The Four Worst Business-Killing Beliefs

What you believe is what you get. What you believe about your business becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. You act toward what you believe. You don’t act on or ignore what you don’t believe.

What do you believe about your business? Do you believe the party will go on? Do you believe the competition cannot touch you? Do you believe just because everything is okay now, that it always will be?

Those are all self-limiting beliefs at best, and business-killing beliefs at worst. Here are the four worst business-killing beliefs.

Business-killing belief #1 

“That is the way we have always done it. No reason to change now.”

This may be the worst one of all the destructive beliefs. Why would you believe there is no reason to change now when the world around you changes all the time? You must always change how you conduct business because the competition is probably aiming at you right now. Or the customer needs are changing. Or perhaps the government is thinking about placing restrictive regulations on your business. You should always assume conditions will change, perhaps abruptly. Plan for it. Model “what ifs.” What if you lose your largest customer? I know a CEO that this happened to. He was out of a job three months later.

What if your largest supplier goes out of business? Do you have alternative suppliers? How fast could you turn them on if you had to? What if your key employees left to work for the competition? Do you have a backup plan for that?

Business-killing belief #2 

“We tried that once and it didn’t work.”

I cannot tell you how many times someone has told me this. Just because it was tried once, doesn’t mean it won’t work the next time. It doesn’t mean it can’t be tried differently. It doesn’t mean it can’t be tried by a different person. Someone with better skills, or better insight.

This belief usually stems from people who failed and don’t want to be exposed as failing. That is why they blame the attempt, not their failure in the attempt. Permit people to fail in an attempt. I know I certainly have. If I added up all the ideas I had that were successful and compared them to those that weren’t, my record wouldn’t look so good. Remember, an idea that isn’t tried is always a failure. A swing you never take is always a strike. So start swinging. And swing again. And again. Swing until you hit a home-run.

Review all the best ideas your team had but didn’t work out. Try them again. Try them with different people. Try them with more resources. The point is try them, don’t just bury them.

Business-killing belief #3 

“Things will get better in the next quarter. Let’s just wait and see.”

Salespeople are notorious for believing this. Maybe they believe this because by nature salespeople are optimistic. They have to be in their line of work. Or maybe they just make excuses to get the heat off of them. They do that sometimes too.

Wait and see is the worst thing you can do when you have a bad quarter. A bad quarter almost always leads to another bad quarter. Or an even worse quarter. When you wait you lose precious time to right the ship before it sinks. You can never get a re-do on a bad quarter.

When you have a bad quarter, dig in and find out why. Don’t buy the wait-and-see excuse. Did customer demand drop? If so, why? Did the competition take some share? If so, why? And why didn’t your sales team see that coming? Did your cost of sales go up? If so, why? And why didn’t your manufacturing team see that coming?

More importantly, what are you going to do about whatever the problem is? Whatever you do, do it fast. When my business gets soft, I move very quickly to correct it. Sometimes that involves unpopular decisions. Cuts that people don’t think should be made. Changes that people think are premature or unnecessary. Just remember, you are not running a popularity contest. Your job is to maximize shareholder value. Sometimes, most times, that involves decisions your team won’t agree with.  Explain to them the best you can but get on with it. Don’t wait for better times. The better times won’t come if you wait. Only the worst times will come.

Business-killing belief #4 

“Don’t Get Ahead of Your Skis”

This is code for “don’t try something that might not work. Or don’t try something that will make me look bad because I tried it and failed.”

Getting ahead of your skis is a good thing. The most spectacular inventions and developments in human history were done by people ahead of their skis. Einstein. Musk. Ford. The list goes on and on.

Ahead of your skis is where the danger and risk lies. But it is also where the excitement and adventure lies. You should want to be ahead of your skis. That is where the magic is. The next time someone tells you not to get ahead of your skis, ignore them. It probably means you are on the right track.

Bottom line, do a business-killing belief check-up. Even one can wreck your business, so if you find even one, change it right away. And whenever your people parrot one of those beliefs, help them change their mindset. If they can’t or won’t, consider replacing them.

Written by Steven L. Blue.

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