How to lead in difficult times

The economy is still recovering slowly and, while things look better than in previous quarters, there is still quite a bit of stress in the market.  It’s harder for people to find and keep jobs, resulting in less disposable income in the economy, which makes things harder for businesses.  Everything seems like it is constantly changing, and there is little stability for anyone anywhere.

So what is a good business leader to do?  Times are tough for business leaders, if only because they are being asked to do much more with even less.    What can you do to help yourself and your company?

One thing you can do is eliminate low-value tasks.  Is everything on your list really necessary?  Is it even something that is best done by you?  When budgets shrink it is tempting to try and do everything yourself, doubling down and putting in the extra hours to get everything done.  Unfortunately this is more likely to get you burned out and end up damaging your entire company in the long run.  Much better to try to figure out what can be delegated and what can be removed entirely.

Secondly, build relationships.  It’s difficult to ask for help, and every business leader wants to believe that they are self-sufficient.  But when you have an issue that you are struggling to deal with don’t be afraid to see if you can get help from someone else.  Maybe you have a company that you could be partnering with to better effect.  Maybe your employees have ideas on how to solve problems that you were struggling with.  But building and drawing on relationships helps to make every problem a little bit easier.

Deal with team issues first.  If there is a relationship problem in your office, then that’s going to color everything else that you do.  Fix teamwork issues and other problems will become much easier.

Finally, learn from your success.  Figure out what you’ve done in the past that worked and determine why.  Ask yourself, how can I expand on my successes?  How can I make sure that I repeat them?  Don’t concentrate on your failures, except to understand why they happened.  Instead, focus on what is going well for you and work to duplicate it.