Too Conservative, Too Stingy.

Do Not Look Like You Are Closing For Business

We all go through some interesting cycles in our business careers.  We develop some interesting patterns in how we operate from time to time.  I am not sure that every time we go through a new pattern of operating that we produce the best results.  I know in my career, some of my patterns of change did not turn out as well as my business preferred.  Some of the cycles of change I introduced in my life of business leadership did not necessarily turn out so well.  At the time I was in those cycles, I could not see how bad the pattern interrupted and eventually damaged the good flow of business activities.  I was blind to the ways my cycle of changes had done the damage they did.

I recall one of those not-so-good cycles.  There was a period of time when I became very conservative in how I lead my business operations.  Conservative methods are not necessarily a wrong way to operate, however.  I prefer to recommend some conservatism in many functions that help a business model become more responsible, especially in accounting.  Unfortunately, I went through a period of time when I became too extreme with my conservative ways.  I became too conservative.

I would pinch every penny, watch every penny and count every penny.  I become so obsessed with my conservative attitudes that I become rather stingy about my business money and my business time.  I went across the line of responsible conservatism.  I became a nasty little miser.  I got too stingy.

When I think back at my stingy ways I see some things that really hurt my business model.  The things I see now that hurt my business back then were not evident to me back then.  I was blind to the damage they were doing.  I did not know what I could not see.  In retrospect, I now see exactly where the most damage was done.  It is too bad that my ego and my over-confidence was not in better check back then.  Those characteristics hurt my business growth.  What's more, I protected them with all of my might.  Nobody could tell me anything different.  Not back then.

I sometimes wonder how many business leaders are reading this blog and operating in that kind of mode?  I know it can happen.  I did it comfortably.  I practiced wrong thoughts, wrong methods and strongly supported them.  Nobody could tell me anything different.  Not back then.

We all go through some interesting cycles in our business careers.  We stand on wrong doings as if we have reached the top of the hill.  We practice wrong stuff, wrong thoughts and wrong doings.  We are proud of doing those wrong things because we truly do not see how wrong they are.  We protect them with all of our might.  I know, I am guilty.

One of  the most damaging things that can come with too much conservatism is that we can grow into becoming too stingy.  Often times when we go over-board with our conservative ways we develop a rather stingy attitude about money and ideas.  I have not found that either of these characteristics is such a good idea to practice in a business leadership role.  They can create more growth damage than the business deserves.  I highly recommend that if you are one of those business leaders who operates with a high degree of conservatism, check your stingy pulse more often.  In fact, find someone who is not afraid to tell you the truth and ask them if you operate with a certain degree of stinginess.  Make sure it is someone who is not afraid to hurt your feelings.  Maybe you could ask your spouse.  They are often the best ones for telling the truth.

Stingy methods can limit future growth.  Stingy methods can cripple creativity.  Stingy methods can promote stingy employee behaviors.  Stingy methods can ruin the laws of compensation that can quietly work invisibly against your business efforts to succeed.  Stingy methods burn up valuable resources.  It robs your business of hidden support from all of the players you need to engage.  Stingy methods curb your potential to develop a good sense of character.  Stinginess does not often come from careless and reckless business methods.  It usually is found under the covers near the more conservative strains of business leadership.  If you are somewhat conservative in your business leadership, look honestly for the signs of stinginess.  It might be happening to your business model under the covers.  Take a serious peak to see if you have some happening.  We need to clean it up if it is happening.

Being too conservative with the cycle of business leadership can become converted to an unwanted high level of stingy ways.  It can happen to the best operators.  It can also happen without notice.  It can come strong to play without the business leader recognizing that it has arrived and taken over.  Be careful of stingy methods if you operate your leadership from a more conservative stance.  Some unwanted business damage may be happening right now, without your awareness.  We can become too conservative and therefore too stingy in our cycle of business leadership.  Our business model will suffer.

How do we detect this little effect?

Do Not Look Like You Are Closing For Business 

Habits are fun to watch, sometimes.  People can develop the craziest habits.  Most of them are a lot of fun to discover and watch.  Others are not very funny at all.  When I am asked to come help a business 'fix' some things, I notice some of their bad habits immediately.  Did you know they do not usually see the same bad habits I see?  It is true.  Many of the little bad habits that are doing the most damage to their business models are habits that the producers are not recognizing.  They cannot see the bad habits they are producing and they cannot feel the damage that is being done.  To an outsider, the bad habits are obvious.  To the producer who has turned them into bad habits, they are invisible.  It is true.

So how do we detect the stingy ways if those ways have become invisible bad habits?  Most of the stinginess that occurs in a business model is generated as an unnoticed bad habit.  That is usually where you will find stingy methods.  They are invisible bad habits.  They grow up slowly and became a routine part of what the business leader believed needed to be practiced.  They begin small, eventually become justified and then grow up unnoticed to become big and bad.  Stinginess is a seriously silent plague to a small business.  It works like moss on the sidewalk.  It fist appears in the little corners and shadows where nobody walks.  It starts out tiny and unnoticed.  Then year after year it grows larger.  It begins to spread around until it becomes part of the routine path where everyone walks.  On wet days, it gets real slippery.  Sometimes it receives some maintenance attention and gets scraped off a little bit.  But it eventually grows back.  Stinginess is a repeating bad habit.  It works just like moss on the sidewalk.  It comes back and begins to make the area slipperier than heck on certain days.  Stinginess works just like the moss on the sidewalk works.  It is danger waiting for its opportunity but nobody notices it until it is too late.

We first start our stingy ways by cutting back on some luxuries.  That is easy to do because it is the right thing to do.  We feel good about making those kinds of cuts.  We trim back on the use of the air conditioning system.  We turn down some of the showroom lighting.  We cut back on the overtime closing routines.  We quit using the cleaning services.  We trim back the smaller delivery systems.  We begin storing the office supplies in a locked back room.  We start checking out and checking in the work equipment and tools.  We begin video surveillance on our staff activities.  We start limiting employee benefits.  We develop a we against them point of view.  We promote no more extras, no more incentives.  We begin questioning how each staff member uses "our" facilities.  We start the process of becoming very stingy.  It begins in the little corners and grows up to become all over the place.  It can become very slippery to walk anywhere when stinginess takes over.  It kills good team work.  It kills growth.  It kills character.  It kills creativity.  It kills inventiveness.  It limits good ideas.  It harbors deceit.  It promotes untrustworthy actions.  It favors the liars.  It quiets the truth.  It erodes any chance for developing a healthy group of growing employees.  Nobody worth their weight in employment will go the extra mile working for a stingy environment.  Nobody good.

This is often the result I witness when I am asked to come help a broken business model.  Stinginess has taken over.  It has grown from the dark little corners and become a major part of the slippery sidewalk everyone is trying to use.  It is not easy to describe and not easy to identify.  It has become a major and justifiable part of the overall accepted ways a business model has learned how to operate.  Everything looks and acts like it is broke.  Even though it is broke, it certainly does not need to look like it.  Most business models that get to this point are business models that need a healthy dose of change.  They need a new leader, a new direction and some new revenues.  If you are that leader, look out.  You are the one who needs replaced.  You are part of the problem.  You are not part of the solution.  You may have developed some very stingy bad habits.  Your sidewalk might be growing too much moss.  Your attention to budget cutting may have become too serious.  Your conservative nature may be too much for your business model to handle.  Take a serious look at the temperature inside your showroom.  Is it governed too low?  It it governed too high?  Get serious about how much stinginess has become routine practice.  It may easily be killing your business growth.

Learn how to curb a stingy habit.  Go get help.  Check out how to become more giving.  Learn how to praise and promote.  Take better care of your customers environment.  Make sure they have enough lighting to see what you sell.  Get serious or get out.  Quit crippling the way your operation functions.  Find new ways to generate more revenues.  You need more money flowing in if your budget is constantly choked.  Learn how to improve your marketing ways.  Do not keep on cutting until it hurts your business model.  go find new revenues.  Grow your business.  Get far away from the stingy tendencies.  They will grow up to become too slippery to stand.  Stinginess works just like cancer, slow but sure.  Too stingy can become too unbearable.  Good folks will leave your model.  Be careful.

Until next time...