Unintended Consequences.

Think About Your Future Consequences

Want to manage a real set of challenges?  Try on a tragedy in your business model.  Try dealing with something illegal that has happened inside your employment ranks.  Better yet, try facing the press on regional television regarding an immoral act that has been exposed to the media in a widespread way.  Now you have a set of challenges landing on your desk that will consume some very valuable time.  Not to mention, damage your business in unintended ways.  Welcome to the world of unintended consequences.

Business leaders are often faced with tough selections in their business decisions.  Sometimes the selections offer a 'no-win' situation.  I have had to deal with many 'no-win' corners in my life regarding business leadership selections.  It ain't fun.

Sometimes those 'no-win' situations arrive without warning through unintended crossroads developed from poorly selected choices of earlier opportunities.  When we look back we clearly see how earlier choices lead up to this unintended consequence.  Now we are faced with some 'no-win' decisions.  Regardless of what or how we select our next choice of actions, we will lose.

I term this kind of situation in business the place where leaders learn how to minimize loss rather than maximize profits.  Profits are no longer the main driving force of the business model.  Minimizing loss has taken over the steering wheel.  The business leader is now facing choices that are designed to lose with the least amount of loss maximized.  The 'no-win' pattern of choices must be dealt with at the lowest possible cost.

Amazing enough, this kind of scenario is simple to describe and easy to define.  Every single business leader recognizes this kind of situation.  Many have dealt with these kinds of situations often in their business careers.  'No-win' scenarios are not misunderstood occurrences.  All of us have had our fair share of them.

What's more, all of us have experienced how we felt about dealing with unintended consequences.  It is a troubling experience.  Sometimes that awful feeling lingers for a long time.  Guess what?  Even though the awful feeling lingers on and the unintended consequence drives the heart into a pattern of continued troubled feelings, the show must go on.  Business leadership must still endure.  Business leaders still have a show to perform.  The acts to that show are running live and continuous, regardless of how badly we feel about dealing with unintended consequences.  The show must go on.

Page two.

Make Healthy And Clean Decisions, Even When It Is Unpopular To Do So.

When I was working with a mature couple on their first business effort they ran into some family problems along the way.  Their daughter got caught stealing another employees money.

The news of this event traveled fast.  They had been trying to mold their daughter into becoming more active in the business affairs.  They had elected to move her duties around the model so she could see how each part behaved and functioned.  This mature couple was trying to teach their daughter the business.  Little did they recognize that she did not want to become that serious about her involvement in their business.  She performed sub-par in every area they promoted her to perform.  The company employees could see this pattern quite clearly.  The mature couple became blind to this fact.

I was helping this mature couple work on some business developments that were designed to help them reduce their continued flirting with business losses.  I had mentioned the potential that their daughter might not be the best choice for their ongoing efforts to teach her the business.  I have way too much business experience to know when someone is not interested in operating a small business.  From my life experiences  it was very easy to see.  I had made a couple of prior attempts to get their attention directed towards the truth of this reality.

At times, this effort was very uncomfortable.  Before the theft, many corners were turned that did not reflect well for the employees, the company and the mature couple who owned it.  Some difficult situations had occurred.  Some tough decisions had to be made.  Some unwanted outcomes became part of the business reality.  There were brief moments of despair, broken trust, conflict and lost revenues.  The business model had to deal with issues that were not part of its written plans.  A great waste of resources and time was spent on dealing with side issues that should never have become part of the daily process for running a healthy business model.  The mature couple became more divided between how they felt about each other as well as their overall respect for their business direction.

My work became more serious as this challenge began to grow.  The employees became more dissident.  The atmosphere became more stressful.  The desire from the mature owners became more determined to press this daughter into a higher role.  They wanted so much to have their family become good and successful business leaders.  They wanted so badly to be the owners of a great family business.  It was their driven choice.  They were bound and determined to make that happen.

As positive as I am about everything in the world of business development, I could not see this one effort working well.  I could not see this daughter changing her mind.  I could not feel how she would become as passionate about doing well with this business model as her parents were.  I could not feel her desire to learn what it took and do what it required to make this business model perform well.  The two sides were miles apart.  My work to help this mature couple remove their constant business troubles was to engage their efforts to see this challenge more clearly than they wanted to see.

Then the theft occurred.  It was not small beans.  It was ugly and went down ugly.

The daughter not only got caught, but would likely face prison time if a conviction pursuit was to really happen.  Unintended consequences will arrive.  Every business owner knows what I mean.  Our business trails have some of this litter hanging around.  We intend for some things to happen in our business life but later discover how they end up on a path going the other direction.  Unintended consequences.

I got fired by this couple.  I got blamed for her lost ways by being accused of causing too much pressure in her life surrounding the subject of my work to help her avoid the lack of improvement.  Unintended consequences.  They happen.

We parted amicably.  Once as involved business friends, we no longer speak or see each other.  They have become divorced.  The business model has fallen apart and the once strong $5 million per year operation struggles to generate $1 million per year right now.  The daughter is married, messed up and moved onto another state to live.  Unintended consequences.  They happen.

Make sure you get a strong grip on the ground you walk when you make the decisions you make involving your business model and its future.  Your current actions will eventually determine the kinds of consequences you will need to face around the corners you cannot yet see.  What may appear to be good for thought today might eventually become your 'no-win' choices of tomorrow.  Be very cognizant of how much spin you generate for those unintended consequences of tomorrow.  They happen.

Long term...it is easily worth the current trouble caused by avoiding to make the 'protected wrong choices' you face today.  Otherwise, expect unintended consequences to come knocking at your door.  Trust me, they are not very much fun.

Until next time...