by Chris Odongo, CEO of Wylde International
Adversity is not the enemy of progress rather it can be one of the greatest enablers of progress. Indeed, I once read an article called “Snowplow Parents” where the author argued that friction is the best way to build grit in a child and that when you remove all obstacles from the path of a child then what you end up with is a child with low levels of grit, tenacity, and resilience. But what does all these have to do with business opportunities and adversity you may wonder.
You see, we are currently in an election season as a country (previous election seasons have seen a slowdown of the economy) and we are also witnessing an unprecedented economic disruption through fuel shortages, falling strength of the Kenya shilling, rationing of dollars, growing government debt that is squeezing out businesses from the debt market and an aggressive tax regime that threatens to squeeze water from rocks every day. In this short article, I will attempt to answer some questions that will help you dear reader to navigate the season and come out a winner.
What are the adversities that we face?
The first adverse condition we face is the potential slow-down in economic activity as we near election day. Investor appetite may wane, and projects may delay.
A not-so-new condition that businesses may face is a weaker shilling, which makes imports more expensive and times tougher for importers of goods and raw materials, notwithstanding double-digit inflation and higher interest rates.
The third adverse condition is an aggressive tax man who removes the confidence in your step and makes you look behind your shoulder with every transaction you make.
How can businesses spot opportunities in adversity?
Opportunities abound despite adversity. The first step is to realize that in a population of 50 million people, in Kenya for example, there are bound to be very many needs that require solutions in the form of goods and services.
The biggest question to ask yourself as a business owner is what are the needs that exist from my potential customers that my goods and services can meet? You need to spend time with your customer and potential customer and study them to understand their needs and the jobs that they are trying to do and see how your goods and services can help them meet those needs and do those jobs either easier, faster, cheaper or better.
Practical Steps to spotting opportunities
“Nice statements you have up here” you say, “show me some practical steps. Give me a formula I can follow,” well, here goes!
Step 1: Understand your customer’s needs and your value proposition
All customers have needs and are trying to achieve a certain goal with the goods and services that they are buying in the market. For example, people want to move from point A to point B safely and securely, they also want to talk to other people for various reasons which are why they have meetings etc. So, your first step is to observe customers consuming your product and ask yourself what are they trying to do? What is their objective?
Step 2: Understand how adversity has affected their ability to do these things they are trying to do
Now, this is the most important step, because we are talking about adversity which brings with it constraints. In short, people are not able to do the things they wish to do using your products and services because of adversity. Let’s look at adversity number 1; economic slow-down occasioned by political tensions.
So imagine that your customer who was in construction or was running a project wishes to postpone it to after the elections or your client who is a contractor suddenly can’t afford services anymore because their business has slowed down because of cancelled or postponed projects. Now you can see how this constraint is affecting your business. It means that your customers can no longer afford you or have postponed the consumption of your services.
There are other constraints that clients typically face when trying to consume our goods and services. They could be facing access constraints; meaning they have been denied access to the service or product because it is too far or it is not available at the right time. We have been facing milk and fuel shortages in the country which is an access constraint.
Another constraint consumers could be facing is know-how. They may not know how to do something by themselves e.g. IKEA made DIY furniture that you could assemble by yourself and thus making it almost possible for everyone to become a carpenter.
A final constraint that I wish to bring to your attention today is time; sometimes customers just do not have the time to consume a product or service from you. Think about all the things you wish to do but seldom find the time to do them.
Step 3: Sign up for the Big Baraza and learn about the next 3 steps to spotting opportunities
Dear Reader, this article was about sharing with you key steps on how to go about spotting and unlocking opportunities in times of adversity. It’s also about convincing you to attend the Big Baraza :-D, a conference for SMEs put together by SMEs.
This is an election year and we have a broken economy. Allow the village experts to take you through a framework of thinking that will show you how to find opportunities and ensure your business grows. During the Big Baraza, we will have a master class on this very topic and we will be helping business owners rethink their value proposition and align it to where there are boundless opportunities. Sign up at www.bigbaraza.co.ke
(image courtesy of: https://static.dw.com/)