The longer I work with leaders in business coaching and consulting, the clearer I understand: the lion's share of business success or failure depends on the awareness of its leader. From the availability of certain knowledge, from the degree of development of business intuition, from the ability to think strategically, from ambition and desire to achieve the intended goal.
High-quality and effective work to increase the company's profitability is impossible without the active participation of the head.
If the owner of the company understands that he lacks information, certain skills and qualities for success, this is a real gift: after all, the identified problem immediately becomes a task.
A plan for its solution is prescribed, which is only a matter of time to implement. Information can be obtained independently (by training, reading specialized literature) or by working with an expert consultant. The necessary skills can be developed. To instill the necessary qualities in oneself is already more difficult, it requires significant work on oneself. But it is also quite possible, for example, within the framework of business coaching.
Much worse is the situation when the leader demonstrates low awareness and explains all troubles, problems and failures by the influence of external factors. In psychology, this phenomenon is called "external locus of control" or "externality." This concept was introduced in 1954 by social psychologist Julian Rotter.
The reasons for focusing on external factors and making them responsible for their lives have clear psychological justifications, which are not the purpose of this article to cover. I will only note that external people have a whole set of limiting beliefs, which they "successfully" apply in life. The locus of control is easy to diagnose in the course of a conversation with a leader, if you ask the right questions and know how to hear his answers.
The most common beliefs in business leaders are:
1. "Good staff is impossible to find!"
Of course, it is impossible, if you do not know the principles and methods of successful hiring, do not make your company, vacancy and announcement about it tempting and attractive for candidates.
2. "Employees don't want to work!"
Naturally, they do not want to, if you do not have the knowledge and skills of motivation and personnel management.
3. "All employees are stealing!"
This is quite possible if at the stage of hiring you have selected such people and allow them to do it. Where a high-quality control and accounting system is established, theft is impossible in principle.
4. "Why invest in advertising if it doesn't work anyway!"
If you or your marketer doesn't have the knowledge to produce quality, effective advertising, it won't work. But in order to truly measure the effectiveness of your ad, you need to count the conversion. And this is not what most managers do.
5. "I have no money for advertising!"
For small companies with low turnover, a large-scale advertising campaign is a utopia. But no one encourages you to be equal to well-known brands. For microbusiness, "guerrilla marketing" tools are appropriate. They are practically cost-free, but at the same time they are highly efficient.
6. "Why strain, invest in business development, because you can't bypass competitors!"
Maybe the competition is really hard to beat. But is it necessary to do this? Isn't it easier to detach from them and find uniqueness in the eyes of consumers?
7. "I was strangled by taxes!"
What have you already done to optimize your tax expenses? There are a number of experts who specialize in just this kind of business assistance. They offer legal and working schemes to reduce these costs.
8. "My business cannot be more profitable!"
Of course it cannot! After all, you are so convinced of this that you will not even try to change the situation. But the business of competitors who study, work on themselves, test and implement new recruitment, management and marketing tools will develop.
As we can see, the distortion of reality through the limiting beliefs of a leader is the biggest cause of business failure.
What to do?
There is only one recipe: develop your awareness! Work on yourself, study, develop as a person and a professional. Stop referring to external factors, and more often ask yourself the question: "What exactly can I do to change this situation?" And if you find it difficult to move forward on your own, the knowledge of specialists in the field of business coaching and consulting is at your service. Nowadays, many tools have been developed for business development, and whether to use them or not is solely your decision!
Elena Trigub
