If I asked
you to name the fastest man in the world today the chances are you will name
one of the big sprint heroes of the day. There is much hype around the Men’s
100m event in the world of televised athletics. It is a big prestige event that
draws a lot of our attention due to the media focus on it. There is incredible
build up, a bit of rivalry. Hours of training and dedication boil down to a
short stretch of rubber. The gun goes and less than ten seconds later it is all
over. Meanwhile the guy running the marathon has another two hours and 42
kilometres to go.
We are
becoming conditioned to the sprint. The internet has generated a short
attention span. Its blitz media and growing demand for more generates a
pressure to operate in short iteration cycles. There is a tendency in a crisis
economy to look to flip the quick deal, make your money and move on. In your
mind the faster you can keep flipping the more you make. So we trade instead of
producing, import and sell rather than creating an export, and we complain when
the economy is not fixed overnight.
There are no
quick fixes to the economy. Yes there are a few policies that could be quickly
changed, but the outworking of those decisions is going to take a while. It may
take a generation to restore and rebuild. The bottom line is we are in it for
the long haul. Zimbabwe (or anywhere in the world for that matter) is a marathon not a sprint and your business needs to
be prepared to face it.
Marathon
running is as much about psychology as it is physical training. You need a
focus that will get you through the rough periods. That focus needs to be
positive as opposed to negative else it will just reinforce failure. A great
place to start is the impact you are having on your community with your
product. There is an idea that ‘social entrepreneurs’, those who focus on
finding solutions to social, cultural, and environmental problems, are on their
own little class of business. I don’t think that this is true. All
entrepreneurship solves a problem. That solution will have an impact on society
directly or indirectly. Hence I would argue that all entrepreneurs have a
social component (or should have). There is a tendency to focus only on the
money in business-after all it is a key metric in sustainability and makes
investors happy. It is, however, a poor motivator. If you are going through a
rough patch there is a good chance that the money (or lack of) is giving you
sleepless nights. Look to the impact on lives. Look to the relationships you
are building. Look past your selfish profit margins to others. Look for the
positive, generate optimism and then go deal with the money.
The long
haul needs people. In the short term it is easy to do it on your own, it is
easy to burn people with your deals because you never have to deal with them
again. The long term needs relationships that you can rely on. The long term
needs community. The better we can build a solid, positive community of people
around us the better we will last the storm. Community allows money to
circulate within it rather than having it externalised. A strong community
realises the power and benefits of building something that lasts, even if there
are differences of opinion. I sat in two meetings with the same professional
grouping over the last month. The first meeting was destructive and confrontational
and ended in a walk out. The second was like looking at a different crowd of
people; it was positive, the discussion was constructive, differences of
opinion were acknowledged and a way forward was reached. The primary difference
was that in the month between meetings one member of the community had spent
time and effort meeting with individuals and getting them to focus on the
benefit to the professional community and their clients rather than just
individual members opinions.
Lift up your
head and see the long term. Then dig yourself in and prepare for it. Then, with
that focus, get on with the daily battles that get you there. Before you know
it you will be at the end of the race.
