Knowing when to walk away
In business we often come across opportunities, people, businesses, ideas and situations that look promising and profitable.
While some can certainly meet and even exceed our expectations, every now and again one can hand us a confronting dose of reality that can result in hard decisions and the possibility of cutting all ties.
But how do you know when to stop or when to try harder? Here are five checks to put in place so you know when it’s time to walk away in business.
1. Know what you stand for
Know who you are and what you stand for both personally and professionally. Also know what your business and brand stands for, beyond just making sales or profits.
What boundaries do you want to set around the way you work? What behaviour is acceptable and not acceptable from you, your staff, your customers, suppliers and associates? What lines are you comfortable with crossing in business and what lines will you never cross?
By establishing what you do and don’t stand for and what you will and won’t tolerate you make it easier to identify when you need to take action to prevent a situation from escalating, or when you need to cut your losses and walk away.
2. Be committed to win/win
Any business arrangement you enter into should be win/win, and equally win/win at that. If it isn’t steps need to be taken to rectify it in order to create a mutually beneficial arrangement.
To guard against possible resentment and relationship breakdowns, you need to regularly evaluate your working relationships and maintain open communication to make sure all parties are getting what they want and need.
Sometimes in relationships one party ends up giving more at times, the key is to be aware of it and manage it to ensure it balances out. If it still continues to be win/lose than it might be time to lose the relationship.
3. Keep your emotions in check
Emotions influence and impact every decision we make. For this reason it is important to be mindful about how they may be motivating or fuelling your thoughts and actions through crucial situations and circumstances.
Whatever you are dealing with examine your thought process, are you making rational arguments? Are you calm or highly emotional? Are you looking at the facts or at the hypothetical? Often some time and space from the situation can be enough for you to think a little more rationally and logically.
4. Listen to your intuition
Our subconscious mind takes in far more information than we can consciously process and can often give us little clues through our intuition to help us in our decision-making.
While we can’t recall all of the information, we will often get a ‘feeling’ that something is not quite right. Listen to it; you get this for a reason. Find out more information to evaluate the opportunity, person, business or idea properly if needed and make the decision that gives you the most peace.
5. Know your value
In order to avoid resentful and difficult situations you need to be clear on the value of your time and expertise. What you do, what you know and even who you know is valuable.
If you want to know how valuable, work out what it would cost to hire someone else to do everything you do at your level. You will soon see just how much your time is worth and how valuable your knowledge and skills really are.
Once you know your value set your price and stick to it. As tempting as it can be to chase, discount and say, “yes” to the money, it can come at a cost and sometimes even a loss to your business.
By knowing what you are worth and what you want to command you will be able to sort the good opportunities from the bad or the costly, and move away from those who don’t value you faster.
How do you decide it is time to walk away in business?