Recently I took a doctor recommended stress test and I realized I was demonstrating physically how the world is impacting our businesses and how we need to act to be able to maintain our success in the new economy.

How it used to be.

When I first got on the treadmill life was good. It was a nice manageable steady pace. Easy to maintain without much exertion and as long as I simply kept moving I was handling everything just fine.

When the economy was robust that was how we ran our businesses. It was easy to be profitable and maintain our expected results without much stress because we understood how the business world functioned. Sure we’d trip once in a while but with a bit of time it was relatively easy to recover.

The business world for the most part operated as we expected and we had confidence in how our actions were going to deliver for us – keeping us on track moving down the road.

Changes are made for us, or are they made to us?

After a couple of minutes on the treadmill my cardiologist asked how I was feeling. Confidently, I said, “Fine, I can do this all day.” Next thing I know the elevation is changing on me and I am now walking up a steep incline.

Largely because of the impact of the speed of the internet and the globalization of business, the pace of business for most of us changed. We suddenly had to have a plethora of technology changes; we were competing in a bigger league, customers were better informed and demanding more.  The learning curve from this caused many business owners to begin feeling like they were constantly working uphill. For many executives these were not changes they were craving, these were changes forced on us like the doctor deciding I suddenly needed to be working uphill.

Businesses were excited with the new opportunities being presented but realized they had to be much more agile to work at this new pace and in better shape to be consistently working up the hill.

At this pace we need agility over stability.

Still able to manage this pace and increased incline I felt confident. My thinking was, I work out, do half-marathons, have good health measurement numbers over the years and I can handle this test. That is, until this uphill pace was increased to a new faster pace I was unfamiliar with. An external force was pushing me to perform at levels beyond my comfort zone. (I swear I saw an evil smile cross the doc’s face when he did this.)  I realized at this pace a small trip would leave to a painful stumble. I found myself working harder and realized my stability on my feet needed to be replaced with agility on my feet.

Business is going through this same shift. Stability was an important desire for decades. Remember how businesses would tout how long they had been in business? Today, people care less with how long you’ve been in business and care more about how well you are doing at this moment in time. Stock holders and customers share this view. Stability is rapidly being replaced with a need for agility – the ability to operate at increased speeds and constantly uphill.

Look at the before and after pictures.

Before I stepped onto the treadmill the doctor took a series of pictures of my heart and shortly after the treadmill stress test was completed more pictures were taken for contrast and comparison.

Businesses should be conducting comparison studies within themselves. Take a snapshot of your business from five years ago and compare it to your current operations. How do things look? Were you more profitable then than you are now? Did you feel more comfortable and confident then than you do now? Be cautious not to simply look at the numbers – they can be deceiving. For decades my medical numbers have been solidly in the normal zones for health.  Keep in mind, many businesses have died in the last few years that according to regulators and auditors were in great shape as far as numbers go.

Look at the heart of your organization. How well are you dealing with your stress test? Are you increasing you abilities and agility to operate at this new pace or are you huffing and puffing trying to maintain until “things get back to normal?” In my case the stress test saved my life with the doctor’s expertise in knowing what he was looking at and how to properly deal with what he saw. Is it time to save your business by taking that same approach and analysis and incorporating the skills of experts?  I know it’s time to take care of the health of your business.

On a personal note: I encourage my business friends over the age of 50 to consider talking with your doctor about taking a stress test. At the very least it will establish some baselines for comparison as you age, or as in my case it could also be a life-changing event.

The flight attendant shrugs his shoulders, shakes his head, and throws up his hands and says, “Nuthin’ I can do.” As we turn onto the runway he adds, “It usually never affects the plane anyhow.” USUALLY???

Have you ever noticed bad employees stay with you for a long time (because they have nowhere else to go, which is an article in itself as to why you allow them to say!) while your best employees are being poached and given opportunities by your competitors even in these challenging economic times?

Like the best companies in every industry, your organization should be on a constant search for better talent to strengthen your team. The talent wars will determine the success of any organization competing in this new economy. Before trying to attract and hire top talent you need to ask yourself three critical questions that will determine the quality of the talent you can attract and more importantly, get to stay. Are you really ready for top talent?

Question #1: Why do you want top talent?

When I ask this question of audiences I get responses such as, “They will make my team better. They will save me money. They will produce more. They will help my bottom line.” Every one of those answers is true from a manager’s standpoint, but not one of them will get that talent to stay with you. The correct answer to that critical question – Because I want that employee to have a life-changing work experience works for us.

What does a life-changing work experience look like from a top talent’s point of view? As one human resources director told me of an actual experience she witnessed; when the employee is leaving because her husband was transferred and she is crying in her exit interview saying things like, “I will never find another place to work as good as this one.”

A life-changing work experience is about how connected the employee is to the work she does, the people she works with and the opportunity to exercise her talents. She wasn’t crying over a lost paycheck, she was crying over a lost work-experience. This is why you want to hire top talent so you can provide them with that type of connection to what they will get paid to perform. If you can’t provide that experience, your top talent will not stay and frankly you have some things that need to be done to create that work environment.

Question #2: Are you hiring talent or filling jobs?

Filling jobs means you are interviewing when you have a job opening. Hiring talent is bringing on board a person who has talents you highly value and finding a place for them to fit your organization. When you are filling jobs you have a box you need to put someone in. It’s restrictive and based on a job description that has more to do with the mechanical aspects of the jobs rather than the fit of the person to the workforce or the culture of the organization. A job reports directly to a boss, has specific duties to accomplish and after a short period of time the owner of that box refuses to perform duties outside of the job box created for them to fit in.

Talent is more free-flowing in top talent-attracting organizations. When they hire talent they hire an individual to perform that talent anywhere in the organization that can benefit from those skills. Find someone who has a knack for solving complex problems with simple solutions? Why limit them to a box of one job title? Let them roam the organization as a solution-provider for anyone that has a need for that skill. The company is better off, the employee is better off doing that thing he is best skilled for, and everyone benefits!

Question#3: Are you willing to change the hiring and retention process to keep your top talent?

Top talent should be hired based on a talent description, not a job description. Recruits should be asked to demonstrate their talent, not submit a resume. Do you really care how they look on a piece of paper? As fast as business is changing, you want to determine how they are going to perform their talents for you in the future. Request a demonstration and conduct a team interview to see how well they are going to fit.

To retain top talent you will need to abandon a recent pillar of managerial structure: Treat everyone the same. One size does NOT fit all. Top talent expects to be managed and lead differently than the middle of the road talent employee. Managers need to be taught how to manage the elite and yes treat them differently than the rest. (Again this can and will be an entire article later.) When you insistent on managers treating everyone the same you appeal to the lowest common denominator which means you dumb down your organization and you lose the elite talent.

If you want to attract and retain the best of the best, you have to provide the work environment to keep them on your payroll. So the next question is: Are you ready for top talent to work for your company?

Have you ever been to a Meetup? Tweetup? Flashmob? Social Media event? What about using Foursquare to connect with people in the same location you just checked into?

Do you even know what these are?

These gatherings have no attendance requirements and have no annual fees. You pay as you go for the events you want to attend and sometimes they are simply free.

Rotary groups have an attendance requirement and a rigid schedule of meetings at least twice a month. Chambers of Commerce are constantly struggling to come up with services to justify membership. Both require annual membership fees. Why? Mostly to support overhead that may no longer be necessary. This is what is wrong with these groups: the model no longer fits the business world. Today’s business world is fluid, leaders are schedule challenged, and people only want to pay for exactly what they want and attend only those meetings that interest them.

Tell me I’m wrong – have you never gone to a Rotary meeting only because you felt you had to even though the presenter was of no interest to you?

Tell me I’m wrong – when it came time for your annual chamber dues check to be written, have you hesitated, wondering how to justify spending the money since you no longer feel you are getting your money’s worth?

Remember buying an entire album or CD for the one or two songs on it you really liked? Today people pay by the song, when they want it, 24/7. No more paying for what you don’t want to hear and no more waiting on store hours to buy it. Business gatherings are now the same way.

I have attended open invitation gatherings of local business people connected by Twitter (tweetups). I have made great connections over these lunch gatherings.

What exactly is a tweetup?

An organizer announces on Twitter a gathering at this restaurant at this time on this day. Those available and interested come and exchange business ideas over lunch. All of us know the best exchange of information at any chamber event or Rotary meeting occurs in the side conversations, so why not just have those? That is what a tweetup is to our group. Sometimes we have 12, sometimes we have over 30. The point is it is fluid, come if you can, and you only pay for your lunch. Simple and organic. No annual fees or restricted membership.

I also attend social media events. For these I pay a small fee. Once again no membership dues, I only pay for a ticket to attend those meetings that interest me. I obviously don’t get to as many meetings as I would like because of my schedule. Business travel just doesn’t allow for it. Were I paying an annual fee or had an attendance requirement, I’d probably drop out of the group, and that is what is causing Chambers and Rotary groups to lose members.

As one CEO told me when he got a letter from Rotary informing him his attendance was lacking, “They say they want movers and shakers, but today moving and shaking is very different from the 1950s.” Needless to say, he dropped his membership.

In addition, the younger generation of upcoming leaders are more expense focused, more immediate results oriented and more mobile. They do not identify as closely to their geographic location, traveling freely for business and pleasure and often working for companies hundreds of miles away.

I argue that membership fees are a trap for bad programming. If your meetings or offerings were that awesome, people would flock to your meetings and pay to get in Like TED conferences.) The fact is the majority of the people attending current functions are doing it out of obligation, not desire, because they have been trapped by membership fees. As more and more people are realizing that, memberships decline.

If Rotary groups and Chambers of Commerce want to increase involvement and attendance of younger, more active leaders, they need to create better programs and drop membership requirements, attendance requirements and overhead. Flash gatherings and meetings of substance are thriving with business leaders who make a difference. The traditional model just needs to be updated to attract them.

Many organizations are afraid to spend marketing dollars these days claiming no one is buying. Some organizations are “hoping” for growth but not willing to make the effort to grow, or try new things to grow.

Normally, I try to teach the cutting edge and challenge executives to try new things, but today here is a reminder of a tried and true technique that need dusted off, that’s old school, but still works.

Growth strategies are not always new and innovative; sometimes the growth opportunities can be easily accessible and right in front of you. In advising a fellow speaker about growing her business I told her the easiest sale I can make is to one of my audience members. They have heard my information, delivery style and feel a connection. They know me and my approach to growth strategies. When they come up to me afterward and start asking about available dates on my calendar I know it’s mine to lose. Why does this happen? It’s the connection.

The same thing goes for my corporate clients who use me year after year — They know I am good; therefore, it’s easy for me to get to the point of sale. What about your current clients or customers? Do they feel comfortable enough with you to open up and share what’s really going on in their organization?

Get Interested

Every company is experiencing its own unique economic ride these days. How well are you tuned in to the specific journeys of your customers? Do the research, interview key executives of the client, get to know their situation. Trust me, right now people want to talk and tell their story. Whether it is a go-against-the-flow story of having a great year, or telling a tale of woe, people like to be heard. Show interest, listen and do not sell. That’s right don’t sell, just be the friend with the ear. Not only are you gathering information for a later sales call, you are being the friend they need right now. The more they know you, like you and trust you, the more they will want to do a greater amount of business with you.

Of course this is nothing new, but I see few organizations grabbing this opportunity. They are still pressing the sales staff to find new sales, to bring home the big new contract, when the best thing these sales people can do is grab a box of Krispy Kremes and a few coffees and make a call on a good current client and talk about the state of the industry, the economy, and that client’s tale to tell.

Be the friend, and set down the order pad for a couple of visits. Be the ear they want to use to brag, let off some steam or just chat with.

People buy from those they are most comfortable with and we all know it’s easier to sell to a current client than go find a new client. The key is you don’t just want current clients, you want current clients who find you indispensable, and not just because of the products and services you offer, but because you are someone they need.

We all face adversity, challenging times and tough moments in our lives. Those who succeed have the ability to bounce back from these trying times and elevate their drive to overcome and achieve. Learn how to improve your bounce.

To get a prospect’s attention you need to grab their attention. To grab their attention in the age of information and overwhelming sales pitches, you need to deliver a Shock and Awe approach they will immediately identify with. Here is how.

Technology is amazing how it can transform tasks and the flow of information. Without technology we wouldn’t be able to operate at the speed with which business moves today. Although technology has transformed our daily tasks, it has not replaced these critical components of success I’ve noticed lacking in the technological world. In fact, technology may even hinder these important pieces of success.

Hustle

Drive

Persistence

The ability to communicate

Interpersonal skills

Focus

Discipline

Commitment

Attitude

Belief in oneself

The next time you want to learn a new app for your technology; consider relearning one of these old apps instead. I believe the more hustle app will help your personal success much more than the TMZ app for your phone.

Can you imagine your every move during a disaster being scrutinized and reported to the world. BP is giving us a vision into the future of business reporting. Is your business ready for the microscope of attention during your worst times? Just looking at the drop in BP stock says the cost of mistakes has significantly gone up.

To prepare for such close scrutiny:

• Manage the news from the beginning by being upfront and forthright with information.

• Throw the kitchen sink at problems. Time is measured in nanoseconds in today’s world.Mistakes and disasters will happen to your organization at some point.

• Be financially ready for the dip in orders and possible stock backlash.

• Expect external finger-pointing while you are still in solution mode. Maintain focus.

• Once the problem is finally solved. Develop a white paper on everything you learned in the process and share it with the rest of your industry as a gesture of commitment to preventing this from happening again. If you don’t do it, someone else will with an edge of blame and contempt. Rebuild your reputation on your own terms with this first step.

I’ve heard it called paying your dues, sweat equity, falling on your sword, and doing what it takes to survive. Bottom line it’s a red flag your business model is broken. What am I speaking of? Not paying yourself what you are worth.

I’ve never seen a business fail because the owner was being paid properly, but I’ve seen many businesses fail because the owner was not taking a check home.

If you are not getting properly rewarded for your efforts you will lose interest and energy and there is where the business failure comes from – you start just going through the motions.

You aren’t running your business to be a non-profit or damage your lifestyle. Remember why you started your company to begin with – to get paid what you are worth and improve the quality of your life!

If your business isn’t paying you enough to at least support the lifestyle you had when you started the business, why are you operating your business this way? It’s an important question to ask yourself.

This is not a question about your work ethic, how many hours you are putting in or how much desire you have to succeed. Ever watch a gerbil on a wheel? He has focus, desire and exerts lots of hard work but he never gets anywhere.

When you find yourself in this situation re-evaluate your business model because the red flag is waving indicating something is wrong. There is no joy or reward in being a martyr for your business.