Stop Firefighting and Take Control

How Four Things Can Turn Your Business Around Quickly

A business is in the firefighting stage when they aim to just make it through the day, and thinking a month or two ahead can feel like long term planning. During this time sales and profits are usually under pressure. Stress levels are up. Not all customers are receiving the level of service your company stands for and broken promises are happening.

In recognition of this environment, new policies or programs are introduced and some work but all too often focus is lost and things go back to the old way. How does a company get out of this cycle of continual firefighting?

1.    Make Time to Breath – when a business is in a firefighting cycle extremely short focus and lack of resources tend to cloud decision making which results in more trouble to clean-up.

2.    Stop Chasing Symptoms – typically there are only a couple major reasons why so many things are going wrong or are out of control. Look for the root cause; what is the start of the process and its steps that are not working?

3.    Balance Detail With Progress – getting caught in micro-managing prevents teams from getting big wins. Details are critical but too much focus on them can make time evaporate. If too many mistakes are happening then either training or the process needs to be addressed and simplified.

Focus On Four Big Projects - if your project list is longer than your grocery list you have too much on your plate. Adress only four areas that give you the biggest customer, financial, and problem resolution results and stay with it until you get to the end. Than pick for the next four and so on.

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Blog By Andrew Ballenthin, President of Sol Solutions. When you need to stand apart from your competition talk to Sol Solutions for your marketing, strategic business planning, and operations streamlining needs. www.solsolutions.ca  Passionate About Connecting Pieces.

The Community Marketing Blog is a place for businesses to share their marketing and successful growth stories. Its objective is to spread inspiration, strategy, and practical application of business principles in order to help more companies succeed whether times are tough or a practical solution is required to get through a unique growth challenge.

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