There’s nothing like a crisis to bring things into sharp focus. Our house was recently struck by lighting. In leaving the burning house, my daughter, acting mostly on instinct, grabbed 3 things: her favorite stuffed animal from when she was little, a favorite photo, and her Miyazawa flute. 
Left behind to be lost in the fire were her computer, her iPad, and even her iPhone. And in that defining moment, she realized that she was destined to be a musician, and not a scientist or an engineer – a decision she’d agonized over for months.
The experience made me think that there’s a business analogy.
If your business were on fire or in crisis mode, what 3 things would you make sure you had? What 3 assets are the most essential for your business to continue and thrive? A trusted member of your management team? Your top sales generator? A key strategic alliance partner? Your source code? Your customer contacts? If you need more than five seconds to decide, you’re thinking too hard.
Or – just maybe — you (like many of us) you might to need to re-examine the essence of your business.
If you answered that you’d take nothing, because everything you need is in your head, just know that if you’re lost in the fire, your business is lost as well. If you’re a solopreneur with no aspirations of anything more, then that might be OK. But if your business is or will be more than that, it might be wise to think about transferring some of that knowledge to others, or document processes so that others can carry on building the value you’ve created.
If your answer involved a couple of key people or business alliance partners, make sure you’re taking the time to mentor them, encourage them, and keep them motivated and engaged. Let them know how much you value them. Don’t wait until one of them walks out the door or turns their back on you to realize what you’ve lost. Conversely, do you have a contingency plan if, despite your best efforts, they suddenly leave the business?
If your answer revolved around key assets like source code, manufacturing or design documents, customer lists, or other intellectual property, make sure they are fully documented and digitized, as well as protected from an IT security standpoint. If your systems or files were hacked, what’s your recovery plan?
We all have a lot of stuff in our lives and in our businesses, too. Much of it isn’t really core to what matters. But there are a handful of things that really matter.
Don’t wait for a crisis to take time to focus on them.
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