The Seen and Unseen Components of Business Success

Over the course of my business career, I have witnessed many business successes and failures, including some of my own. I have seen intelligent, knowledgeable people with great business plans fail and I have seen others less well equipped seemingly stumble into tremendous success. There have been so many examples that it forced me to start looking for other things that might contribute to the success or failure of a business. Over time, I came to understand that there are both seen and unseen components of business success and failure. This work is ongoing, but I thought it time to share some of what I have learned.

Basic Building Blocks. There are seen and unseen basic building blocks needed for every organization. First and foremost, you must have a product or service that people want and are willing to pay for. The more you can differentiate that offering from what is in the market, the greater your likelihood of success. Second, the truly successful organization will have great talent/people. Some might argue that financial strength ought to be second, but in my opinion, great talent will help to overcome any deficiencies in finances. Third are sufficient finances to establish the business to the point where the revenue generated will pay operating expenses, provide for reinvestment in the business and generate a reasonable profit. The fourth and invisible building block is resonance. It is possible to achieve a level of success with a product or service that doesn’t necessarily resonate with your internal purpose in life, but the level of success possible is increased considerably if you can match your work with your internal guidance system and achieve a level of resonance between the two. The resonance or vibration precedes you and opens the door to improved receptivity with everyone with whom you have a business relationship.

The Formal and the Informal Organization. Early on in my career, I spent a lot of time in large corporations that included Textron, AMF, and Gannett. One of the things that I learned during that time is that in every organization there is both a formal organization and an informal organization. The formal organization is the one outlined in the corporate organization chart and recognizes the official reporting structure of the organization. It is frequently the result of past accomplishments of the people listed on the chart.

The informal organization is more of an alive organism and reflects current, in the moment channels for acquiring information or accomplishing tasks. In many silo type organizations, it is much faster than going up and down the chain of command in the silos to accomplish a given task. In some silo organizations, it is the only way that anything gets done. In my experience, the informal organization will eventually be formally recognized after a number of successes. Usually it takes so long for this to happen that the newly recognized formal organization is already being circumvented by a new, faster informal organization.

In the last couple of years there have been a number of books written about how to overcome the silo mentality in organizations when in fact the successful people in those organizations generally know how to work around the silos in the first place. Successful companies generally have a closer alignment between the formal and informal organization while companies that are failing generally have less alignment between the formal and the informal organization.

Triple Win Solutions. In organizations, decision-making is accomplished with the help of a frame of reference. A few highly visible companies and highly paid executives have given the media plenty of cause to suggest that businesses are only interested in profits and what these executives can keep for themselves. This has fostered a lot of discussion by the environmentally conce
ed about making decisions using a triple bottom line frame of reference that relates to people, profits and the planet. This strikes me as a little too idealistic to gain widespread acceptance.

Over the years, I have come to base my decisions on a different trio of considerations. My approach is one of enlightened self-interest and will accomplish as much or more than the “people, profits, planet” approach. In every situation, I look for options that will serve the customer, the owner and the employees. I need each of these constituencies to be healthy, happy and prosperous for my business and/or my clients business to succeed.
If decisions are based on this frame of reference, the well being of each individual constituency as well as the combined well being will be addressed. In my experience, decisions that serve all three constituencies have higher success rates than those that serve only one or two constituencies.

As I study, research and explore organizations and information being developed by others in this area of study, I am constantly excited by the growing awareness of the unseen in our lives. Just recently, I finished “The Field” by Lynne McTaggart. It was an intriguing book with evidence of what is being discovered in the unseen part of our world. There is more information on her website at http://www.thefieldonline.com . This expanding base of knowledge is drawing me like a moth to the flame and I am convinced that knowledge of the unseen is virtually exploding into consciousness and has the potential to dramatically alter our lives in the very near future.