What Business are you in?
Posted by Perry Lewis on Thu, Oct 29, 2009
Back in our early days (1976 to be exact), we hired a wise gentleman at the end of his career who helped us out a great deal. One of the valuable lessons I learned was to ask “what business are you in?”. At that point in time, we were trying to be all things to all people, and spreading our expertise too thin. This is the single most important question that you need to ask yourself about your organization, which may not even be a for-profit business. In addition to all the rules you work with, there is probably some overriding business process or decision-making process that can help you define your organization. Sometimes this is called a ‘core competency’, but I tend to look at it more from the point of view of answering that one simple question.
For the past 30 years, if someone contacts us and asks if we can automate the scheduling for their long-haul trucking fleet, it’s pretty easy to say, no, we can’t do that for you. If a client asks us to upgrade the operating systems on their computers, we can also say no, we’re not in that business. By the same token, it can be really illuminating to put your decision-making processes through the same filter. For example, what if a customer calls and asks if you do plumbing or electrical repairs? You may have the expertise in-house to do that, but for many very good reasons, may want to decline. On the other hand, if your business revolves around installing energy-reducing appliances, you may answer that question differently. It may be that your organization is missing out on some opportunities that will also make your customers happier.
There is even another way that asking “what business am I in?” can be useful. For example, I have worked with more than one public utility billing office who, in addition to their primary job of CRM and billing, are really in the Delinquency Processing business. All of their efforts (and much of their revenue) revolves around collecting late charges. One utility was actually HAPPY when someone didn’t pay their bill; indeed, the entire organization was moved to action over that. While I didn’t personally agree with the philosophy, it would have been very helpful had I understood the focus from the beginning of the project.
The crux of all this is simply to encourage you to understand your own business processes in relation to your stated (or unstated) goals, and make sure they are in alignment.
Photo Credit jhoweaa