How to Build a Winning Business

To be a consistent success in this ultra-competitive business world, winning must be the obsession that drives your company.  The goal of winning must be the foundation that underlies every decision you make, that guides your thought process, that pushes you to be aggressive and focused when others are merely content.

There are Four key components, but lets make sure everyone understands what we mean by “Winning in Business”.

           Increase in market share

           Landing new customers

           Achieving big goals

           Hiring the right employees

           Meeting your commitments on time

           Retaining your customers over the long-term

           Keeping your best employees excited and motivated

           Getting to market before your competitors, etc.

Component 1 |Attitude is the foundation

Winning is the attitude that gives you and your company the “edge,” that separates you from your competition and keeps pushing forward.  It’s an attitude that determines success or failure in every business decision you face.

Winners don’t make excuses and get it done! It doesn’t mean everything you do is successful, but effort means everything. You have to make it clear that you will not tolerate the use of excuses as a rationalization for lack of production, progress or trying to achieve the stated objectives.

Component 2 | The importance of “winning today”

By emphasizing winning, and more importantly, “winning today,” you move everyone’s thought process away from a general concept and direct it toward achieving immediate results.  It builds momentum and it eliminates any excuse about not understanding what your goal is and what you expect should be done to achieve it.

In everything you do you should emphasize “winning today.”  And that means everyone in the company should have the same priority: “winning first”, before anything else in their business relationships and decision making.

Your message must be consistent: “We want winners and we will begin winning, NOW!”  It isn’t hollow conversation; you must talk with conviction and a tone that leaves no room for uncertainty.  By adding winners to your business, your organization is immediately exposed to the habits and standards of success.

Component 3 | Build Winning Standards

Any business that doesn’t have a clear, precise definition of winning has not established the foundation for a successful, growth-oriented environment.

You must have in place the specific standards and expectations by which winning performance can be judged.  This is critical when you’re introducing change in order to revitalize a losing company and demoralized employees.  If employees clearly understand what it means to win, they will more readily adopt winning attitudes and behaviors.

Use the hiring of leaders to make a strong statement to your employees.  Hire winners and superstars, those people with success in their background and winning their genes.  Their tempo, work ethic, and enthusiasm will be essential in reinforcing the direction that you want your company to pursue and in building momentum toward achieving your goals.

Winners become your message carriers.  They sprinkle throughout your firm the knowledge it takes to shake off the doldrums, to make a bad situation better, to turn a good company into a great one. Winners walk with confidence, winners have habits that are molded from success, winners understand and teach what works.

Component 4 | Winners reject failure

The elements of failure can be everywhere – employees flaunting rules, reporting late for work, leaving early, spending too much time complaining and gossiping.  If you don’t expect immediate results, you’re creating an atmosphere where less than the best is acceptable, where winning is some abstract goal that serves more as a public relations ploy than an actual quest.  You must expect daily progress toward each of your stated objectives.  It’s achieving at least 1% improvement each day.

Winners never accept failure in any form.  They won’t let people or the culture or the atmosphere or history or lack of expectations bring them down.  This is the essential attitude that winners bring to your company, and it’s critical to establish a winning attitude before you can accomplish anything of lasting value for your company.

Winners simply won’t fail from lack of effort, lack of commitment, or lack of determination.  Nor should your organization.  You must push aside any distractions and make sure that you focus on the assignments that have the highest priority.  You must convey this single-mindedness of purpose to the entire organization.