Growth as a Context

I've been working with a number of clients these last months on growth issues. In the process, I've come to realize that the word "growth" brings up thoughts of "hard work," "major change," "tied up resources." In other words, growth is often viewed as a struggle. But the fact is, growth is a state of mind that leads to actions intentionally aligned with a long-term goal. It's not easy OR hard, just a different context that works in lean as well as bountiful times.

During lean economic times, it's easy to fall into a state of mind of "maintenance" where business owners and entrepreneurs try to keep afloat. But growth is not explosive, nor does it require expensive changes to current operations to make it happen. More often, growth is incremental change that ceaselessly moves forward given the right care and feeding (intentional actions).

For example, one of my clients was in "maintenance" mode because they didn't have enough resources (time, money, people) to grow. In this economy, just to maintain their current revenues, they added 2 new commissioned salespeople. It wasn't working. Revenues were dipping. When they switched to a growth perspective, the goal of maintaining revenues created a whole new set of actions. To fill their pipeline, they focused on having an outside agency prequalify prospects so their salespeople had strong opportunities to work on. With less to hunt for, the salespeople had more opportunity to close new customers. In addition to maintaining sales revenues, my client is now poised for growth when the economy shifts because they've reduced their sales cycle while doubling their pipeline. (At less cost than adding new personnel.)