Pivoting your Way to Success in 2021
he Impact of 2020~ this year has been an epic year of change, challenge, and cultural impact.
The pandemic has altered the way we manage our daily lives indefinitely and caused extreme and violent economic shifting. There has been political and social levels of unrest in a way that the country has never experienced before. Our society has changed permanently without a design for the way we should conduct our lives.
And guess what? This is the best time for innovation, manifestation and creation. This is the birth of a new nation. Creativity thrives in Chaos.
What is Pivoting?
The huge buzzword this year is “Pivot”. According to Entrepreneur.com, pivoting is a significant business change that is intended to help a business to recover from a tumultuous period or a change that makes the current business strategy unstable. Let’s break this down further.
Pivoting is a significant business change. That makes it different from a tweak in a marketing plan, a broader social network, or a new manufacturer. That means a change of strategy that will alter the entire way that your business operates from that point on. Are you ready to release the old framework and breakthrough into a new direction or are you inevitably trying to put old wine into new wineskins? Are you flexible enough to get some external opinion on your business model or do you insist on doing the way that made you successful in the past? The past is gone and the now is here.
Pivoting is also intended to help a business recover. The activity that happens after a storm is recovery. This the process of dealing with a disruption and the process of coming out of it. This is the rebirth of success in your business with consideration of the changes caused by the challenges that a business has experienced. The business can be suffering from a social change like quarantine, a cultural change like an illumination of otherwise underrepresented sects of society, or political change such as governmental shifts. Some businesses have had an explosion of growth beyond production capacity. Other businesses have been impacted by social restrictions, where they have had to temporarily close and attempt to regain momentum. Other businesses have been totally inhilitated by this societal shift. All businesses that will survive will pivot, to some capacity, as a process of recovery.
Mind Your Business
Pivoting is a customized process. There is no template that every business can fit in that will provide a “pivoted” version of their business. The pivoting for service business will be different than products. A newer business will be different than a more established business. The type of business that you are in, your location, your financial situation, your personal stability, along with the economic, social, and political conditions of society at large will all play an intricate part in the changes that will be necessary to have your business thrive and survive.
There are some common elements that a Pivoting plank should contain, such as:
Vision
You have to be able to see it to implement it. If the direction that you are pivitoning into is out of alignment with what you feel is the purposeful direction of your business, all the planning will become useless because you will never apply the new system. This alignment is a two way street because you have to be flexible enough to allow a new perspective and try a new way of operation. Ultimately, you have to be comfortable with going forward in confidence to have an honest chance of success from applying your pivoting strategy.
Planning
You have to have a clear plan of execution for your pivoting plan for the pivoting plan to be a success. An idea without a plan is just a thought. The planning process starts to make the concept into a concrete action plan, assesses the viability of the concept, analyzes the risks and how to navigate them, arranges the action steps, and creates a financial plan, among any other things. It also allows individuals, institutions, and organizations that may be in position to support your concept to have a clear perspective into your positioning strategy. The plan places the pivot into profitability.
Financing
The pivot needs to be fully funded to have a fair chance of success. If a person has a seed for a tree, and they plant it in a pot that limits its growth, it may not reach its full potential. This limitation is not because of the possibility that is contained within the seed, it is because of the limitation of the area that it has to execute. It is not the seed’s (idea’s) fault it was not successful and it does not mean that the seed does not have the potential of success. If the area (supply) is not available, the growth will be limited and the true potential of its success will not be able to be reached.
Most times, pivoting comes at a time of constraints for most businesses. The owner may have gone through some personal crisis, financial handicap, drop in demand, or some other downfall. Sometimes this may create some apprehension in investing more into the business, especially in unfamiliar territory. But, this is the exact time to dive into pushing a new agenda for your business and invest into the future stability of the business.
Collaboration
There is a famous saying by John Donne, “No man is an island, Entire of itself; Every man is a piece of the continent, A part of the main.” You are part of a system that is called society and your business improves all of our lives, whether it is a medical practice or a restaurant. What you do makes the world a better place to live. There are many people involved in the success of your business including those supporting you in the beginning, the companies that you hire to perform services for your business, and the customers you serve. It is important to recognize that your perspective is only one of many and it has been influenced by your experiences. Working with other perspectives into your business strategy and how it can be adjusted to be repositioned is the most powerful action you can take to pivot into your position of success within your new conditions.
Stabilization
This is new and anything that is unfamiliar to you will require some adjustment. You have to give your plan a fair timeframe to be able to measure the viability of its success. It is important to stabilize your new business strategy in performance, in acceptance within your customer base, and in monetary profitability. You have to allow the company time to adjust to the activities it takes to implement to pivot in synergy with your plan. You have to have to allow your customers to adjust to the new experience and become attracted to your new business opportunities. You have to give it time to prove its profitability and insure that your financial projections are accurate in investment, expenses and revenues alike. It is important that you stabilize your pivoting plan if you want to give it an honest chance of success.
Conclusion
With a valiant effort, a Pivoting Plan can be the catalyst for your business to reach immeasurable heights of success. It is necessary to recover from any major change that creates instability within your business and a pivoting plan that is aligned with your vision will keep you motivated to stabilize it. Your business is designed in a very specific way and an effective pivoting plan comes through you minding your own business. A viable budget is necessary to sustain your pivoting and this, as well as many other defining elements come from a collaborative planning process. Your pivoting plan can convert your adversity into your advantage, if you allow it to. Pivot your Position.
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