Brand and the Dark Side

You decide

Are you starting a company? Do you run a firm or practice? Are you the one at the top, the CEO or Managing Director or Senior Shareholder or whatever? Are you the one who thinks about where the organization is and where it must get to? Are you at times overwhelmed with the pace of change in your industry? Do you get stymied by regulators that keep shifting their interpretations? Ever find yourself standing alone at night overlooking the city pondering your next move or how to come back from a minion’s mistakes?

It comes with the territory.

It is the dark side of building a company, an organization…a brand. It is all the decisions, coping with change, being the final authority and having the responsibilities as well as the perks of the power position.

It is not easy. It never has been. Coping mechanisms abound:

• Make all management decisions by the book

• Rely on intuition above all else

• Buy technology

• Hire Consultants

• Get a coach

Time, trust and experience

In a conversation with Martin (Marty) Marshall, a Harvard professor who ran the executive program He explained that the University no longer allowed an undergraduate to go directly into the MBA program and required some time “working in the real world” first.

Why?

Business is not all about models and numbers. Yes, you can use those tools and avert some risks thereby. You can find a few variables that demand your constant attention and, in some cases, predict your results for a while.

Time is not on your side. You can’t write a set of rules that will work every time. Data takes time to accumulate. You can parse it quickly and reliably with some of the new software. But it does not reveal what is coming. You will have to make decisions with incomplete data.

Trust becomes significant, trust in the data you have, trust in your interpretation and trust in your staff’s take on it. But sometimes you need to go outside the firm. A consultant may have seen more situations like the one confronting you. A coach may know how to help you change the way you operate. Too often we wait too long to engage these experts. We gravitate to those that support our views rather than seeking out contrarians.

Experience is the critical element. Yours and that of the experts you turn to who can help you extricate your company from the difficulty confronting it. Look for women and men who are comfortable with change. They don’t need to be from your industry but some work in a similar arena is always relevant. Avoid choices like Scully at Apple and the Penney new hire that ran it into the ground.

You are in charge.

The smaller the company the more it is you making critical decisions. Big enough to have a board of directors? Then you could be being challenged on the basis of performance, politics or simple pragmatism. But most organizations, an estimated 80% don’t fall into that category so you have to assess the situation now and in the future and take action.

You didn’t get where you are by being wimpy. You didn’t grasp the reins without having some support. You may have been pushed out of a big firm or just elected to leave but you are the gal or guy that has the responsibility.

Write the book and continuously edit it. Go by gut feel when you have to. Spend the money on the best technology you can buy. Hire experts that refuse to be “yes men.”

Take charge. That’s the only way you can control what gets done.

Jerry Fletcher

And so it goes.

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His consulting practice, founded in 1990, is known for Trust-based Brand development, Positioning and business development for independent professionals on and off-line.

Consulting: www.JerryFletcher.com
Speaking: www.NetworkingNinja.com

DIY Training: www.ingomu.com