We’ve all heard the business cliché: think outside the box. It means to think freely and not be bound by old, nonfunctional or limiting structures, rules or practices.
That doesn’t work anymore, says Jeffrey Hayzlett, primetime TV and podcast host, keynote speaker, best-selling author and global business celebrity. Today, for companies to prosper, their leaders must fearlessly do what it takes to be successful, he maintains. That means “throwing out conventional wisdom, reframing limitations and steamrolling obstacles” to make things happen.
Hayzlett delivered this message in the keynote address to this year’s Heavy Duty Aftermarket Week. An annual event, it is North America’s largest gathering of the independent heavy duty aftermarket.
Don’t Die
“There is no secret to success,” he told his audience. “It’s all about hard work [and business leaders] must adapt, change or die. There is no other option. Leaders always need to be moving their people and organizations forward, innovating and changing. They can’t just coast.”
Change inherently entails risk, added Hayzlett. If a leader isn’t willing to risk anything, there is no way to facilitate change.
Don't be Afraid to Fail
Hayzlett shared some core lessons on business transformation, leadership, innovation and change management to drive business growth. He learned these lessons during his long business career and from many business leaders. They are detailed in his book, Think Big, Act Bigger: The Rewards of Being Relentless.
One essential lesson is to understand that change is extremely important for moving businesses forward, but it is usually difficult to accomplish, he said.
“Don’t be afraid to fail,” says Hayzlett. “It’s okay to fail, but fail fast. Learn from the mistakes. Every failure is a chance to learn something new, regroup and press on.”
Most businesses fail because the people in charge “didn’t think things out, didn’t put enough resources behind it, didn’t spend enough time, didn’t spend enough sweat equity or they just picked a stupid idea to begin with,” noted Hayzlett.
“If you’re going to do it right, make sure you do all your homework, put enough money behind it, be realistic and then work your frickin’ ass off,” he says.
Block and Tackle
Implementing change boils down to “doing the blocking and tackling – doing the things you have to do,” Hayzlett stressed. However, even with this, he says “failure is still a possibility. That’s just the nature of business, and most people are afraid of failure. The fear of failure stifles businesses. I say embrace it.”
Hayzlett described a two-million-dollar campaign he did while he was Kodak’s chief marketing officer. It was a mobile campaign for movie theaters that he thought would be great because of the captive audience.
“It seemed like a brilliant idea, but it failed in execution because of one tiny and seemingly obvious problem that no one had considered,” he says. “We forgot to look at the basics. Everyone turns off their phones when they walk into a movie theater.”
The campaign was repurposed and it grew a part of Kodak’s business by 1,427 percent within one year.
Create Tension
Another piece of advice Hayzlett shared is for leaders to play it unsafe and create tension with the organization. Doing so “moves people out of their comfort zones and makes them react and stretch their boundaries [as they] think of ways to get things done,” he says.
However, he warned that this has to be “good tension.”
“The intent is not to make people feel uncomfortable, but rather inspire them to generate new thinking, innovation and inspiration,” he says.
Bringing his address to a conclusion, Hayzlett said that to think big and act bigger, leaders have to get over any failure and move on.
“There will always be things that are going to get in the way,” he says. “But keep in mind, nothing gets done until you get started doing something.
“Keep pushing, be relentless and steam roll through those things,” he says.
