What do you do when there is no established model for your business?

You can’t just sit around and wait for something to happen. You have to make it happen.

This may seem to go without saying.  However, people who’ve only worked at companies with an established business model and clearly defined roles often struggle when thrown into a situation that requires “dead lifting” a completely new paradigm.

I’ve seen this happen in our organization and in others I’ve been close to.

Creating a new business model requires a ton of trial and error.  It never happens the way you think it will.

I think the most frustrating part is that you rarely (if ever) get it right the first time or even the fifth.  You have to muster up the moxie to keep trying until you find a combination of products, pricing, promotion, placement and people that works.  And you have to do all this before you run out of working capital.

To some, a blank sheet of paper is a thrilling prospect.  To others, it is a paralyzing reality.

I’ve listened to a lot of big wigs give business presentations.  Some good, some not so good.  Maybe it’s my proximity to the Wal-Mart Headquarters, but most of these business leaders seem to have Wal-Mart somewhere in their resume.  I guess Wal-Mart (especially in its early days) was quite the engine for producing high-potential leaders.  Business people who “grew up” at Wal-Mart are now running other multi-national, multi-billion dollar, multi-multi-multi corporations.

This weekend I attended a presentation by a corporate officer of HP.  It was a great presentation.  This person started working at Wal-Mart when the company only had 200 stores and about $500 million in revenue.  Wal-Mart was still considered a “small” business at that time.  What he learned helping Wal-Mart grow from 200 stores and $500 million to the largest company in the world must have been incredibly valuable and is no doubt helping him in his current role at HP.

I wonder which companies are now producing the next generation of business leaders?  Just my opinion, but I don’t believe it is the companies that already have a formula for success and are replicating that formula through all levels in the organization.

I think the reason Wal-Mart produced so many capable business leaders is because of the feet-on-the-ground, entrepreneurial sweat equity that went on in the early days of Wal-Mart’s history.  I’m not saying that some of it doesn’t still go on, but now it is more of a cultural remnant than a “if we don’t make this work we won’t be here” reality.

I’m not a fan of the phrase “Failure is not an option.”  Not only is it cliche, it’s philosophically off base.

Failure is always an option.  And in fact it is often a distinct possibility.

Think about it for a minute.

If failure is not an option, yet you fail, then failure was in fact an option.  You may not like that option, but it is an option nonetheless.  Maybe a better way to phrase it is, “Failure is not ideal.”

This philosophical debate leads me to a theological question.

Does God ever want us to fail?  Or does believing in God mean we are destined to be consummate winners?  The latter would be the stance of a certain Baptist pastor in our area.  In fact, he went so far as to brand his nationally syndicated televised sermon series, “Winners.”  Don’t get me started.

If God does will us to fail, how do we know when to stop striving, when to find peace in collapse?  I have absolutely no idea how to answer that question.  I’m still trying to figure that out myself.

What I do know is that failing is almost always a part of succeeding. Failure is a great teacher.  This is especially germane in entrepreneurial endeavours where there is no clear path to success.  You have to figure it out.  You have to be willing to risk failure in order to succeed.