HOW DO YOU EAT AN ELEPHANT? (You know . . . )

How do you eat an elephant? Well, one bite at a time of course!

Maybe you’ve heard that in relation to business ownership as well: “Having a business is like eating an elephant.” Over the years, I’ve worked with business owners from many different industries, with businesses of all shapes and sizes. There is a common sentiment when we begin working together, and it goes something like this:

“There’s just too much! I need to make sure my clients are taken care of. I need to make all the sales calls. I constantly worry about making payroll.  I need to talk to the newspaper about the advertisement. I need to make sure the bills get paid. And finally I have to perform a small miracle to get my employees to show up to work on time and do their jobs. How can I possibly do all that? I don’t have time to sit down and develop all these systems, scripts, forms and standards. It would take me a solid six weeks of work just to get this place organized!”

Does that sound familiar? Can you hear some of yourself in all that chaos? You’re not alone. Every business owner since the beginning of time has struggled with how to do it. How do they develop their business, when they can barely get it to run in the first place?

I’m sorry, but I have some bad news for you. You can’t. You will probably never find the time to do it all, if you’re focused on how to do it. Why? Because your focus is off. It doesn’t matter how many times you release your 'arrow of good intentions', you’ll never hit the target if you’re not aiming at it. Oh sure, you may get lucky every now and then, and hit the target out of sheer luck. It happens. But you’ll never achieve consistent, predictable results if you don’t take careful aim each time.

You Can’t Hit a Target if you’re Aiming at the Sky

At the risk of seriously mixing my metaphors, that’s why you can’t eat that elephant: your aim is off. It’s not about how. It’s about WHAT. The problem is not how to eat the elephant. It’s identifying the elephant in the first place. Once you’ve identified the elephant, then you can focus on having a system to prioritize where you’re going to start.

Take small bites out of your elephant. Take the right bites. But most importantly, determine what your elephant will look like when you’ve eaten the whole thing this will help keep you focused on the results, not the work.

You need a vision of what your business will look like when the elephant has been eaten. Without the vision, nothing you do in your business will make much of a difference. You may make some small changes, and you may even see some good results of those changes. Everyone gets lucky, once in a while. But without the vision, your business will never truly become a great business. You have to stop focusing on the work, and start focusing on the results.

What is your Vision of your business? What do you want it to look like?

As the business owner, your most important job is the development of your VISION. That’s it. It’s not taking care of your clients, it’s not making sales calls, it’s not advertising your services, it’s not paying the bills it’s not even managing your employees. Your job, your most important role, is defining what your business will look like when it’s finished, and effectively communicating that with your staff.

In our Mentoring Programs we get owners working on their business VISION– this is a a real struggle for most people. You start by focusing on the WHAT. WHAT is the product or service going to do for your client? WHAT will it look like? WHAT is your guarantee to your customers? HOW will you keep your employees focused, owning the common VISION and come to work every day committed?  We keep you focused on the results, not on the work.

Now you might be thinking, “I have a Vision for my business, but my employees aren’t helping me achieve it!”; of course not. If your employees aren’t helping you achieve your Vision, it’s because you haven’t effectively communicated nor have you devised a Vision that is a shared Vision. They can’t help you hit the target if they don’t know the Who, What, How, Where and Why about the target.

Approach that Elephant Strategically

To determine what bite you need to take first, you need a Strategic Plan. With a clearly defined strategy, only then can you choose Where and When to start. With a clear plan you can develop a system for prioritizing? Without that system, you’ll get stuck in reactive rather than proactive mode. Furthermore, without a system you cannot prioritize. You have to know How and When to pick and prioritize your battles.