Building Trust and Credibility: How to Turn Around Your Business

Featuring Jim Weber, this was a podcast on The Learning Leader Show hosted by Ryan Hawk, it is Podcast #468.

In today's fast-paced business environment, it's important to have a solid strategy in place to turn your business around. It's not enough to simply hope for the best and wait for things to improve. To truly succeed, you need to focus on building trust and credibility by setting clear goals and numbers, and by focusing on things that could have a profitable ROI.

Building Focus for Your Brand and Business

One of the most important things you can do when turning around your business is to build focus for your brand and business. This means making your business one thing, and focusing on the products or services that set you apart from your competitors. The riskiest strategy a CEO can craft is one that looks like their competitors. Instead, play a unique strategy that no one else is playing. This will help you stand out and create a strong brand identity that resonates with your customers.

Embrace a Curious and Lifelong Learning Mindset

Another important factor in turning around your business is to embrace a curious and lifelong learning mindset. This means fully focusing on meetings, with no phone calls or distractions. You should have the capacity to absorb business information and gain knowledge, and you should go to bed a little wiser than when you woke up. This will help you stay up-to-date with the latest trends and developments in your industry, and will give you a competitive edge.

Create a Trust-Based Culture

Trust is the cornerstone of any successful business, and it's particularly important when turning around a struggling business. To create a trust-based culture, every CEO and team member must have complete trust. This means behaving in a way that you will deliver on your promises, and creating a seamless web of deserved trust. Like Berkshire Hathaway, you may even consider eliminating standardised reporting and meetings, and instead focus on creating a culture of trust and transparency.

Focus on Your Customers

Finally, when turning around your business, it's essential to focus on your customers. This means identifying opportunities to serve them better, and following your customers like Warren Buffet and Greg Abel. If you see opportunities with them, take action and make changes to improve their experience. Additionally, systematically underinvested in the product and brand and failing to gain new customers is a common mistake many businesses make. Instead, when introducing a new product, play to win, and don't play the short-term game if it's going to affect the long-term game.

Turning around a business is no easy feat, but with a solid one-page strategy, you can focus on building trust and credibility, creating a strong brand identity, embracing a curious and lifelong learning mindset, creating a trust-based culture, and focusing on your customers. By following these steps, you'll be well on your way to creating a successful, thriving business that delivers on its promises and achieves its goals. Remember, great businesses hit their plans and their numbers, and your team needs to create collective success with constancy of purpose. Purpose can be better than a mission as it has a lifelong impact.