The theme for this month’s newsletter and blogs is “Don’t wait.” Now that the election is over, many leaders in many companies are waiting to see what changes the new administration might bring.
Don’t wait for potential changes. What should you be doing instead?
Waiting for a Bite
Perhaps an analogy could be taken from a friend’s fishing experience. Our friend was once fishing for bluefish on a North Carolina beach with a group of very experienced fishermen. They were catching so many fish that they were getting exhausted. The beach was empty except for them—but down the shore about a hundred yards was a fishing pier that people had paid money to get onto, and the pier was jammed with hopeful fishermen. Those people weren’t catching a thing. My friend couldn’t believe that they were just up there watching him and his group being incredibly lucky, but they just stayed on the pier because the proprietors of the pier promised great fishing, and they had paid for it.
The people on that pier were waiting endlessly in case they would catch fish instead of seeking a no-fail opportunity just down the beach. In our economic scenario, businesspeople could wait months on a potential promise of better opportunities. How much valuable time and how many precious company resources could be wasted while business leadership is watching for opportunities that may or may not show up.
Evaluating Opportunities
In current news, there are predictions that the economy will improve under the new administration. Company leadership, counting on these predictions, might only seek out opportunities that will bear fruit if the economy does indeed get better. But what if the economy falters? Those opportunities may not be as valuable.
Or perhaps there are predictions that the manufacturing sector will pick up, so company leadership seeks out opportunities that will be valuable if that happens. But again, what happens if that business sector remains the same or, even worse, declines? Those opportunities could turn out to be worthless.
Look Elsewhere
The answer is to seek out opportunities that will be fruitful in any economy.
For example, a restaurant chain that has done well in middle-class neighborhoods and shopping areas sees that a new mall is going up in a particular city. A mall is a great opportunity for this chain, as it will have built-in walk-by foot traffic. This opportunity has no real relation to economic predictions but more of a relation to shoppers’ traffic, which is almost a given.
The management of this chain could worry about economic predictions and delay the decision to lease a space in the new mall, waiting to see what the economy is going to do. Or, they might wait for an uptrend in their business in other locations, waiting to somehow tap into it. But delaying and watching might very well lose them the opportunity as all the spaces leased by the time they decide to move forward. It will be too late.
In such an instance, the right thing to do is to jump right in and take advantage of the opportunity. Then, keep on the lookout for other such opportunities and take advantage of them as they arise.
So Don’t Wait
The lesson here is not to wait. Seek out advantageous opportunities despite any potential changes. Such opportunities will be there if you look for them.
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