Interestingly enough, some small business think that they can still dominate their industry with the business strategies they learned from their Grampa Ned way back in the early-80’s, while on his beat-up rocking chair.
They are in for a rude awakening.
With how competitive and fast-paced the business world has become, business owners are bound to experience bitter defeat if they don’t learn new strategies and methodologies that can give them an obvious advantage over their competitors.
What’s the most effective way to learn new business strategies and concepts, you might want to ask?
Well, that’s where business consultants come in.
Let’s talk about why small business need business consultants right now more than ever.
1. Learn new techniques and mindsets.
Business can learn a lot from what Sam Ovens has to say about entrepreneurship, “Entrepreneurship and success is more of a battle in your own mind than it is in anything else.” When business have consultants who can share these kinds of insights and ideas with them, they are bound to be equipped with the right mindsets that would help them achieve insurmountable success.
Also, when business owners hire consultants that are worth their salt, they’d be able to learn the tricks of the trade that other successful businesses in their industry are using. Also invest in tools to automate your processes. Hospitals are getting access to aces charting where they can store patient information and also keep it secure.
Considering how important having the right mindset and business strategy is to success, it pays for entrepreneurs to invest in hiring an experienced consultant to jumpstart their business’ growth.
2. Get connected with like-minded people.
Business consultants are often well connected in the industry that they’re in. That’s just how they are because of the nature of their work. They often deal with business owners, managers, or people with influence that can often make a positive impact to a business startup should they decide to help. This is a great chance for small business to take part in the growing niche of influencer marketing to grow your brand and audience reach.
At this point, I need you to imagine how much value you would get if your business consultant would introduce you to their contacts. Perhaps to someone who would do well as your client or your supplier. Or perhaps to someone who can help improve your business process.
That’s just a glimpse of how much business consultants can help small business. With this kind of benefit, a business can easily look like an established brand when they are seen together with influencers or industry leaders.
3. Have better clarity.
Clarity is power. The more clarity a business owner has, the more laser focused his actions are towards reaching his goals. That means, no unnecessary turns to the left or to the right that can cause the business owner to be distracted in what he has set out to do.
With how the internet has opened truckloads of opportunities and solutions to the business owners, getting pulled in by the shiny object syndrome has become a common challenge that they have to contend with — they have no clarity.
However, when they have business consultants who can call them out for their lack of clarity, they are immediately pulled back to the road that they ought to be traveling.
When you think about the amount of money, time, and resources that get wasted when someone gets pulled in by the shiny object syndrome, you’ll have a better appreciation of how crucial a business consultant’s role is to a business.
4. Have an accountability partner.
Taking a small business from the startup phase to a level of overwhelming success requires hard work (tons of it), focus, perseverance, careful planning, motivation, and everything else in between. All of which are exceedingly hard to sustain if you’ll go at it alone.
However, if you have an accountability partner to push you and speak life to you in situations where you are just about ready to call it quits, your chances of succeeding drastically improves.
The good thing about making your business consultant your accountability partner is the fact that he is well equipped with motivation strategies/techniques and the psychology behind how people’s minds work.
Here’s the thing, while a business owner can certainly choose his best friend as his accountability partner, there is a good chance that his best friend will fail miserably at his task.
Why, you might want to ask?
Simple. That’s because his best friend isn’t trained in the psychology of motivating people (among other things). Sure. His best friend might be genuinely concerned about the business owner (which is also important in and of itself), however, being genuinely concerned alone just isn’t going to cut it when a person’s goal is to achieve significant levels of success. You’re going to need help — a professional one at that.
And so the question becomes: If you want your business to succeed, are you going to need professional help? Or is it enough for you to receive genuine concern from one of your family members?
At this point, I hope you answered the former.
5. Business consultants can optimize your business process.
Because the consultants come from a neutral place when observing a business process, they can see how the business operates from a different perspective. When you couple that with their years of experience in the industry, they can determine (and point out) the unnecessary steps that a small business makes in their business operation.
Once these unnecessary steps have been pointed out to the business owners, they can then get rid of it increasing the efficiency of their business workflow.
What’s next?
Are you currently working with a business consultant? If you answered with a “yes,” can you share how your working relationship with him/her have been so far? What are some of the best practices that you can share when it comes to dealing with business consultants?
