We’ve all heard that timing is everything. Yep, wow, great. So what’s for dinner? When people say, “Timing is everything,” it means nothing to us. It’s like looking up and saying, “Hey, that’s the sky.”
But, if you look back on decisions you’ve made in your business, you’ll see that timing makes a huge difference. At times, it works in your favor, but in other cases, it does not. For example, in my first business venture I developed a paper-based exercise and food tracking system. Unfortunately, it went belly up just before the internet started to catch on. It could have been a ground-breaking web application. But, the timing was just a little off. On the other hand, starting Appointment-Plus in 2001 was great timing. Early adopters loved it and provided the feedback necessary to grow it into the industry-leading application that it is today.
In your business, do you give much thought to timing? If you don’t, you should. Consider the following:
Promotions. Many businesses have tried a deal-of-the-day promotion through Groupon, Living Social or one of the myriad other companies offering this service. If you have provided one of these special offers to prospects, was it during the slow time of the year for you? Was it during a time in which your staff had vacations planned? Was it during the same time a competitor was offering a promotion? The timing of these types of deals is critically important to their effectiveness.
Hiring. Are you considering hiring someone? If so, how does it relate to your seasonal cash flow? Will you have the time to properly train the person? If you are a massage therapy company and you get really busy starting in October, should you hire another massage therapist in October or should you hire them a month before to get them up to speed on your computer system, your policies, and your culture?
Feedback. Do you always give employees positive feedback immediately upon them doing something well to reinforce that behavior? Research has proven that the closer you can provide positive feedback to the behavior you would like to reinforce, the more likely the behavior is to be repeated. So, timing of feedback is very important.
The next time someone says to you that timing is everything, don’t just politely agree and move on to the next topic. Instead, use it as a way to check in and make sure you really are factoring timing into promotions, hiring, feedback, and other decisions you have to make every single day. You’ll quickly start to realize that timing truly is everything.