Today is ‘A’ level results day. I hope that everyone gets the results they want.
But if you don’t, I hope that you remember that the results you wanted were only a short-cut to wherever you want to go.
That destination isn’t closed off to you, it’s just that you might have to take a more roundabout route to get there.
And we all know that travel broadens the mind.
The problem with forcing yourself to conform to a particular ideal of ‘beauty’, as an individual or a business, is that over time and space, what constitutes that ideal changes. Plus of course it is an ideal, never actually seen in nature.
Of course this is the point. No one can possibly keep up, but they will spend time, money and energy trying. Time, money and energy that could be spent on things that are more dangerous for the status quo.
Yet, as humans, we find beauty in the things we love. Whatever the beloved looks like, becomes by definition, beautiful.
That means there’s no need to define yourself by another’s standard. Live up to your own.
The right people will see your beauty.
We’re fond of the oddball genius, the outsider who sees possibilities that nobody else could, the creative destroyer that starts with a clean sheet, cross-fertilising industries or disciplines to generate a great leap forward.
But there is another breed of innovator, just as valid. One who combines deep knowledge and understanding of what’s gone before with an openness to novel solutions that enhance that past rather than destroying it. Driven by a straightforward desire to make things better.
Unicorns and racehorses. We need both.
One of my favourite Seth Godin aphorisms is this one:
“Make things better by making better things.”
Making things better is what humans do. And we mostly do it by creating new, better tools – tools for making and tools for doing; tools for organising and tools for co-ordinating; tools for learning and tools for thinking; tools for connecting and tools for feeling.
For me, great tools extend human capabilities without undermining the humanity behind them or the context around them. They make us both more human and more part of the world we live in.
Our very best tool is our ability to re-imagine what ‘better’ means.
“No taxation without representation!”
We’re all familar with the demand that triggered the American war of independence.
Colonists felt it was deeply unfair that they should have no say on how they were governed from afar, but still had to pay duties on luxury goods received via that far-off government.
Nowadays there are those who would like to flip this idea around, claiming that those who pay ‘no tax’ should not be represented in government.
This is based on misinformation of course, ‘no tax’ in this case means ‘no income tax’. People who are not eligible to pay income tax still pay national insurance, VAT, fuel duty, tobacco and alcohol duties, car tax, insurance tax, and these taxes often represent a significant proportion of their income.
What those suggesting “No representation without taxation” are really saying is “You don’t count.”
Tax is far too important to merely avoid. Time to think differently about it, before it’s too late.
We all see the world through our own particular lenses of values, experience, beliefs. We wear those lenses closely, as if they are part of us.
We form them through conversation, reading, watching – by temporarily seeing through other people’s lenses.
It’s important to be aware of this. It’s also important to actively seek out different lenses through which to view the world.
Otherwise, its easy for those lenses to become blinkers.
One of the books I’m reading at the moment is “Jainism and Ethical Finance”, by Atul K. Shah and Aidan Rankin.
The first vow taken as a Jain is ahiṃsā – non-violence or the desire to do no harm.
The interesting thing about this is that it extends beyond humans to animals, insects, microbes and even plants. Strict Jains are vegetarians who do not eat roots, because this destroys a plant’s ability to reproduce itself.
That is a very thought-through concept of impact, that we could all learn from.
Especially as it doesn’t prevent Jains becoming highly successful business owners.
Last night, on my way to my pilates class, I spotted one of my neighbours leaving the house of another.
I happen to know that she visits this neighbour every day, with a meal, with shopping, to have a chat. She’s been doing it for at least 30 years.
For no other reason than that they are neighbours.
What struck me last night was the sweatshirt she was wearing.
“Love will save us” it said.
She’s right. Nothing else will.
A metaphor for the relationship your business creates with its clients could be seen as fluff. A nice marketing touch. Something to hang a campaign on, to help people choose you over others.
But it can and should go much deeper than that.
Blue Rocket Accounting used their metaphor (“we are Mission Control to your space mission”) to standardise their services, to define the Roles people working in the business play for clients and to design how they deliver on that promise. The metaphor becomes shorthand for the purpose – ‘what we do for the people we serve’.
That’s not fluff. That’s the foundation.
Profit = Revenue – Cost.
So if you can reduce cost, you can increase profit. And if you can increase revenue you can also increase profit.
So how do you do that?
The classic answer is that there are only 4 ways:
This is of course true, but it misses a vital point. Nowadays, whatever business you are in, there are hundreds of options for customers to choose from. Why should they buy from you? Why should they pay you more than the next business?
Unless you are operating in some unfortunate part of the world, nobody really needs anything any more. For example, we all need to eat, but do we really need 25 different kinds of cornflake? Do we really need cornflakes at all?
No.
The truth is that you’re not selling anything. You’re making a promise. A promise to help the people you serve become who they really want to be. That’s what people are willing to pay for. The bigger and better the promise, the more it will be worth to the right person. That’s how you increase revenues.
The hard part is working out who is the right person, and who it is they want to become.
And the hardest part is keeping the promise you make.