Here is a good example of how understanding the dynamics of your marketplace enables you to craft an approach that let´s you add value and keeps you from making decisions today that create problems down the line. It gives you the appropriate frame of reference for decision-making. While this example is a fairly obvious one, there are many other decisions that are more subtle and nuanced which are also helped by a clear market specific frame of reference.
Since the emphasis is on quality and customer service, Jan must also be conscious of her company´s limits:
"We´re in a position now where we can´t find enough qualified people to do the work we already have, so we don´t want to advertise and end up overextending ourselves."
Limiting their advertising also means that Jack Ricks Glass has chosen not to pursue an online presence for the company. After all, one of the biggest reasons for creating a web page for a business is to increase visibility, a business imperative that, as Jan sees it, isn´t quite an imperative… yet. Besides, their business itself hasn´t quite entered the computer age: "We don´t even have one."
Jan gives us a great picture of a practical, hardheaded approach to the business. It´s attractive to many people to have the latest gadgets and "doo-dads" to make us feel that we are equipped for today´s business. However, Jan knows that spending money to find or train and then retain qualified workers is much more critical to the core idea of the business and concomitantly, to their ability to satisfy their customers. Jan has a great intuitive feel for what it takes to realize the company´s brand promises and she works to ensure those capabilities, rather than being seduced by the "latest and greatest" technologies that are touted in the media.
The larger players in the industry have embraced high-tech solutions, from computer cutting tables programmed to optimize yield to automotive companies linked to insurance companies for direct billing.
But Jan has good reasons for not putting her company on the cutting edge of technology:
"That was the most important lesson I learned and have retained from West Side Glass—gradual, constant, steady growth that you can handle is the best way to go. I didn´t do that when I had West Side. I grew too quickly. You can get too much work. And if you don´t have people to handle it, you wind up with shoddy work or with other problems that leave you spinning your wheels."
In conclusion, the following 5 capabilities:
Having a clear grasp of your purpose, knowing yourself
Accurately reading changes and developments in your business environment
Continuing to learn
Being able to talk about and think issues through to good decisions, and then,
Being able to act on those ideas to realize the company´s purpose
are the key capabilities needed by today´s family owned businesses to thrive in tough competitive circumstances.
Business profile courtesy of Family Business Strategies.
About the author: Daniel Elash,
PhD. can be reached at http://www.syntient.com.
This story also appears in Dr. Elash´s new work, Doing It Right, Realizing Your Company´s Potential. For more information about Doing It Right please go to www.syntient.com.
