Focus

As business professionals we are often taught to focus on the issues at hand and to dig deep into
issues. Our MBA training has taught us that we need to understand an issue inside and out to really
come up with a good idea. So what have we created? Market analysis, financial analysis,
performance analysis, trends analysis…, you get my point. All this focus on business issues, don’t you
think we should have better performance coming out of companies these days? But we don’t! Many of
the same issues that plagued companies ten years ago are still around today and much of this comes
down to focus. Sometimes too much focus prevents us from seeing what we need to see.

Problem solving has been a key feature throughout my career. I am always solving problems for
somebody and that means I need to focus. Conventional wisdom would have us believe we need to
get inside a problem to solve it. There are times in which that is true. But often times the outside view
will give us a view of the situation we could never get by focusing on the issue.

One of my first jobs, as market analyst, I was assigned the European markets. I had spent two weeks
in Europe on vacation prior to this job and really didn’t know much about European business practices
at the time. As a new analyst to Europe, I was not familiar with the ways in which the others focused
on problems, which was to sit at their desk and go over spreadsheets, market reports, calling up sales
guys. They never left their desk because they believed all the information they can get off the network
or from the sales guys. I didn’t know any better, and I don’t believe in sitting in a cubical will solve
problems. When I arrived we already had order problems with Spain, the orders were not leaving
soon enough, I got up and talked to logistics, and went to the warehouse. In the warehouse I
completed orders myself just as the guys in the warehouse do. I realized then, why the orders were
not getting done, the paper work for Spain was more than any other country and it was saved until
last. If they did it first, I would have Spain done and all the other countries as well. The guys at the
end of day left the paper for the next shift because it was too long. So I requested the warehouse
change the order they fill out the country paperwork. It was this approach that ended up solving the
problem and finding a way to save $2 million in logistics costs as well!

Am I saying inexperience is better? No, but when it comes to focus, keeping a little bit of the curious
innocence, does seem to help. Quite a number of challenges were solved when someone stepped
back and took a new path or new look at a problem and asked new questions. Talking to numerous
companies over the past few months, many talk about “making it through the down time,” or “we need
to focus on fundamentals in these lean times.” Well ok, that is fine but look at how a lot of companies
handle this. Cut staff, cut cost, work longer hours; is this really helping? It sounds a lot like the same
old business of just getting in there and hoping if you just put in enough effort into cutting cost, you will
see the end of the tunnel. For many this works because sooner or later markets do improve and then
everyone breathes a little easier. But if more companies, managers in particular, would stop; stand
back and ask the innocent questions again, I believe many would get through there downtimes faster
and better off.