Saving Your Failing and Falling Business
All business fail — time to time.
Some businesses fall into a downward mode and never recover and are forced to close themselves-down or become bankrupt.
Some businesses fail in their existing fields — yet manage to pivot into totally new products, services or offerings and scale heights again [these are the rare ones].
Some businesses lose their earlier profitable levels — but manage to stay afloat.
Some businesses survive — by sucking the profitability from other units.
Often, when an organization is in trouble — there are always signs, signals and indications of their being in trouble — much before the organization or its CEO realizes it.
Paradoxically — most of the organizations also have the answers, solutions and know how to fix what is wrong.
Off-course Sometimes technological advancement can bring you into obsolesce from being a cutting-aged one — But this won’t happen overnight.
The 21 Tell-tale signs that your organization is in big-trouble OR heading for one
1. Top talented people are leaving in big numbers — this is a very easy sign to notice. Otherwise too — Employee turnover rate has become all time high
2. No new clients
3. Existing clients are reducing or stopping to buy from you/use your services
4. Outstanding’s are increasing in the markets — you customers are not paying in time. You’re regularly on the receiving end of late payments
5. You find that every month — you have increasingly difficult time to manage cash-flow and expenses. You’re unable to pay bills on time
6. When you find that you can’t pay salaries on time — probably you have already reached the bottom
7. You have reached your borrowing limits
8. Meetings become blame-point-finger exercises
9. Sales are falling
10. You’re holding too much inventory
11. Everyone is stressed
12. You have become a MeToo — No Differentiation, No niche
13. You are the only one — people come to — for all the decisions
14. Unstable leadership — too many changes happening too fast — as part of knee jerk reactions
15. You are into big cost-cutting mode — even though it is also compromising on the essentials
16. Your business has not introduced any changes in product, services and in your message to the client
17. Employee have stopped asking for raise or bonus or promotion
18. You have expanded too much — too fast, without consolidating any
19. Your organization has gotten into Late filing of accounts
20. Increase in customer complaints to alarming levels
21. You have lost few of your Key accounts/key customers
Causes of business failures — the most common ones are given — you can add your own
1. A new entrant/competitor* — who is not only aggressive BUT also is giving the customers what they never thought possible
2. Market Saturation [too much supply-very less demand]
3. Changes* in Customer* preference/buying-habits
4. Economic* Slowdown
5. Leadership* failures* and Poor Management *
6. Not changing in spite of observing* emerging trends*
7. Bad Product
8. Bad Customer* Engagement
9. Poor employee* engagement*
10. Overexpansion
11. Lack of capability* development — equipping employees with future skills*
12. Lack of corporate vision* and clarity
How to turn-around your failing business
Like always all the *marked ones have detailed Do-it-Yourself Blogs on that topic in Success Unlimited Mantra
1. Understand why business* fail*
2. Understand why Business* succeed*
3. Identifying — why your business is falling
4. Understand whether your business needs to stop operating AND taking decision WHY should it continue or stop trading
5. Listening to
I. Your Employees
II. Your Clients
III. Your Competitors
IV. Your Business Partners
V. Your Vendors
VI. Happenings in other Industries and businesses globally
6. Identifying the gaps and revamping what are needed
I. Sharpening Your Leadership Capability
II. The Talent which can help you pivot, face the challenges and grow
III. The Customer Value Proposition
IV. The Employee Value Proposition
V. Changes in Product/Services
VI. The Business Model
VII. The Revenue Model
VIII. The Marketing Channel
IX. The Promotion Methods
X. The Technology Upgradation
XI. Getting rid of bad customers
XII. Letting the unproductive employees with poor talents and attitude leave — for full read https://successunlimited-mantra.com/index.php/blog/what-to-do-when-your-business-is-in-trouble
