KP#24 Going Back is A Good Option

Distractions and scope creeps are common occurences in business and project. Before long, the business or project would take on its own direction. It is time to review and return to the original mission and values may provide a way out of your troubled business or project.

The story of the Prodigal Son in Luke 15:11-32 or the Ephesian church in Rev 2:1-7 serve as examples of the need to go back to the original mission and values.

Business Venture Lessons from the Prodigal Son Parable
There are much lessons to be learned from the parable of the Prodigal Son.
The Prodigal Son know how to start a business - get capital first. Unfortunately he does not know how to run it. He committed the same error as most start-ups with lots of capital - waste them in big scale marketing events and advertising without the products being ready for the market. Nevertheless, his father teaching lead him not to steal or cheat in time of need but to earn a living working even in a lowly job. His breakthrough comes from doing a reflection, facing the reality, admitting his errors, working out the options, making the choices and once again taking the action - Go Back, even if need to be shamed. Other lessons are given in the mindmap below:



Next: Principle of Potential
 

KP#23 Create The Trends

Instead of watching and following the trends, we could innovate and set the new trends. e.g. The software Vasicac create one of the killer application for micro-computer now widely known as the spreadsheet providing successes for Lotus-123 and then the Excel. Older people will be similar with names like Multiplan, QuatroPro etc.

In the post Creative God but a Boring Church I discussed about some of the reasons of the boring church and how to be creative. Jesus had always been an innovator - breaking free from the traditions, revealing the truths, and demonstrating the power and authority. Innovation is not about breaking moral laws but more about breaking contradictions, impossibilities and removing compromises. It is about 100% win win for all. This is very unlike human practices of legalizing our sins or weaknesses. Mat 5:17 shows Christ came not to abolish the Laws (God does not contradict Himself) but to expose the lies, the sins, the weaknesses, the truths and to empower us with new nature to fulfill the laws. It is not a compromise but a break-through solution.

As we establish the new trend with our innovation. we need to provide a bridge to the new world. This bridge could involve educating the existing market, building new infrastructure, removing prejudices etc. This bridge building could be very expensive. It could be most expensive show stopper for your innovation. It caused God to incarnate and die on the Cross. If possible, your innovation should ride on existing structure and knowledge unless you have large resources. e.g. cars need better roads than the trails that horses ride on. Cell phones needs a new infrastructure. The growth rate and investment needed to make our innovation successful depends much on how we can make better use of existing knowledge and infrastructure. This explains the easy adoption of PC with word processing to replace type-writer and Spreadsheet software.

See the attached mind-map for more ....

Next: Going Back is a Good Option

KP#22 Seize the Opportunity

Seizing an opportunity has a pre-requisite practice of KP#21 Be Watchful. Once you detect and confirmed a structural change, you need to act quickly. Your ability to act quickly depends on your agility, readiness, responsiveness and risk management. Most people are not ready to act - the inertia to change is too high or there is a lack of resources (no reserves), or lack of mobile resources.

Responsiveness does not means "recklessness". One needs to have Risk Management. Risk Management is not about not taking risks but taking calculated risks and determine how much risk you can take without jeopardizing your core business success.

The details are in the mind map.


Next: Create the Trend