What Stage Is Your Business In?
Transcript:
Hey guys! Welcome to this week’s podcast. I want to dive into a little known secret that will keep your business relevant and profitable and that is inserting innovation at key times in your business. But first, I need to give you the cycle of a business and a business product or service so you’ll recognize when it’s a good time to inject some innovation.
The cycle
Every one of you listening to this podcast has probably seen this cycle in action. You might not have recognized what was going on but take Blockbuster or Sears for example. Both failed because they got stuck in executing their business model and neglecting to inject some necessary innovation that would have kept them profitable and relevant in today’s fast-paced and fast changing culture.
You will be in one of the parts of this cycle right now. This podcast will help you not only know when to inject innovation but also encourage you to keep going!
Let’s get started.
Dream Stage. This is what experts call the “unconscious incompetence” stage where you have an idea that you’re excited about. It’s got some teeth to it, so you know you’re going to do it! But you have no idea how much you don’t know, which is good because if you did, you wouldn’t get started.
Distress Stage. This is the “conscious incompetence” stage where now you know that you don’t know what you’re doing. It can be overwhelming and cause a lot of doubt. Will my idea work? Will I figure it out? Will people even want my product or service? The only thing that saves you here is that you’ve invested so much into your dream that you can’t quit. However, if you don’t keep advancing and allow overwhelm to cause you to stop, your dream will die on the vine.
Development stage. Now you’re entering “conscious competence” stage where you are figuring it out. There are still a questions you might have, but you have definitely come out of the dark woods into a road well lit. You have renewed hope and know you can do it. You can make it profitable. You can make it work!
Demonstrate stage. This is the “unconscious competence” stage. You’re now rocking it. You have arrived! Your business is profitable. You’re starting to see your other dreams happen because your main dream was the first domino. Life is good! You’ve sweat, cried, bled, and wondered and now all of those hard and dark times are producing results. Now it’s time to maintain. Not so fast. Maintaining minus innovation will lead to the fifth stage in the cycle, which you do not want.
Death stage. The only direction from the demonstrate stage you have is down unless you inject some innovation here. Innovation can be a revamped or completely new website, an improved product, a new service, an improved service, really anything that introduces some new and some excitement. You see, one of the main things that kept the greats who build America so successful was their ability to see what was coming and position themselves for it. They didn’t fear the change. They thrived in getting ready for the change. It was a game of wits against change.
“Learning and innovation go hand in hand. The arrogance of success is to think that what you did yesterday will be sufficient for tomorrow.”
what is and what if
This all leads to the question of how do you know new thing to introduce. Well, I can’t specifically tell you that, but what I can do is give you a great exercise to help you discover some innovative ideas. I first learned this from a friend who read about it. This exercise was first used by Walt Disney as far as I know.
Walt Disney released Fantasia in 1940. Unfortunately, it flopped in theaters because Disney was ahead of his time. He designed the movie to be interactive. He went to theaters and asked them to modify their theaters with some machinery to create smoke, lighting, and other things that really was ridiculous for any theater to do for one movie. As you can imagine, they all said no. I would have, too.
But that didn’t stop Disney. He did a “What Is and What If” exercise where he created two columns. One column was the “What Is” with current theaters like you can’t interact with the characters, you have to stay in your chair, you can’t touch or interact with the scene, etc. He then wrote in the What If column things like, “What if… you could interact with the characters, the scene, and not sit in your chair?” The result? Walt Disney World. Out of limitation, Disney introduced innovation using this exercise, and Walt Disney World, the happiest place in the world, was created!
Of course, your innovation injection doesn’t have to be as large! Last year (2020), I freshen up my website, added some brand photos I had done, and doubled my income. I’ve also introduced some new services, not because of a death cycle but because my clients kept asking for them so I created them.
If you’re needing some freshening or if you’re in that death cycle where business has dropped or if you see something coming and you can position yourself to take advantage of it, do this What Is and What If exercise and inject some innovation into your business!
P.S. You can do this for personal areas, too. Romance. Friendships. There are no limitations to innovation!