I’ve been doing some consulting. Consulting is an interesting job. I come up with incredible ideas and my clients totally ignore me. It’s great for my ego.
When I consult, I only do it with CEOs who are running companies that are on the way up. It’s fun for me and I enjoy helping them so they don’t have to reinvent the wheel. Occasionally, they do listen to me and save themselves some time and a lot of grief. It’s not because I’m smarter than they are, it’s because I’m older and more experienced. So many of the issues and problems they face are ones I’ve dealt with a time or two.
One issue that comes up repeatedly with my clients is focus. I’m convinced that the younger people are, the harder it is to focus. We live in an A.D.D. world that inundates us with images, sounds and experiences quicker than we can take it all in. In a society that’s been brought up on MTV, we have less and less of an attention span, making it more and more difficult to focus. Coupled with impatience, this leads to a tendency for people to flit from one business model to another, never giving sufficient time or attention to one area long enough to reap the rewards.
Talking about focus and staying the course seems very simple. But on a day-to-day basis, it’s hard to keep an organization focused. Entrepreneurial types tend to be creative, innovative thinkers. Once an idea is launched, it’s much more fun and intriguing to move on to the next great idea than to stick around to fully implement the original plan.
Let me tell you a tale of two clients of mine. Client A is extremely creative and talented. He came to me with a good business model that played to his strengths. Unfortunately, being the creative, A.D.D. type, he is absolutely incapable of focusing on his core business and doing that well. He’s got an idea a minute. He just bounces all over the place. He comes up with these wonderful ideas, but they aren’t related to what he is doing at any point in time, so he veers off in a new direction. That’s a recipe for disaster. You’ve only got so much time, so much energy, so much money, and so many people. He chews them up and spits them out. The guy makes me crazy. Since I’ve been working with him, he has gone through one business model after another. Each one is the new thing that’s going to be the home run. His business is struggling, and has been for years now.
Client B is also full of good ideas and has a good business model. He’s had numerous opportunities to move away from his core business, and I’ve advised him against it. He is very good at focusing and executing his core business. He’s a great leader and gets his people to focus their talent as well. It’s not the most exciting business in the world, but it’s damn profitable. His people like working for the company, they are excited about what they do and the company is growing at a fast pace, just booming.
Client A and Client B are equally talented, intelligent people. Both are entrepreneurs who started with nothing but great ideas. One is fabulously successful. The other is floundering and failing. The difference is FOCUS and the commitment to hang around to see ideas through to fruition and profitability.
Recent Comments