Can growth be made 'crisis-proof'?

The growth of companies is no different than how the branches of a tree grow, as all growth does not have to be ‘linear’….and so companies and leaders must first create a successful business model using the owner mindset, and then ‘scale’ it up by launching/implementing the same model in newer markets where they transplant a successful proposition and style it to local needs. The ‘what’ doesn’t change, but the ‘HOW’ does.

However, in markets where the model is sustained and established, to grow further, companies should listen to client needs and imagine newer products/services that they can provide to the same customers to up-sell and/or cross-sell to them or to provide for their needs that they seek from the relationship….such a process of ‘scoping’ up in markets helps build  stronger bonds with stakeholders and customers, provides employees with new learning opportunities, and helps create an enduring relation with the clients and enhances lifetime earnings from a client. A parent never disconnects from a child , even when they become adults and set up their own families and home, so it is important that the company provides each employee with a purpose to remain connected with the company (the child), while being customer-centric.

When does the sense-of-having-a-purpose FAIL?

It is well-proven that customer needs are simple, and customers hate complexity….while company’s, in their desperate search for radical innovation, love to thrust complex solutions at customers, only to the disenchantment of tenured customers and employees. This is the biggest mistake a company can make, as any process of change should not only be in line with the prime purpose set and keeping an owners mindset, but also by ensuring that any new initiative or process should not hurt/disenfranchise existing staff/clients….but only add to newer additional propositions that serve the evolving needs of a newer wave of clients….over the passage of time. The process of radical innovation should not be to thrust, for example, digitization down the throats of older clients who are tech-aliens just because the younger generations, who are tech-natives, prefer that. While organization like to force change customer habits, it is often done for self-serving reasons like ‘expense saves’. This is when the sense-of-having-a-purpose FAILS.

The 3rd Arrow of a Company’s growth!

To meet this challenge of evolving needs of a generational mix of clients, it is important to look at the third arrow of growth (other than ‘Scale up’ and ‘scope-up’ being the first two) to one where growth is done on principles gradually transforming by creating ‘adjacencies’ – through newer processes, technology, and other ways to serve changing client needs while remaining fundamental closer to its core proposition and purpose…..older processes and channels should not be eliminated owing to self-serving reasons, but newer changes should be grown adjacent to older channels while providing for the choices of each of the generational-linked evolving client needs.

Treat your company, as you would treat one’s own child

It is important always to keep an owners mindset and do for a company, how we would do for our child. Avoid hobbies and do not pursue any initiative of growth because it seems like the logical easy thing to do after the change/crisis period is over. It is important to remember that the behavior of stakeholders during crisis does not sustain and, fortunately, the world has more ‘periods of stability’ than ‘incidences of crises. All human beings are episodic in their mind and programmed to forget with the stimulus of crisis is over….and behavior reverts to the mean, like before.

So, please remain committed/firm in the midst of crisis, just as a motorist would  do by continuing to hold the steering firmly when suddenly encountering a very bumpy road…..that is not the time to re-imagine or re-design strategy as surely it will cause an accident….that is the time to be firm on purpose…..once the  turbulence of crisis is over, and stability returns, people are at peace as before and behavior and ‘WHAT’ they seek does not change and even ‘How they seek it’ does not materially change right after.

Avoid re-imagining what doesn’t need to be re-imagined

Instead imagine how you yourself feel mid-flight when the plane hits turbulence, and how when smooth flight conditions return…..a predictable/advancing business needs no more…..it need belief, trust, discipline, latitude to navigate within acceptable boundaries, strongest faith in the front lines, high responsiveness to the needs of the stakeholder, and the maturity to understand that ‘crisis is inevitable’ and companies that are smartly and predictably growing view them as an opportunity to pause, re-energize, reinforce faith down the line, commit to staying the course on their original purpose, and believe that the need does not go away, and crisis is not to stay forever, but important to look internally and build trust and support with an environment which is ‘safe to fail’ with original the right people hired with the right level of resourcefulness and initiative, and ‘GROWTH WILL AUTOMATICALLY PERPETUATE ONCE THE CRISIS PASSES’, only with greater predictability.