Businesses are whole systems. To make a comparison to your body, there are organs that have entirely different roles, but they all contribute to bringing you to life.
In any business, you’ll need some sort of function that keeps its organs healthy:
- Finance
- Marketing
- Operations
- Leading
- People
None of these can be allowed to fall into disrepair or the entire business suffers.
As an example, businesses with project based fees often suffer from peaks and valleys. What happens is that the business runs low on work and so they do a bunch of marketing to drum up sales. Eventually, they get too busy to fulfill the work they have and take their attention off marketing to focus on delivery. Then the existing projects come to an end, they realize they’re in another valley, and they start hammering on marketing and sales again.
To grow, each of these business “organs” needs attention and activity in some cadence that is unique to your business model and size.
That means that each needs an indicator to track health and a system for investment that both take place according to a predetermined rhythm.
What’s that rhythm for each of these? What are you watching? How do you invest?
Featured image is Vitruvian Man by Leonardo Da Vinci. Used under public domain.