The simple solution, yes please!
There’s something built into us humans that makes us wish we could just snap our fingers and what we want to happen happens. We want to find the pill that makes us slim and healthy, or the simple method that makes us happy. That’s probably why it’s so rewarding to present the simple solutions to the difficult problems. There are many who buy what politicians or others say; that if you do X, Y will be solved.
I’ve thought it many times myself, that it would be great if all my ideas, private and professional, could be solved at once. As long as I thought the idea and sketched out in my head how it should be, it was done. Do you recognize yourself?
But there are rarely simple solutions to complex problems.
Unfortunately, it’s not that simple
I have a clear idea of what all this should look like, so it can’t be that difficult to get it done. But yes, it is. It takes time. It’s “easy” to think up the solution, but harder to implement it.
The same is true for improvement work. I meet many people who somehow think that it is quite easy to move the business from the undesirable position it is in today, to a desirable better position. They want it to be quick and there should be a quick-fix.
But unfortunately, that’s not how they work. That said, fortunately we don’t have to wait years to see progress. For these come as we work. If we start to eat more healthily and move around, we will soon feel better and maybe even look better. If we start saving money, there will be more money in the account after a while. If we tackle one pile of paper a day, we’ll soon have a tidier office.
And even so, if we start working on improvement in a targeted way, we will be better tomorrow than we are today. We will feel better and have more fun at work. Customers, whatever we call them, will be better served and our finances will be better.
“To win the game, you need to stay in the game”
But in order to do that, we need to firstly decide to really work on improvement and secondly to be persistent. To quote entrepreneur Dean Graziosi; “to win the game, you need to stay in the game”. It is only by keeping up the work that we will be able to reap the rewards of our efforts. You won’t win if you don’t stick around and do what’s needed.
Anyone who is not patient and leaves the work for something else, will not get anything out of the little work that was done.
Sure, we see the small signs of improvement, but to get the big results, we need to be consistent and persistent. This applies to us as people with better physique, energy, money, knowledge, or whatever we want to achieve. As well as it applies to our business.
Trust the process
To then further ensure that we succeed is to have a methodology and tools that facilitate our work. To find another quote, this time from marketer Jeff Walker who said; “you need to trust the process” when describing that you need to follow the methods to succeed.
It is not possible to:
- have no process (method) to follow, and
- than jumping here and jumping there, in order to constantly find a different process.
All is not gold that glitters
For the latter, there is an apt English expression; “the next shiny object”. In this case, it means that someone runs with one method and/or tool and then after a while someone finds another method or tool and jumps to it.
I remember one organisation years ago that put quite a lot of resources into training and adapting to one method, but after a while someone found something that they thought was better. Quickly they changed and started with the new one. What do you think happened next?
Very true, after a while someone else found something new and they jumped to it. Now, after all these years, unfortunately not much has been achieved, and of course there is no uniform method. A huge waste in a job that is really about reducing waste and creating more efficient and better ways of working.
New version out now
Speaking of process, there is a new version of the Shaper and Business Excellence method out. It is version 2021-07-18. It contains a lot of simplifications and clarifications. We are now building an interactive interface for the methodology so that the different phases and steps can be easily accessed, and training and support material in the form of templates and tools can be provided directly for each step.
Are you interested in learning more about how your business can take the next step in your improvement efforts and how Shaper of Business Excellence will help you? In that case, I think you should contact me for a 30-minute briefing.
You can reach me as usual via the contact form and 070-528 52 61
Looking forward to hearing from you.
Greetings,
Matts
