Too often businesses fail when they have a fixed mindset. They lack the ability to change and adapt, and often its due to the lack of partnership with other businesses to collectively learn from their mistakes and successes. According to Forbes, “Business owners and businesses have to be flexible, evolving and adapting with what is happening around them.” What does this mean to the average business owner? What can a business owner do to avoid the missteps of businesses who wanted to keep doing what has always worked, and in the end failed? There are many factors that can contribute to the success and failure of a business or company, but we’ve found that working together is a strategy that uses adaptation to succeed.
Working Alone Can Lead to Failure
When I look at the mistakes of the past, I can see when other businesses have failed because of their illusory superiority. When we think about failing business strategies, the London Business school states, “The illusion of control takes hold. This bias, which is reinforced by the previous two, sees people overestimating their ability to control the future. They take credit for the outcomes of decisions and confuse forecasting the future with actually making it happen.” People and businesses become so infatuated with their ability to succeed, they become blind to other strategies and ideas. A perfect example of this is Blockbuster Video. In the early 2000s Blockbuster was approached by Netflix and was offered to purchase Netflix for $50 Million. At the time Blockbuster did not see the DVD-by-mail company as a good investment and now Netflix is a billion-dollar company.
What Working Together Looks Like
Other companies have been immensely successful due to their ability to adapt and change. The most recent and biggest accomplishment of partnership I can think of today is Walt Disney Co.’s Marvel Studios and Sony Pictures Entertainment regarding our favorite webslinger, Spider-Man. The Wall Street Journal quoted Amy Pascal, a producer of “Homecoming” stating, “It’s an unusual thing for two companies that are so competitive, but it’s better for each to have a Spider-Man movie that really works.” Prior to the Marvel/Sony partnership, both companies were having trouble and losing money keeping Spidey separate from each other. Since coming together both franchises have seen financial growth by working together and learning from their mistakes together.
When We Work Together – We All Succeed
Law 4 Small Business wants your business to succeed. We want to learn, grow, adapt, and change together. To help our partners and ourselves grow and succeed, we launched our preferred partners web page. Not only do you get the benefit of being listed on our website, but we will coordinate our efforts to rate, review, and friend each other, to succeed together. If you’re interested in working with us and becoming a preferred partner, please contact us so we can add your business as soon as possible. We look forward to hearing from you.
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