What Got You Here Won't Get You There In 2025

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This time of year is about goals. About achievement of some type. It’s resetting and going again. Those resets come with reflection on the past year. Thinking about what went well. What didn’t go the way you wanted? From both of those how you can now move forward.

Because forward in time is the only direction we can go. We can’t change the past. What’s done is done. We can make different decisions moving forward.

“What got you here, won’t get you there” is the adage. If you keep doing the same thing over and over again, expecting a different result, some might say you’re insane. Well, according to Einstein’s definition anyway.

Getting to the next level, means doing the things you’ve been doing well, but also adding to them. Because what got you here is a foundation. You have to keep doing the things that got you to where you are. You can’t stop those efforts.

Typically, this is in the selling area of your business. You can’t stop those successful actions. You might want to add more, but don’t stop what’s working.

In other areas of the business, we do want to do things differently. If you look at your business as (3) buckets. Sales, operations, and support we can see what needs to change and what can continue as-is.

Sales: Do more of what works.

Support: This is IT, HR, Accounting, Admin. These are all the departments that support the internal operations and sales teams. Let’s quickly break these down.

·????????????? IT: Keep doing what works to maintain operations. If growing rapidly, there is potential for different. These guys keep the computers on and websites running.

·????????????? HR: Keep doing what works. If in a growth phase, hire more here to recruit more talent. That’s the biggest lever here. Do more of what works.

·????????????? Accounting: Keep collecting money. Improve processes, but don’t break anything.

·????????????? Administration: Again, keeping the trains running. Nothing different here.

Your internal team, unless you are rapidly growing doesn’t need to do anything different. For them, life stays pretty much the same. It’s dealing with today’s issues and keeping the trains running on time. No new track to build. No mountain to clear. Just do what needs to be done.

Sales: Two options here. Maintain effort levels that will get you what you’ve always got. Or increase the sales team, getting you more. Or each person increases their sales efforts, also getting you more.

When sales efforts result in gains over 20% of last year's, operations must change. A person can handle 10% more. It’s not that big of an increase. When your team is already working at their limit, adding work becomes problematic. You are no longer to add work without something breaking. Meaning, something must change. You have to do something different.

When you can’t do more to reach your goals, you now have to work differently. And in an economy where hiring takes a long time, if you even fill the role, you must work differently. In 2025 what is the different type of work?

First, you have to start automating tasks for your team. Whether that’s invoicing, meeting minutes using AI tools, or compiling requirements. For electrical engineers let’s what can be automated using tools you already have:

·??????????????? Automated meeting summaries from Zoom or Teams.

·??????????????? Email Automation: routing emails to specific folders. Check-in or update email automation.

That’s about it unless you invest in other tools

·??????????????? Design automation tools to lay out elements within your Revit models.

·??????????????? Circuiting Automation to automatically circuit your electrical devices.

·??????????????? Automatically size breakers in your Revit panel schedules based on loads

·??????????????? Automatic panel schedule placement on sheets

·??????????????? Automatic Riser Creation.

Other tasks like design meetings, specifications, QA/QC, and code research are what your team will need to be a part of and invest their time in.

All these tools are available from Kowabunga Studios.

Because if you can’t complete all the work you have, you have to work differently. Kowabunga Studios has the tools that allow you to work differently in 2025. ?

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