Starting a company is easy. You have an idea, product, service or goal that you consider amazing and want to provide it to the public at large. You register your company with your home state and file any other compliance documents needed and ‘ta-da!’ you have a company of one. The first few months or years of spaghetti throwing strategies are fun and creative. You likely generate some sales, possibly even a few million dollars in sales. Everything is amazing, albeit stressful at times, until suddenly you flatline. You could still be inventing new products and services, but your sales stagnate. Profitability may decline or new market entrants have you working harder than you’d like, whatever the cause you feel it just becoming a little too difficult. At what point do you realize your spaghetti strategy is no longer working?
Planning our RV trip – The Destination Defined and the Iterative Journey
When we decided to tackle our family RV adventure, we set a goal to see the U.S. in just one year. We didn’t have a real plan or vision for where we were going or when, we just generically said ‘the U.S. in one year.’ We knew we had a good idea, although not completely original. We were excited and started shopping for a new camper almost immediately. The possibilities seemed endless and the destination and timeline absolutely feasible.
However, as we started to plan, we realized the original goal was unrealistic and changed the target timeline to two years. We also got clearer in what we were trying to achieve during this time period, which had an impact on our journey. While we wanted adventure and to see the U.S. and share that with our kids, we also welcomed the chance to change how they were educated and how we worked. We wanted close-knit family time and to encourage our kids to have courage in ways a stable house-bound life didn’t allow. And we wanted them to have access to seeing the world differently and understanding that there is life outside of our tiny town that looks much, much different.
From here, we were able to really start planning our trip. We mapped the specific regions and finally the destinations within each region. We got more clear in where we were going and when and were able to better communicate and plan on how to get there. As we’ve gotten on the road, our trip planning and journey is continuing to change. I’m doubtful we’ll be back ‘home’ in two years. The destination and vision is changing because the possibilities are intentions are already starting to look different.
How Does This Relate to Building a Company
Creating a company is not dissimilar to planning this lengthy trip. You have a great idea for a product or service and a really broad vision of what you would like to do without any real specificity or plans. You then start to make some moves to set all of that in motion. This works for awhile – perhaps even a few years, but at some point you realize it’s not working anymore. Maybe sales are declining, maybe you are running out of cash, maybe your employees don’t seem as excited – it could be a myriad of things, but you just know it isn’t working. Many entrepreneurs in the early stages fail to get beyond the product or service level and set a real vision for the company that can motivate customers and employees alike. They also fail to successfully communicate that to the employees and develop a strategy around how to execute it.
Communicating your vision to both your customers and your employees is a vitally important piece that is often overlooked by entrepreneurs, particularly in the service space. Often, a vision or mission becomes a phrase or paragraph stuck to a wall somewhere and it’s never talked about again. This isn’t enough, especially in the outwardly lived world we see today. You must communicate it, both to your team and to the outside world. You must become a key person of influence. You must bring it to your 1:1’s and team meetings and ensure that it is top of mind at all times for your team. You must develop some of them into key people of influence that both outwardly and inwardly communicate your vision to the world.
At the executive team level, you must continue to work to develop the strategy that will execute on the vision. As the owner and leader, you can’t be afraid to iterate, innovate and change. As this series progresses, I will identify and layout key tools and a framework that will help you develop your strategy, define your target market and employees, build your company culture and manage that change.
The Team Must Be Clear in Your Why and the Destination
When we started to plan our big RV journey, the ‘team’ was excited because it was camping and they saw that as fun. We had to sit down with them and communicate the realities and the vision. To do that, we needed effective visuals, a map and clear communication. The reality still did not settle in until we got underway. At the top, management was clearly planning and executing, pivoting when needed. But, all of this wasn’t shared with the team. We did however, continue to articulate our why and the vision for this trip, especially during periods where being ‘in the thick of it’ was exhausting.
Our planning for this trip took almost 18 months. It wasn’t created in one day and we continually discuss and re-visit our strategy and our plans. The underlying vision and what we are trying to achieve has not changed as we’ve embarked on the journey, but we have had to shift some priorities and become more effective in our communications. We’ve also had to manage this change amongst the team (transitioning from two bedrooms to one shared room and having to reroute to fix our broken solar are some key examples here). You will have to do the same with your blooming business. I’ve got some tips, tricks and strategies to help.
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