Concentrate on Concentration: Deliver more value and you’ll earn dollars

You’ve got to spend money to make money.  Don’t put all your eggs in one basket.  Save your pennies.  These are all well-worn statements that contain more than a grain of common sense.  The size of those grains depend on which business sector you operate in and what your priorities and needs are.  Here’s one that is 100% true regardless of where you work, for whom or why.

“Change your focus from making money to creating more value and more money will follow as a consequence.”

In other words, the more valuable a product or service becomes in the eyes of the market, the more likely it is that demand will increase without you having to produce more.  An example: the black, viscous fluid just beneath the unforgiving Texan terrain was essentially worthless until people realised that it would fuel transportation, industry and manufacturing.  Another example: in this country, drinking water is and always was accessible and all but free until the perceived value of bottled water made buying it a near necessity.  What about an example from the services side of business?  Well, we’re just one of many businesses that find that offering a little extra time to chat with clients about their needs is the incubator of goodwill (on both sides) and of course repeat business.

Great! But how?

Good question and while every circumstance, goal and business is different, there is one thing in common that all paths that lead to success seem to have.

A (strategic) framework.

It sounds very simple but time and time again without a framework that is rigid enough to stop our inner entrepreneur from driving us off the rails yet flexible enough to accommodate adjustments, things get difficult very quickly.  So what are we looking at exactly?

1. Start with your vision, mission and values.  What do you want, how will you achieve it and what governs your methodology (what you stand for and what you won’t stand for).
2. Resourcing.  Your assets.
3. Liabilities.  These need to be acknowledged, addressed and limited where possible.

There’s more.  Quite a bit more but this is a basic framework checklist mapping how you might choose to deliver value and then deliver more value.

You can’t stick to a framework, or a set of guidelines or an operational plan… if you do not have one so this should be a priority.

Oh, about those distractions…

Here’s a brief and not very exhaustive list:

Novel shortcuts, your competition, the small stuff, important but not urgent, urgent but not important, premature diversification opportunities, shiny things, tax bills that seem a little too large (because they actually might be), regular bills, irregular bills, BAS (see you on the 24th of this month for our webinar), webinars – not related to your goals…

Feel free to add ten more of your own.

Final thought:  if you establish the right strategic framework for your business you will find the time and resources to concentrate your value and add value to your life and those of people closest to you.