What do you think is your competitive advantage?
When we think about gaining the competitive advantage, we often look for data around our competitors’ products, services, market share, social reach and financial performance. Whilst this remains relevant, there is a competitive advantage that we have complete control of but might not be aware of.
- First, let’s look at some of the facts that have been emerging over the past 6 months:
The ‘great resignation’ is proving to be another significant disruption to business. In the US alone, 7.6 million people resigned from their role in April and May this year according to the labour statistics. That’s a huge number and creates additional instability for organisations - The employment market in Australia is hot, hot, hot! The challenge to find good people to fill vacancies is tough. An unofficial stat I heard the other day was that a good candidate may only be on the market for a maximum of 7 days. Boy will that challenge some organisations rather lax approach to recruiting!
- Sales people have to work twice as hard to get business across the line.
- Customers are more demanding than ever and your competitor is only one click away. We live in the ‘now’ economy and if you are not attentive and responsive, your impatient customer or prospect will move on and you lose the game. In fact research done by PWC revealed that 32% of customers claim they’d walk away from a brand they love after just one negative experience.
These facts, and the continuing uncertainty and disruption courtesy of the pandemic, are swirling around us threatening to impact our bottom line and the challenges are a plenty. No matter how hard you work, if you employ the same methods as everyone else or the ones you have been reliant on in the past, there will inevitably be someone who’ll outcompete you.
So where does your competitive advantage lie?
Being in control of busy, let me explain why.
It’s understanding that you need to work smarter not harder and be in control of busy to be able to adapt to what is going on around you. Busy is quickly becoming the new pandemic that is hindering your ability to gain a competitive advantage. Because if you are simply stuck in the busyness then you will not see what you need to, you are blinkered therefore reducing your ability to be agile and adaptable.
Importantly, busy prevents you from:
- Building strong relationships with your employees and building a culture that will not only retain your good people but also attract strong talent to you. You need very strong brand ambassadors right now and the best opportunity sits right within your team. You relationships need to go deep and you need to ensure you have alignment with priorities and expectations.
- Providing winning client service to your customers and prospects. Once again, people trust word of mouth and they want attention now! They are not interested in your busy excuse as to why you couldn’t do what you said you would do, they’ll simply move on.
Those two things – your employees and your clients are right in the sweet spot of your competitive advantage. Their experience is within your control as a leader and it is highly dependant on how you engage, how you connect, and how you treat them.
Your people are your power and how powerful they are depends on you. Organisations that are well placed to deliver exceptional client service will win the game. That is ultimately reliant on your people. Busy has no role to play there.
The question for you is how competitive are you right now or is busy taking over?
If you would like to understand how you can get in control of busy please contact me here