I admit I have felt sad, but here’s what I’m doing about it…
Originally sent exclusively to The Letter subscribers on December 15th. Want to be the first to get my personal newsletter in your inbox every Monday at 7am? Subscribe for free here.
I read a fascinating article about Nokia. If you are 35 or older, you will remember when they dominated the early days of mobile phones.
Text messages and Snake. It was everything.
We became obsessed and controlled by this new trinket. Nokia was cool. They were the Nike of phones and tech.
Then they weren’t.
BlackBerry took over. I loved mine.
Then they weren’t.
Then came an entrepreneur in a black turtleneck, blue-washed denim jeans, New Balance trainers (not the cool ones) and with a rare talent for public speaking.
Ladies and gents, we give you Steve Jobs.
He knew one thing.
If you do not innovate, you evaporate.
Nokia had talent, systems, money and dominance, just like BlackBerry. At the time; more than Apple had.
What Apple had, like Sony had when they started, was a dynamic entrepreneur with one word attached to him.
Obsession.
Hunger and obsession are dangerous to competitors.
Steve’s obsession was like a hungry lion hunting. Be obsessive about your cause and you can beat better-funded competitors.
Remember, Apple was nearly finished when Steve came back after being sacked.
I never want your business or mine to become Nokia. I want to stay on top. Comfort leads you to rest on your laurels. “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” is dangerous ground.
If you are an entrepreneur, you are never done. Ever.
This whole thing is a tough gig. The idea that you do it so you are answerable to no one actually means you are answerable to everyone.
I am answerable to millions of customers, thousands of staff, suppliers, bank managers and the tax man.
They all turn up wanting their slice every day.
On top of that, to stay in the game I have to work harder on myself than I do on my business.
Every week I get punched from left to right, with the last year being particularly tough.
It has been tough because I know some of our businesses have not innovated enough.
They have not grown enough.
I have not mentored my senior people enough to be better.
I have felt sorry for myself and I admit I have felt sad.
Then you realise you have to develop your personality and skill sets in private so they serve you well in public.
When you are down on your luck, with no one to turn to, here is what to do:
Think long term. This is hard when everything feels against you. Short-term wins look tempting.
Read books. The more you read, the better you lead.
Get over it. You will have to work harder.
Lean into the difficulty. Embrace the bugger as a welcome friend.
Get a notebook and write.
Celebrate your wins. They will still be there, then quickly get back to work.
Communicate the challenges with your teams so they understand.
Get very good at marketing. Not ad spend, but creating campaigns that make people buy. (I am running a masterclass on getting customers in January - come if you'd like to help yourselves to oddles more customers and leads)
You are doing well if...
You are making entrepreneurial decisions that are long term, even when the "now"is ever so painful.
For example,
Still employing,
Investing and talking about solutions and a brighter future.
Not defaulting to discounting. Discounting is death. Offers achieve the same outcome ( making people buy) with far better results.
If you are still growing on the inside while things are dying on the outside, hooray. You will pull through.
Innovate so you do not evaporate.
Share the numbers with your teams.
The difficulty is usually where we grow.
Embrace the bugger.
To your continued success,
James
PS. IInterested in spending the day with me learning how to master the art of marketing? Get your tickets here.