As a Business Coach, we often get brought in to work on improving sales teams. It might surprise you to know that a company’s brand is one of the most important places to start. Here’s why…

Often a certified business coach will be called in to help create a plan for change. Or, as part of a business consulting session, you have suggested some changes to the way a business operates.

When a business considers changing something in who they are, what they do, or how they do it, there is always a certain amount of risk involved. Whether the change is as simple as bringing in a new supplier for a healthcare facility or eliminating a product line produced by a software company – good change or hard change – your Brian Tracy training will give you the tools to analyse the risks involved.

Part of the FocalPoint Business Coaching Professional’s role is to play the devil’s advocate.

Brian Tracy recommends businesses use Murphy’s Law when trying to decide whether to take a risk: If anything can go wrong, it will.

Use this concept with your business coaching clients when they are considering a change in the way they do things – whether the change is coming at your suggestion; or it is a change they have recruited you to mentor them through.

Sit down with your client and, together, write out a scenario for the change. Track each step involved in planning, developing, instigating and integrating the new system, process or product into the company’s current situation.

Now, find the “Can go wrong” spots. Consider:

• Why the change is happening?
• What, exactly, is the change? Where will it take effect?
• Where in the business will each step towards the change have the most impact? Operations? Sales and Marketing? Human Resources?
• When will each step take place?
• How the change will affect systems already in place. How the human factor (both employees and customers) will respond to the change.

Just in case that little exercise didn’t come up with enough pitfalls to tackle, do some brainstorming with your client. Take each step and say: “What can possibly go wrong here?” You should both be able to come up with a few more disasters.

At this point, the team you are consulting with might be totally discouraged. Better now than after they have invested $40K in fish fertilizer for a salmon farm.

Brian Tracy calls it “Crisis Anticipation.”

Now is the time to really create the plan for change. Re-visit each crisis or roadblock that you and the client have come up with and deal with them. Question the impact of the “Gone Wrong” situation. Create options that will prevent the situation from happening.

Here’s an example:

Gone Wrong: By eliminating the floppy disk product we’ve lost old and valued customers.

Consider Impact: Yes, we lose old customers, but we’ve expanded our client-base to a higher income and more tech savvy customer.

Create Option: Show the old and valued customers how making the change along with you will be worth their while, offer an internet workshop.

At the end of this kind of thorough risk analysis, your client can either instigate a change with confidence or decide against the change altogether. And you’ve done your job as a Business Coach.

Thanks for joining me. The software scenario isn’t quite real, but we do have a lot of case studies that will show you how our amazing business coaches operate, from Boulder, Colorado to Virginia Beach, VA.

Thansk for reading our blog!