Posted: 14 May 2015 07:13 AM PDT
Photo (CC) by
Dennis Skley, on flickr
The world we live in is not a static
place.
This is true in every aspect of
life, including small business. For
small-business owners, things are changing, and those changes are happening at
an ever-increasing pace.
Doing business tomorrow will be
different than doing business today. And doing business next week might be
something we can’t even imagine today.
Disruption is another term people
use when discussing the changing environment in which we live. When disruption occurs, you are forced to
respond in some manner. No longer can you continue to do
business as you have in the past.
While small-business owners may not
know exactly what the next disruption coming down the road will be, they know
it’s coming. Knowing it’s coming means the owner has a chance to determine his
or her response.
Owners can respond in one of
two ways:
§ One choice is to do nothing. Let the
disruption come and then respond.
§ The other choice is to be proactive and to
disrupt the business themselves. The event no longer happens at a random, and
perhaps a bad, time.
Taking a proactive stance gives
the owner several advantages.
For one thing, bad timing is taken
out of the equation somewhat. The disruption occurs on the owner’s time schedule.
Second, being proactive means that
the owner is not forced into playing catch-up but instead has done at least a
little preparation in terms of possible responses. Even if the decision is to
do nothing, the owner has
made that decision and has not let circumstances make the decision for him or
her.
By disrupting your own business, you
also can get a jump on your
competitors. Not only might you get a step ahead, but you put
them into the position of being behind and responding to the external
environment.
Being proactive changes the mindset
you are working under. No longer are changes in the environment a threat.
Instead, they become opportunities. You take control.
The bottom line: Disrupt
your business before others decide to disrupt it for you.
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