couldn’t shop on Sundays

4. There were no superstores

5. No late night shopping

6. We only drank Nescafe and Maxwell House

7. The only safety feature in our cars was the seat belt

8. There were only four channels on television

9. We had little choice

10. We didn’t know what croissants, butternut squash and fajhitas were

11. Only women shopped

12. Coffee was an adult drink

13. You bought a book from a physical store in the high street

14. If you couldn’t afford it, you didn’t buy it

15. It was about location, location, location

16. We had cumbersome cassette recorders

17. You could hide and not be seen!

18. We had time

19. We trusted the police, doctors and advertising

20. You got what you were given

Why can small businesses compete with the corporates? Because:

They have soul

They have passion

They have a sense of community

They have small teams that can make quick decisions

They are more intimate, personal and in touch with their customers

They can change their business models to fit new ways of marketing

However, small businesses need to get better at:

Reinventing their marketing…..period.

Differentiating themselves.

Executing at least some of those great ideas they come up with.

Employing leadership behaviours not management traits.

Investment not cost cutting.

Taking a hard, long look at what they need to change in the next 3 years.

The question is, are you making waves or just ‘bobbing’ along to see where all this takes you?

Times like these force us into unprecedented waters, push us to think differently and dictate change, or it should do! Change is good, but, all often too late. Why is change good?

It brings about innovation

It means we have to think creatively

It gives us a new lease of life

It stops us doing stupid, inefficient things

It stops ambiguity, vagueness and being nostalgic (just not an option)

It prevents us from following the boring and possibly helps us become inspiring

We become more reliable on other people

It causes us to stick our heads above the parapet rather than being invisible

It can be refreshing rather than the alternative of old

It pushes us to be curious instead of obscure

And, it may even make us incredible rather than normal.

…with a bit of true grit and determination. Great video. If you haven’t bought his new book, “Tribes” and you are into developing your leadership skills look no further!!!

http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2008/12/the-seed-the-pi.html

Another word! It’s linked to the previous post! A quote from Seth Godin “Change almost never fails because it’s too early. It almost always fails because it’s too late.”

Good point