In a period of significant and sustained economic uncertainty, most small and medium sized business owners and executives view innovation and change as the “life jacket” of the present and “bridge” to the future. They have internally embraced innovation and change and started to plan for changing the markets and customers they serve, the products and services they manufacture, deliver and offer, the raw materials, components or staff they source, and the business model and organization structure they manage. An inevitable combination of these changes adds up to a fundamental, and many times jarring, departure from what has made a small business successful in the past. I call this “Big Change.”
You would think that with a relatively straightforward business model and organization structure managed by a business owner or executive intimately involved with the day-to-day running of the small business Big Change could be achieved in short period of time with a modest effort and disruption. In my experience this is absolutely not the case. Small business owners and executives know what to do but not how to do it. They lack the organizational capacity and skills required for Big Change. Typical shortcomings include:
- Understanding of what it takes to change a business deeply rooted in past successes
- Experience and skills critical to successful implementation of the required changes
- Loyalty to long time staff and past business practices ill-equipped to handle the changes
After years of working with small businesses loyalty to long time loyal staff and adherence to past business practices is the most vexing challenge for small business owners and executives. Essentially, they are forced to confront and change the people and practices which made the business successful. However they naturally have a deep steadfast loyalty and faith in these people and practices. The following are successful Big Changes strategies that small businesses employ to address these shortcomings:
- Turn Big Change into Incremental Change to minimize the amount, type, and speed of required changes.
- Hire a Change Agent with management authority and resources to make the changes including hiring, establishing new business practices, and producing measurable results.
- Build a Separate Organization to hire the staff with the required experience and skills with no obligation to use legacy staff or business practices.
Tobey Choate, Managing Partner
