To Pivot or Not to Pivot: Learn the art of the 3Cs

To pivot, or not to pivot, that is the question. OK, so I’m not a philosopher, per se, but I am curious when 2020 will come take home its drunken pivot.

In today’s world where everything seems to be changing at warp speed, it’s easy to get caught up in the FOMO worry trap and start thinking you might need to make a pivot in your business, especially if you’re experiencing a slow down, or you’ve changed some tactics and they don’t seem to be working the way you had hoped or planned.

But we keep getting push-pull messages from the social media business gurus (wish you could see my air quotes and eye rolling…I’m going hard here!)

“Your business isn’t growing? PIVOT!”

“Not getting the new patients/clients you want? PIVOT!”

“Feeling somewhat insecure and uncertain about the pending/in-progress recession? SHARP RIGHT TURN!”

“Shiny! Squirrel! Tap-tap-tap on your pain points and insecurities.”

This all serves to distract and detract from achieving your ultimate success.

Here’s the thing. If you’re experiencing some slow down in your business, or you’ve recently made some changes and you’re not seeing the RESULTS you want…yet…maybe you need to take a deep breath and slow way down.

By now, you know I’m a big, huge fan of the slow down to speed up or scale up method of business strategy, so let’s start there.

If you’re lacking clarity, you’ll get mixed results. Period, full stop. This is true for marketing, sales, and operations.

It’s important to start with getting clear about what you want to accomplish, and how you plan to do it. You can listen to my podcast Episode 58, and you can also access a free resource on my website to help you get crystal clear about your vision.

Once you’re clear, you’ve got to make a commitment to do whatever you’re trying (say, a marketing campaign, networking, or something operational within your business) whatever it is, commit to it for no less than two weeks, and possibly up to a couple of months, without changing anything. You’ve got to give new ideas and new systems time to breathe and do their work.

Kind of like baking a cake.

While you’re letting your cake bake and rise, you can turn on the oven light and peek inside to measure and track progress, right? Same with any adjustment you make to your business. Gather your data, compare, contrast, and see how it goes.

After some time has passed, if things aren’t going the way you want them to, NOW it’s time to make a slight change.

Let’s be clear, though. Unless you forgot a key leavening ingredient, your cake will rise. So, when we talk about making a slight change, we’re talking NOT throwing the whole thing out and starting over, or scrapping an entire initiative in your business  just because the results haven’t shown up yet. We’re talking about what I call Constant Course Correction. So the 3 Cs followed by TMAA - test, measure, adjust, allow.

We test. Measure. Adjust. Allow. Rinse, repeat. TMAA.

You adjust one thing at a time, otherwise you won’t know what is and isn’t working. Data and time are your friends here.

Why constant course correction rather than a major pivot? Because, like space shuttles, you may appear to be off-course up to 97% of the time, but with testing, adjusting, and communication with the mother board (in this case, your business analytics, your strategic brain and your team’s input and support) you can reach your desired destination. Did you know that the shuttles land in the correct location 94% of the time? Those are some damned good odds. Be like the space shuttles.

We tend to think in absolutes when we get frustrated or impatient. Part of our charm as business owners is that we agitate and constantly look for ways to do better, build something bigger, make a bigger splash. It can also be our achilles heel, not having the patience and trust required to allow what we’re testing to work its own magic. Let the cake bake. Trust yourself.

The point I want to really drive home is this: if you’re lacking clarity, you’ll get mixed results, and that can lead you down a bumpy road of doubt, failed initiatives, and potentially could be quite damaging to your business.

Yes, it always comes back to clarity. From there, you can build-out the incremental changes you want to implement, and Test, Measure, Adjust and Allow in multiple iterations until you find the right formula. Give your one-at-a-time changes room to breathe and grow, like you would a cake in the oven, and don’t change anything until you have gathered the data you need from each iteration.

I promise you will save time, energy and mucho dinero (that’s boatloads of money for non-Spanish speakers) by reviewing, analyzing and making slight adjustments over time. Again, one adjustment at a time.

I share a client story about the 3Cs and TMAA over at the podcast. Go give a listen, and remember to share your review with us so more business owners like you can find us.