Several years ago, I and my business partner operated a SME whose product came to the attention of a large Canadian retail chain. We had a unique product, hand-produced, great packaging etc. and we were invited to their corporate head quarters to make our pitch. It was an exciting opportunity for two newly minted entrepreneurs!
We learned that the retailer's first concern, above and beyond product quality or great packaging, was our system processes. Was our production and sales system robust and flexible enough to produce double our current sales, literally over-night? Sadly, the answer was no. It was a disappointing moment, but a lesson well-learned.
Like many small businesses, we let the sales drive our expansion. We changed, developed, tweaked and upgraded our systems as we needed to, in order to better handle the sales we already had. It's basically a game of catch-up, and it slows down the rate of growth.
Fast forward 20 years...
In my latest business, sales had been increasing year after year, but the rate of growth was not as fast as I wanted. I gathered my team together and asked them: what changes would we have to make to handle double our current sales? (You'd be suprised how quickly the changes that you'd need to make become glaringly obvious.)
From that first staff meeting, we roughed out a development plan that eventually became a super-efficient production system. Over the next six months, we worked out the kinks and changed what we needed to, just as if we were actually handling twice the sales....and we noticed that sales were increasing. By the time I sold the business 16 months later, our sales had increased a whopping 40%. We had prepared for more, and more came.
This example is a true business story, but the principle is true for ANY project that you are developing. Look ahead to what you want, and act as if it's already here. We call it pre-paving, because it's like building a road to a city that's not there yet. The beautiful part is this: it doesn't really require your rock-solid belief in the process...just start ACTING as if what you want is already here and see it unfold.
It may feel like it takes a real shift in perception and imagination to apply this to whatever YOUR project is...however, I guarantee you that there are many small ways to pre-pave for what you want - and bring it closer, faster.
Giving Credit Where Credit is Due: Thank you to David Howse (my marketing guru) who helped illuminate the difference between pre-paving and marketing. When your foundation is solid and you have adequately prepared for more, a great marketer like David can help you soar.
Author Resource:-
Donna Wetterstrand is a alberta business mentor service provider. She can be reached at 403.634.6629
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