In life and in business, it can feel as though it’s easy to fall into a pattern where you’re simply reacting to things.
This can be frustrating in any situation because it removes any feeling of agency that you might want in your own
life, and in business, that lack of agency can manifest as a lack of direction. If you never feel as though you’re able
to pull away from the habit of simply reacting to things, and before long you might find yourself in a situation where
you’re ultimately further away from the business you want to be than you expect.
Taking the Initiative
What are audiences going to like? Where is it sensible to put your money? These are questions that are often
answered by the standards of what has come before you, but to only wait until another brand carves the way might
doom your business to always be seen as just another option.
If instead you want to be viewed as a business that leads the way in defining the customer experience within your
industry, you have to be willing to take risks. It’s understandable that this idea might put you off, as this inherently
means that you’ll be taking a financial risk. However, it’s important to understand what successful ventures here can
do to the public perception of your brand. That’s not to say that these risks should be scattershot—there should
always be a degree of confidence and calculation behind them—but that’s not how it has to appear to your audiences.
Waiting for Problems
With a finite amount of money to work with in business, it’s natural that you might prioritize the areas which need
immediate help first. However, to only focus on these areas is naturally going to result in a situation where you’re on
the back foot all the time. Take your cybersecurity, for instance. You might put enough money into this area as you
feel necessary in the early days of your business and then focus your spending elsewhere. However, if this standard
of security drops over time, and your business suffers a breach or an attack, that could be far more damaging than
the initial cost that would have been required to patch up the deficit. Security systems like managed detection and
response can specifically turn this attitude of “wait and see” on its head. With this, your security system will go
out of its way to identify threats and vulnerabilities and patch them up before they can be exploited.
Surveys and Feedback
customers and employees. Customer feedback is often touted as being something crucial in business, but the
examples in which it’s often referred to do so in a way that’s reactionary. If you only wait until there are problems to
ask your customers what they would like to see improved, the damage might already be done. Instead, you can
regularly ask them what’s going well, what they’d like to see, and this can help to inform your brand so that you’re
never stagnant.
people start leaving, checking in with your staff can help you to consistently improve your work environment,
keeping employees happy and less likely to leave in the first place. This can even help you to develop more trust
between yourself and your staff, and if they develop a perception of you as being willing to accommodate them, that
might change their perception toward their work in a positive way.
