Losing sight of what matters

Last night, Google’s chairman Eric Schmidt testified before a US Senate antitrust committee on the search engine company’s market power.

In opening his testimony, Schmidt alluded to Microsoft, saying, “20 years ago, a large technology firm was setting the world on fire. Its software was on nearly every computer. Its name was synonymous with innovation.”

“But that company lost sight of what mattered. Then Washington stepped in.”

It’s an interesting and probably accurate perspective given how Microsoft has effectively lost its way for the last decade – although given Google’s urge to become an identity service and its buying a mobile phone manufacturer doesn’t bode well for their focus on the core search business.

Losing focus of what matters is a problem for all business owners. We’re busy, it’s hard winning orders, getting paid and keeping customers happy, so we lose track of the reason we went into business.

For most of us it was because we had a great business idea or a belief we could have a better life being our own bosses.

That latter objective is often the first one lost; usually we find ourselves working harder, taking fewer holidays and seeing the family less than if we’d stayed in a comparatively safe job with “Big Corporation”.

Great ideas can also be our undoing – if you’re constantly having brainwaves, you find you have a lot of ideas but no time to execute any of them.

Similarly, one great idea that turns out to be a dog can be bad news as well. Often, we’re loath to admit we’re wrong and hold onto a failing business idea long after it’s shown not to be viable.

Probably worst of all is when we violate our own values; many of us went into business because we didn’t like the values of the corporation we worked for.

Then one day we find we’re screwing subcontractors, that we’re leasing an expensive car the business can’t afford, while cutting staff benefits and tying up customers in legalistic contracts in an attempt not to deliver the services we promised.

Just like the big company we swore we’d never become.

If you’re a big company with a lucrative business niche – like Google or Microsoft – you can get along quite nicely with the rivers of gold flowing, subsidising your indulgences and distractions, most of us though don’t have that revenue buffer protecting our assets.

The cost of losing focus is a killer; even if it doesn’t kill our businesses, it will destroy our souls.

Are you keeping sight on why you went into business?

Paul Wallbank is one of Australia’s leading experts on how industries and societies are changing in this connected, globalised era. When he isn’t explaining technology issues, he helps businesses and community organisations find opportunities in the new economy.