by Victoria Krayna-Spencer
"I don't care how much power, brilliance, or energy you have, if you don't harness it and focus it on a specific target, and hold it there, you're never going to accomplish as much as your ability warrants."— Zig Ziglar
"In today's fast-changing business environment, responsiveness - quickness, agility, the ability to adapt to changing demands - is more vital than ever to a firm's survival." (Bateman-Snell, 2003) A business, person, or brand that does not regularly examine its total marketing program cannot understand why it has succeeded or why it has failed. The purpose of making strategic marketing changes is to enhance opportunities for organizational and individual success. Organizations must be prepared to implement change effectively or die. Yet 90% will not make the changes necessary for their ultimate survival.
But what about marketing the individual? What if the individual were to examine and completely understand one's motivation; learning where and how to allocate one's energy and focus one's intellect, asserting one's competitive drive productively and efficiently; managing relationships in order to support one's objectives and deal effectively with saboteurs? What if one were to become responsive, agile, and capable of adapting to change quickly, as change is inevitable? How does one go from motivation to commitment?
What form of discipline would that require? That discipline takes the form of identifying a small number of priorities, directing resources to them, then measuring and holding ourselves accountable for significant progress toward them. These short-term victories equate to achievements that sustain and strengthen faith in the change effort, emotionally reward efforts, keep the real and/or perceived obstacles in perspective, and build momentum. Without sufficient victories that are visible, timely, unambiguous, and meaningful to others, change efforts invariably run into serious problems. As an individual are you the ten percent willing to make the requisite changes or are you the ninety percent that will forfeit the very life-breath of your dreams?
Bateman, T. & Snell, S. (2003) Management: The New Competitive Landscape, Sixth Edition. The McGraw-Hill Companies. New York, New York.
Krayna-Spencer, V. (2008) Change Management in the Twenty-first Century: Best Practices http://ezinearticles.com/?Change-Management-in-the-Twentyfirst-Century---Best-Practices&id=1255975
