WHEN FOCUS IS SHARP AT THE TOP, GREAT RESULTS FOLLOW
Focus is fundamental to marketing, innovation and sales success.
Products that have a highly focused marketing message are 60% more profitable.
Reduce the number of items offered and sales will actually increase by 250%.
Clearly define the sales mission – it will serve well to increase sales, increase job
satisfaction and reduce burnout.
How can your company become more focused? The secret lies in great
leadership.
Focus requires taking responsibility and making tough decisions – decisions
about what you will and won’t include in your marketing message, product line up
and sales objectives. Just because you can doesn’t mean you should.
As leaders of our companies, our most important task is to make the right
decisions about how to allocate our personal time, our people’s time and the
energy of our business. I believe that the single best measure of leadership
greatness is the courage to make real decisions. When there is clarity of focus,
there is organizational effectiveness and efficiency. You can eliminate wasteful
work by defining your ideas clearly. Bold decisions early in the process result in
higher-quality execution later.
The greatest barrier to real decision-making is a lack of deep thinking. In today’s
email/text message/cell phones/Blackberry world, we’re all so busy that we have
no time or energy to think deeply about our real challenges. Results of this hurried
existence and lack of deep thought are: energy wasted, innovation splintered,
effectiveness diminished…and what you get is stunningly poor execution.
I believe most failures that are blamed on poor execution are in truth the result
of poor leadership early in the process. A lack of leadership creates a chain
reaction of problems: product lines are broad but not deep in quality, advertising
is unfocused and unconvincing, sales teams are unhappy and unproductive. When
leaders are focused, the result is good decision-making.
So dig out your marketing message, product listings, service options, and sales
objectives and try to look at them with fresh eyes. Then it’s time to make some
real decisions. Success will follow.