"It is
impossible for ideas to compete in the marketplace if no forum for
their presentation is provided or available." Thomas Mann, 1896
Letter from the
President
October 1st, 2001
John Hathaway-Bates
President & Executive Director
The facts are now in. We are definitely entering a twelve to eighteen month period of World Recession, and it could be much longer if the human beings that run our businesses panic or wait for times to change. Yet the old Chinese Proverb of "Out of Chaos comes Opportunity" is all that needs to come to mind for us to prosper from the present situation, and I do not see this as a time to adopt a bunker mentality of cost cutting and retrenchment, but a perfect time for the courageous to capture Market Share, and a period of potential socio-economic realignment that anyone who is under 45 has never seen before in his or her career.
Bottom Line: This is one of those times when increasing your business and making it better all round is easy to do. You just need to start thinking outside of the box, while everyone else is wringing their hands and banging their head against the walls.
"When all about you are losing their head . . . etc." as Mr. Kipling once admonished us, is the mantra of the moment. We are watching economic history being made my friends, and any of you who has read A Book of Five Rings, by Miyamoto Musashi will understand, as will anyone who understood the moral of the children's story The Tortoise & the Hare.
Yet all around us at this moment, it seems that organizations are instinctively cutting Marketing & Sales budgets, restricting Travel and trimming back on Research & Development.
Wrong my friends; I truly believe that this is absolutely and stupefyingly WRONG! What General would decide to retreat when the enemy is demoralized and confused?
Any time that the enemy (in this case your competitor) is frightened, confused, tired, over confident, running away, resting, over-extended, or just hiding, that is the time to advance or attack (in this case build your Market Share). Alfred the Great did not destroy the armies of Guthrum the Dane by waiting until good times returned so he could build an army large enough to do the job, or the weather was right; he attacked when Guthrum's army was tired and drunk, recovering from celebrating the Midwinter Solace and he did it during a blizzard! Not exactly brave or honorable, or even politically-correct - but it was very effective! Alfred won the war in a matter of hours against overwhelming odds and became the first King of a unified England.
When the sprinters rest, that is when the tenacious can take the lead. Anyone over fifty can give you a hundred examples of when forging ahead, when everyone else was spending their time explaining why "it could not be done", led to the greatest advances and victories they ever witnessed.
The state of affairs in the economy of the Pacific States of America on the 1st of October, 2001 compared to where it stood just twelve months before, is rather stark. But it must be viewed in context. Compared to other parts of the nation, and to the economic state of affairs in other countries, we stand in a better position than the majority of the world's economies right now. Instead of taking the glass is half empty attitude, build upon the fact that our glass is still half full, when most economies hold glasses that are all but empty.
The problem at this particular time my friends, is that we have just experienced a decade or growth, success and unbridled innovation paying off for almost everyone involved, and with most of the sales & marketing professionals being too young to remember another time, some of them have now panicked when the easy street they were used to travelling just disappeared from beneath their feet.
However, you do not sit around in a funk of despondency and ration what food you have, until you eventually starve during a drought; you either move on if you can, or you go into debt to buy more food, while you build irrigation systems to prevent it happening to you again next year. Pure Supply & Demand thinking, something that was bent out of shape during the last run up of the Stock Market and the so far misunderstood technology revolution that made millionaires based on potential profits and dreams.
Many people look upon the Technology Revolution we are living through much the way 16th Century Europeans perceived the newly discovered New World - the concepts promulgated then changed from the "new Garden of Eden", "Men with eyes in their chests" and "Cities built of gold" to the reality of a new world which, once accepted, allowed for the America we know today to be built.
After 20 years of implementing change and having lunch with thousands upon thousands of innovators and doers during the last two decades, it seems so simple to us. This is a time to take heart, establish goals and forge ahead, not to find a hole to hide in until our fears of the bogyman go away.
In the early 1980's The Business Forum was showing people how to deal with the socialization of the work force, worker's comp fraud, quality management, the beginnings of computer aided management and all that. In the mid-1980's we were holding meetings on the benefits of networking computers and we were promoting little known companies like Novell. Throughout the last two decades we were there, having lunch with the decision makers and discussing the potential effects change would have on our economy and us at the birth of Apple, Microsoft, Lotus Notes, Cisco Systems, Technology Transfer coordinated by NASA, Global Computing, 401(k) Plans, Air Quality Control, Waste Water Treatment, car pooling, even once inviting a Mexican Ambassador to hear our concerns about double taxation as NAFTA was being implemented.
We held meetings on the developing Internet when it was still a dream, on Composites Engineering, the Americans with Disabilities Act, Computer Hacking, Electronic Security, chemistries to deal with (overcome) the manufacturing problems caused by the advent of the Montreal Protocol, Environmental Management & Compliance, Offshore Manufacturing, cultural diversity management, Computer Fraud - whatever decision makers needed to really understand for the Business Community of the Pacific States of America to benefit from unexpected change and evolving technologies - in fact the list of subjects we have discussed has become ever more diverse as new technologies, products and philosophies have been introduced into the economy over the last two decades of the 20th Century and now into the 21st.
We have always done our best to help The Pacific States lead in the economies of the world, and strange as it may seem, we do best for innovators when we are able to identify and bring together potential clients for them, who are actively looking for the very answer that the innovator can provide. (sic)
Now is such a time! It has been a very long time since so many were looking for answers from so few, with the courage to invest in proposing them. You do not believe us? Take a look at our testimonials at CLIENTS and remember that sometimes it is innovative just to be positive in negative times, or to be flexible at a time when the rules of commerce are changing all about us.
However, we can of course only help those who wish to take advantage of what we can explain to them, if they bother to ask. Contact us if you are responsible for boosting sales, or profit building for your organization, and we may be able to surprise you. If you are not the person charged with P&L, but just someone worried about the future of your organization and your own job security - then you can forward us the contact information for the person we should approach - and we will.
(We will of course consider you to be completely anonymous unless you tell us otherwise, and we will always protect your identity - we are looking to help The Pacific States Economy, not build our ego or profit from the present situation. The Business Forum has never set out to make, or ever made, a profit out of helping innovators help the Pacific States of America, our members, friends and supporters).
We have been doing what we do for twenty years and we know we can help your organization prosper because of the present situation. That in turn will help the other businesses involved in the Pacific States economy. But we have to know who we have to talk to in your organization to be able to help anyone. Tell us and we will try, I assure you.
I hope that I will see you at lunch soon.
President & Executive Director
You can email me at john@bizforum.org
You can telephone me at 310-550-1984
or Fax me at 310-550-6121
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