Originally I was going to post about this article from Ad Age. Basically, Ford is consolidating all of its brands under one umbrella so to speak. But I couldn’t. I couldn’t write that post. My mind has been consumed, for much of the day, on one thing, sacrifice.
Right now you can’t turn the corner without being smacked in the face with more depressing news about the economy. It seems that a company’s first reaction is to layoff employees to keep the business afloat. However, the first reaction the company really had was indifference.
Let me explain. The economy has been heading downhill for quite some time. It did not become this way overnight. When the economy first started its tumble, comapnies could have altered their business strategy or model. They could have made some changes. But, for the most part, companies stayed with the same plan they’ve had for years.
Look at the newspaper business. The newspaper is quickly fading away, going down the path of Morse code and the pigeon carrier for how news is spread. A few years ago, they could have jumped online and changed their business model. But most papers kept true to their history and shunned the online community. Where they have failed, blogs have thrived.
Now, newspapers are moving online and are posting high readership. For some newspapers though, it may be too late.
Of course, hindsight is 20/20 and it seems obvious that newspapers should have made the move online a long time ago. But I guarantee there are many things at your business, at your dealership even in your personal life that you wish you would have done.
So why don’t we do it? Well, one reason is the fear of failure. People are crippled by this. No one wants to go out on a limb, take a chance and then fail. But if we never failed, how would we learn? The Japanese consider every failure a gift. They view every failure as a learning experinece. By learning from your failures, from your mistakes, you can better ensure that you won’t fall off that limb again.
Another reason (and there are many more than these two) is sacrifice. Anyone can put up a website, anyone can offer a sale, but it takes sacrifice do it the right way. Most people just go through the motions. They put up the Facebook account, but they don’t update it. They offer the sale in their advertising but don’t explain it to their salespeople. Why? Because they have to sacrifice their time to do it.
In fact, everything takes sacrifice. That’s why diets are a multi-billion dollar industry. People don’t want to sacrifice their time, TV or food to be in shape. They want the do-it-all pill.They want to set it and forget it. They want the gimmick.
Anything that is worth having in life does not come easy. It takes hard work. It takes change. It takes sacrifice. But until you’re ready, you will never move to where you want to be. No one just wakes up and works off their God given talent. Athletes train. Students study. These are all forms of sacrifice.
The ball is now in your court. You can continue to do what you are doing. You can stay on the same path. Or you can make some sacrifices. Start working a little more. Start reading a little more. Start giving up some things you cling to and gain much, much more.
Sorry for the rambling. I didn’t draft out this post. I just wanted to speak from the top of my head. Let me know what you think. And in no way shape or form do I think our current economic crisis could have been avoided if people would have sacrificed. But I do think people and companies would have been better prepared.
