Time to Regroup?

It’s that time of the year, the time to evaluate goals and objectives set at the beginning of the year and decide whether to press on or regroup. Did we achieve what we set out to accomplish this year? Should we think about getting rid of some staff or dump expensive salaries? Maybe we should take our best and most expensive talent and let our competitors have them? Perhaps we just waive the white flag and let the new guys (inexpensive salary folks) run the company for awhile and start planning for next year.

For those of you who recognize this scenario – and perhaps agonize with me during this time of year – you are a fellow baseball fan with a losing team. At some point after the All Star break, executives with losing teams begin to dump players and salaries to teams that think they still have a shot to make the playoffs. They talk about the prospects they get in trade or the salary they save and start “spinning” the possibilities of the next year. The most amazing thing to me about this process is that they do it just before they send out the season ticket renewal forms.

Think about that in a business sense for a minute. The team is struggling or playing poorly, they dump good players that fans enjoy watching (maybe bought their jersey), the fans are frustrated with the team so they are more aware of the little annoyances of going to the ballpark (traffic, parking costs, ballpark food cost and service), and the fans have to hear how bad their team is from friends. What a customer service nightmare!

Luckily for baseball executives and team owners, baseball fans with losing teams have their own “5 Stages of Grief”. Team executives count on the majority of them always reaching the fifth stage of Acceptance. At least in time to renew their season ticket package.

Sadly, baseball has become a business first and sport second. In a pure business sense the players can’t be thought of as staff but rather products. This business model of planning, hope, execution, evaluation, adjustment, execution, evaluation, and possible retreat is more common to a manufacturing or retail business. Launch a new product (player) and then dump it when it doesn’t meet sales objectives or customer acceptance.

What about your business? Do you re-evaluate your business model or objectives often enough? We can easily get comfortable with our process but not really see the complete picture. As in baseball, we must constantly be evaluating our team, product, market, and process to keep competitive and relevant. If you think your market or customer hasn’t changed lately, you are heading for a big surprise. I sincerely doubt YOUR customers will go through 5 stages of grief so they can stay with you.

Get your key team members together for some open and honest conversation. Look very closely at your competitors and any deals you lost lately (or worse, never had a chance to compete for). What is changing, what is the same, where will your customers and market be in two or three years? Are you ready?

Thanks for helping me get to stage 5 – now where is that renewal form…