Flexible individuals accept change as natural. They may have many projects underway at the same time. Sometimes they even appear to be indecisive because they like to keep their options open.
Inflexible individuals like a planned, predetermined way of life. They have a tendency to resist change and they like to finish one project before beginning the next. Having made a decision, inflexible individuals are not likely to change their minds.
Successful small business operators are flexible. This flexibility is related to the ability to deal with risk spontaneously and to having a special tolerance for ambiguous and uncertain situations.
Flexibility is not the indecision that it may appear to be because it actually consists of a series of revised decisions that reflect new information as it arises.
Katrena recommends not identifying yourself as flexible or inflexible. Rather visualising a spectrum from flexible at one end and inflexible on the other end and asking yourself how much breath of behaviour you have access to.
For example when I am working with a client on their business, I like to think that I am varied and flexible in my approach to their specific set of skills and gaps. I like to think that I am very flexible and able to work with a variety of diverse clients and their business specialties and challenges. I also like to think that I am inflexible when it comes to my values, my boundaries, pricing and the list goes on.
How much of the spectrum do you have access to?
If you find that you don’t have a broad breath of behaviour, then work on stretching your comfort zone. As a business person, I was naturally flexible and open by nature. As I developed my businesses over the last 17 years, I developed my boundaries, rules of engagement, policies, procedures, standards, terms, conditions, while at the same time able to open, responsive and flexible to new opportunities, customisation of my programs, developing new services and offerings to new markets.
I work with a lot of women on their business and find that helping business owners create their business plan and stick with it, while at the same time being flexible, as they discover who they are and where they fit in the market. This is often a moving feast and requires flexibility. Because if they just stuck with their original ideas they might not evolve as successfully as they could of.
When you get the balance right in business you can become as successful as possible in your field of excellence. If you have always said, you are an inflexible person, then stop saying it and start working on stepping out of your comfort zone. Being able to access both sides of the spectrum at will to your benefit, is one of the secrets to business success.
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