In this article I want you to validate if my approach to solving business problems resonates with you.
And to start with the subject, I want to go to statistics and pinpoint some of the major frustrations business owners have. After analyzing several research reports, & business articles, I picked a few that seem to repeat over and over again.
Overcoming Your Major Frustrations and Turning Your Business Around
So, let’s have a look at them:
1. Working too hard and receiving too little reward.
2. The business is in chaos, feeling lost.
3. Feeling trapped in the business – because you tend to do everything yourself – because you have little trust in the team.
4. Operating in high uncertainty. Not knowing what actually drives revenue, what works, what doesn’t, and what to anticipate.
5. Catastrophic lack of time – no vacation, overload, no time spent with loved ones, no time for yourself.
There are many other frustrations that business owners would like to overcome, but we will stop at the major ones we listed. If we look closer to the five frustrations we have listed, it all comes to one point – lack of control over the business. Business is controlling the owner, not the other way around.
Can you relate to this?
Question: How did you come to this point? Every story is different. Yours, no doubt, as well.
We will address business frustration in a very practical way – we will look into how we can eliminate the major problem that causes the frustration. We will look at three things today:
First- how you can define the root cause of the problem;
Second – analyzing data to draw some powerful insights;
And third – data-driven decisions – coming up with a simple & effective solution.
By applying these 3 steps to finding & solving the problem, you will gain clarity and control over your business. And as a result, the frustration, most probably, will fade away.
Here we go!
Step # 1
So, how can you find the real problem? Good question.
And the answer is – it depends. It all depends on your personality, on the way you do business, on the processes in place, or a lack of it. The frustrations could be similar, but the underlying reasons for them – different. Let’s say you are frustrated because you work long hours and have a decent number of customers, but at every end of the month, your bank account is almost empty.
Why is that so? Is it because nobody is following up on the invoices? Is it because you spend money on unnecessary purchases? Is it because 80 % of your time you spend on clients who bring you 20% of revenue? What is the reason!?
And to figure that out, we should do some research. Often, the problem does not lie on the surface.
As Albert Einstein said, “If I was given one hour to save the planet, I would spend 59 minutes defining the problem and one minute resolving it”.
The real world of the business is often messy, unpredictable, and noisy. In the real world, the difficult part is understanding the problem. A lot of time and resources are spent on defining the problem.
It is a good idea to start with an analysis of the current situation. Brainstorm with the team; every member can give you a different perspective on the situation, and you can break it into separate pieces to put it all together later.
There is a number of Root Cause Analysis Tools, including the Pareto Chart, The 5WHYS, the Fishbone Diagram, and others. We will briefly touch on 2 of them: “Pareto Chart” & “The 5whys”.
Pareto charts are based on Pareto’s law, also known as the 80/20 rule, which says that 20% of inputs drive 80% of results. 20 % of your best clients bring 80 % of revenue, 20% of your ads bring 80 % of return on investment, etc. The idea is to pinpoint these 20% and put more effort and resources into them.
The concept of the “5whys” technic is to go 5 levels down the issue in order to fund a root cause. Example: We did not hit the forecasted goal at this launch. – Why? – Because we did not sell enough registrations for the Signature Program. – Why? – Because the email marketing did not work as well this time. – Why? And so on, you have the idea. You might find out that the clickthrough rate was not that bad, but when reaching the landing page, the performance dropped. In conclusion, the problem might not be the email sequence but the design and the content of the landing page.
Taking a one step further, you can gather information about the issue: data could be financial, marketing, sales, customer satisfaction, etc.
The goal is to gather the RELEVANT INFORMATION, MOST IMPORTANT INFORMATION, sort it out and prepare for analysis, so this information serves as a base for meaningful insights.
I enclosed an article published in Harvard Business Review: “Are You Solving the Right Problem?”.
The author describes the process to define and articulate the right problem.
https://hbr.org/2012/09/are-you-solving-the-right-problem
Step # 2
Let’s move to step 2 of our quest for truth: analyzing data to draw some powerful insights.
Turning data into powerful insights; and insights into a solid, confident decision is the bottom line of the analysis. As business owners, we want to make better decisions, we want to stay profitable and efficient, and we want to compete having a certain advantage. It’s huge to have the business under control and be one step ahead!
Imagine having a clear picture backed up by data! Imagine having a business built on a rock-solid foundation and being able to move steadily towards your goals! Successful businesses are not built on guesswork. They thrive on the ability to make critical, intelligent, educated decisions.
The Strategist’s role is to help you define what currently works in your business and what doesn’t, what you really want from your business; and work with you to design the plan to make it happen.
Many analytical tools will help you with the task. I use Power BI, Google Analytics & Zoho Analytics. What I look for are some trends, patterns in data, and relationships between variables. Outliers.
Step # 3
We are moving to the final step of our quest for truth: data-driven decisions – coming up with a simple & effective solution.
Now, that we have done the tedious part of the process, you, as a CEO will be stepping in with some strategic decisions on the course of action for the next 90 days, 6 months, 1 year.
These steps might help you to be confident about the decision you are to make:
1. Identify your goal. Based on the example we looked at, you gathered information on what products sell best, what products have the higher profit, what are the trends, etc. What is your objective? Maybe you want to develop a specific region, or maybe you want to increase the profit margin. Define your goal.
2. Evaluate your options. How are you planning to achieve it? Brainstorm with the team and come up with a couple of options, alternatives. You will need to take into consideration the time, resources to be involved, the constraints you might have, and costs.
3. Congratulations! Now you are ready to make your choice and implement it. I would recommend writing a one-page project plan on what decision has been made, why, what was the objective, what initiatives to take place, and the timeframe. And as well as how you will measure the result, critical KPIs.
If you follow these steps, in the process, it will be easy to evaluate whether you are on track to achieving your objective or not. And if not, how can you tweak it to accelerate? Measure, measure, measure again!
So, here we go. You have a basic framework to how to overcome your frustration in a very practical way: by eliminating the root problem.
Overcoming Your Major Frustrations and Turning Your Business Around
And if you need help, it will be my pleasure to assist you. If you find yourself in a situation of uncertainty, or chaos, and you don’t know what to do next or how to do it, I invite you to schedule a complimentary call at the link provided. If you are committed to bringing your business to success, and as a CEO be a leader and inspiration to your team and customer, you probably need to make some changes fast.
Additional Resources:
Guide to the Program “90 Days to a Peak Where Strategy Meets Implementation”
