January 3, 2005

INCHES. DELIVER. BILLIONS.

                   

🚀 Audacious Move™ of the Week

INCHES. DELIVER. BILLIONS.

Extraordinary business growth isn’t always the result of one breakthrough strategy or spectacular decision.
In most cases, it’s the cumulative impact of hundreds of unconventional moves that make a business different and more relevant to its customers.

Stop searching for the ONE BIG IDEA that will transform your business. Start making moves that advance your business, even if it’s only a nano-inch at a time.

🔥 The BILLION Wasn’t One Big Idea.

We took a startup to over $1 BILLION in annual sales.

That’s a pretty big number.

And people naturally assume we must have done something spectacular to make it happen.

A revolutionary product.

A breakthrough strategy.

Some HUGE decision that changed everything.

Nope.

The BILLION wasn’t the result of ONE spectacular move.

It was the cumulative impact of hundreds of moves that challenged conventional thinking.

Different ways of serving customers.

Different ways of leading people.

Different ways of getting things done.

Individually, many didn’t look like much, in fact they looked kind of “crazy”.

But collectively, they created something extraordinary.

You don’t need to make a BILLION-DOLLAR MOVE to build a BILLION-DOLLAR BUSINESS.

💥 What Did Our MOVES Look Like?

We didn’t just TALK about being different.

We actually DID things differently.

For example we:

* Killed Dumb Rules™ that dissatisfied customers.
* Hired for Goosebumps™ to get “Human Being Lovers”.
* Cut The CRAP™ to eliminate barriers to strategy execution.
* Lived Leadership by Serving Around™ asking “How can I help?”.
* Created Line of Sight™ to define strategy execution roles for everyone.
* Strategically Micromanaged™ the things essential to the execution of our strategy.
* Called the Audible™ when things went haywire.
* Got our strategy Just About Right™ and didn’t chase perfection.

These weren’t all massive strategic breakthroughs.

They were unconventional approaches to everyday business challenges.

Some were simple.

Some were uncomfortable.

All challenged accepted ways of doing things.

Together, they helped transform the way our organization operated.

The SIZE of the move isn’t what matters. The DIFFERENCE it creates does.

🎯 The Secret Is in the ACCUMULATION.

I’ve always believed in making a nano-inch of progress.

Not every move has to be spectacular.

Not every decision has to produce a massive breakthrough.

Sometimes all you get is a nano-inch.

GOOD.

One move eliminates a customer frustration.

Another simplifies a cumbersome process.

Another removes a barrier preventing an employee from doing their job.

Another makes you just a little MORE relevant to the customers you serve.

A nano-inch here. A nano-inch there.

Keep making those moves.

Every day.

Throughout the organization.

And those nano-inches ACCUMULATE.

Being different becomes the way your organization BEHAVES.

Not a marketing claim.

Not a clever slogan.

An Organizational Instinct™.

People instinctively look for different ways to solve customer problems rather than defend organizational policies.

The BILLION wasn’t created by one giant leap. It was built by relentlessly accumulating nano-inches of progress.

And that’s how you march toward becoming The ONLY One™ who does what you do.

⚡ The BEAUTY Is That EVERYONE Can Do It.

Here’s what I love most about this lesson.

You don’t need a billion-dollar business to use it.

You could run a small restaurant.

A retail shop.

A professional services firm.

A startup with five employees.

It doesn’t matter.

You can make a move tomorrow.

Kill ONE dumb rule.

Remove ONE frustrating customer touch point.

Find ONE way to surprise a customer.

Discover ONE customer craving nobody else is satisfying.

The moves don’t have to be expensive.

They don’t have to be complicated.

They just have to make a meaningful DIFFERENCE to someone who CARES.

And here’s the leadership challenge.

Don’t make these moves the exclusive responsibility of executives.

Build an organization FULL of people who challenge convention.

Give them the freedom to act.

Encourage them to Be Imperfect FAST™.

Execute. Learn. Adjust.

Then make another move.

The real power isn’t one audacious leader. It’s an organization full of people who dare to do things differently.

🚀 What’s Your Next Audacious Move™?

Stop waiting for the BIG ONE.

The next breakthrough idea.

The next strategic planning session.

The next technological revolution.

The opportunities to conduct business differently are already around you.

A stupid internal policy.

A frustrated customer.

An unnecessary process.

An employee with a crazy idea.

Your challenge?

Ask your team:

“What’s ONE MOVE we can make TODAY that will move us a nano-inch closer to becoming The ONLY One™?”

Then DO IT.

Learn.

Adjust.

And do it again.

Because our BILLION wasn’t built by one magical idea.

It was built by making being different a HABIT.

INCHES. DELIVER. BILLIONS.

You may never want to build a billion-dollar business.

That’s fine.

But you CAN build an extraordinary one.

ONE MOVE. ONE NANO-INCH. ONE DAY AT A TIME.

🚀 Want more Audacious Moves™?

🎙️ Listen to Audacious Moves to a BILLION™ for practical, contrarian ideas for building an extraordinary business.

✍🏻 Explore more articles, ideas and proven tools at BE DiFFERENT or be dead.

Extraordinary businesses aren’t built by ordinary decisions.

They’re built one Audacious Move™ at a time.

Now go make yours.

Cheers,
Roy

• Posted 1.3.05 at 06:00 am by Roy Osing
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