How to tackle the real business problem and focus on resolving it

In the present chaotic economic environment that businesses operates in there can be just too many factors or moving parts to consider. Some of these may also be confusing and distractive in resolving any real business problems.

So how can you stay focus on the real issue and remain vigilant in resolving the issue so that you can contain the problem and not cause further losses?

?

Here you need a strategic approach to devote your attention and resources to bring forth a resolution that minimizes the impact of the problem.

?

1.??Focus on what is important ?- Knowing the real issue is very important. Many falls into the problem of identifying the wrong issue, thinking that some visible symptoms are the real causes to be tackled. Rather a problem's symptom is an indication that something did not work out quite as expected. Whilst a problem’s cause is the reason why the problem occurred in the first place.

For example if your business is suffering from a significant drop in revenue which can be clearly seen in your Profit and Loss Account, you are looking at a symptom. But what are the causes of it? If you investigate deeper you may realise that it may be due to Revenue Per Customer or Number of Customer has dropped. Going further in from Revenue Per Customer drop may be driven by a combination of Price Per Product has increased, Purchased Product Per Customer has dropped and changes in Product Mix purchases. You can even go further in from here to truly identify the causes to the revenue drop.

?

2.? Understand the critical levers – Once you get to the real causes of your problem you need to understand the critical levers that can cause changes to the effects.

Say if the issue is Price of Product has increased the levers to change this effect can be to increase its brand and reputation and this can come from enhancing marketing effectiveness and marketing spend. Similarly if the issue for Purchased Product Per Customer has dropped the lever can be the increase in cross selling effectiveness and for the issue of changes in Product Mix purchases, the lever can be to increase the upselling effectiveness.

?

3.??Determine the strength of the relationship – When you have understood the levers that you can consider to cause changes, you need to evaluate how much is the leverage from the change in those levers.

What this mean is you need to know the elasticity effect by testing what is the effect from a change of say 1% in the lever towards the results. A high elasticity effect is one in which the change in the results due to a change in the lever is large, and vice-versa.

?

4.??Develop a better control of the situation – When you have understood the elasticity effect between the levers and results, you can focus on where you want to ?put in better control and resources to create an expected results.

In another words you attempt to create the environment and condition that best suit and foster the probability of achieving your expected results. Devoting your resources in such a strategic way also reduces any resource wastages.

?

5.??Keep learning from it – This is the key to continuous improvement in tackling real business issues. By doing so things can only becomes better. There is no wasted efforts in this learning, only becoming more strategic.

?

Strategizing your business in this way and tackling the real business problem and focus on resolving it through a systematic approach will forward your business ahead of others. This is most needed in today’s environment so that your business progress will not be hindered.