Statistics say that that one in seven men will be diagnosed with Prostate Cancer in their lifetime. It represents 8% of all new cancers and 15% of all cancers in men. While all of this is concerning, there is good news. When there is proper awareness (early detection), treatment and maintenance, Prostate Cancer is almost 100% survivable. The Mayo Clinic (www.mayoclinic.org) website provides a good understanding of this disease.
I am a Prostate Cancer survivor as is my older brother. Each of us had early detection and took the corrective actions advised by our doctors. I have another brother who was lax in his screenings and is now struggling with his 3rd battle with this disease. All three of us are now encouraging others to be more aggressive in their awareness and to understand what steps they should be taking to minimize its impact in their lives.
Taking care of our businesses has many parallels to our personal health. With cancer, it begins with diagnosing the problem, taking corrective action (surgery, radiation, etc.) and then creating a maintenance program of diet and exercise to assist in managing it.
It’s not all that different in business. Like your health, when an issue begins to present itself, the first step is identification. Then you can go on to how best to fix the problem and putting procedures into place for future prevention, visibility and management.
We’ve certainly experienced those steps here at HL Group – as I’m guessing you have within your organization. Naturally, we also see it in our clients. One of our most recent assetsPLUS clients is a good example.
Their issue was getting an honest handle on all of their assets (what they have & where they have it) that they could trust and regularly update. Once those pieces were in place, they were then able to better utilize this information for strategic financial decisions.
The steps they took in accomplishing this were:
Diagnose the illness: They identified that they were lacking trustworthy asset information
- Data needed to be accurate and available for use – including financial impact
Create a treatment plan: They identified their goals to address the issue and defined an optimal approach that would work within their environment to meet those goals.
- A mobile asset inventory solution tied to their ERP seemed to be the right approach
Follow the treatment: They implemented our assetsPLUS solution, undertook a thorough physical inventory to clean up records while also tagging assets
- Cleans the data and makes future inventory activities that much easier
Take the doctor’s advice for maintenance: They established new procedures and practices to maintain accuracy and visibility
- Regularly scheduled & on-demand audits (for strategic items) for future management
Many times, fixing our business issues follows the same path we follow for the management of Prostate Cancer and other diseases we face in our personal life. The good news is that in either case, we receive the maximum benefit when we challenge ourselves to be aware and then implement the sometimes difficult actions needed to move forward.
I ask for your prayers and support for my brother and for others dealing with Prostate Cancer (or other personal challenges, for that matter). If you would like to know how you can directly support Prostate Cancer during this month, the Prostate Cancer Foundation (www.pcf.org) offers some options.
If you’re interested in how we can help with your business health issues in your assets or your supply chain, just contact me and we’ll start the diagnosis.
