Restarting after a business scare

continue with the story by looking at what one needs to do after recovering from the attack.
After major attacks or setbacks in business one needs to find someone who can boost their confidence in order to soldier on.
When I got home after the attack, the blood on my shirt begged for an explanation, therefore, I was compelled to give an account of what happened.
After hearing the story, my three-year-old son was extremely emotional for two hours.
He challenged me to take him to the dam so that he could kill the crocodile with his water gun.
He talked continuously about how he was going to kick it, slap it and throw it back into the river. He challenged me to pick myself and fight another day.
He argued that if he as a baby had the courage to go and fight the adversary what about me, an adult.
What did that imply to me? My advice is if you fall due to any reason, find someone who can help you to rediscover yourself.
Don’t limit your options to more successful colleagues because even the common spirits can pick you up.
If a manager fails and sits back, he or she will collapse but if the same manager fails and learns something from the failure, he or she will rise.
If a crocodile attacks you and fails to kill you, it would have actually made you stronger.
If one falls and takes too long to rise, they risk suffering from phobias, which would incapacitate them forever.
It took me a long time to free my thoughts from the nightmare. For the first three nights after the attack I had terrible nightmares.
Sometimes competitors come up with offensive strategies, which terrifies you and leaves a scar in your heart that might be difficult to heal.
Unless a terrifying event happens to us while using necessities (such as personal cars in third world countries), it might be difficult to convince the victim to continue with certain activities.
Normally the aftermath of accidents or terrible events is difficult to deal with. In most cases the most difficult thing is how to deal with your conscience after your colleagues have gone back to their houses.
Similarly widows/widowers are comforted during the day of the funeral but find it difficult to cope with loneliness afterwards.
Though we take it for granted that all bereaved people are able to cope with the loss, the reality on the ground is different.
Some fail to cope.
In those circumstances, there is need to call in a counsellor to assist.
Counselling is important even in the corporate world. Managers who fail to get over crocodile attacks must be counselled.
In some instances, it is difficult to separate natural events from spiritual events.
Following our African customs, there is always a reason for such occurrence. In other words, there is someone out there who is after your head.
If this is the way one looks at life, therefore one needs a spiritual solution to one’s problems.
There is no need of giving an individual or company executive a business solution if they are superstitious.
The longer they live in terror and fear, the more affected that the business becomes.
Negative thoughts or feelings must not be allowed to go unresolved for a long time as this is will eventually lead to negative balances in company books.
Therefore, a company executive in this frame of mind must quickly seek the spiritual intervention to prevent further bad luck as well as to give confidence so that they could start all over again.
True, in some business environments, some competitors are out to get you. However, in most cases its extremely difficult if not impossible to identify who the culprit is.
Even if the culprit is identified, at times the evidence is not adequate to get a conviction in the court of law.
At times it might be extremely expensive and cumbersome to exhaust all the legal channels before you get justice.
The choice of pursuing justice or letting sleeping dogs lie rests with the company.
My advice is after making a choice, the company must hastily pursue any of the options and quickly refocus all its energies on the original intentions of the business.
It must quickly find a way to put behind bad experiences and move on.
I cannot continually question why me, why me forever, I have to find strong reasons why I have to go back to the dam.
The sooner my resolve, the sooner I am going to get over the crocodile scare. Seeing crocodiles in action on Discovery Channel is different from actually seeing it jumping on your back.
On the Discovery Channel it is fun but on your body it is terror.
What saved the three of us from this menacing crocodile could be partly our prephysical condition before the event.
Alister and I jog five times a week. Chris’ physic, on the other hand, seems to suggest that he does train although he has never discussed his personal training schedule openly.
In some instance the shock of crocodile attack can leave victims more susceptible to the crocodile.
We had the courage to swim 20 metres to get out of the dam. We also helped Alister to finish the daunting task.
Managers with sedentary lifestyles are prone to suffer more from crocodile attacks than those who follow routine physical training programmes.
Our state of shock or fear could have easily resulted in us being consumed by the crocodile.
In a corporate setting physical fitness relates to the corporate and individuals who work in that company.
Corporate fitness refers to the strength of the corporate brand. In a company anything else can be destroyed but only a healthy brand can survive against any imaginable onslaught.
Brands like human bodies need continual nourishment to remain fit and attractive.
Corporate brand can be strengthened by continual image building exercises. A manager who trains rigorously without checking her/his medical conditions will still fall short on physical fitness.
Brands need to be evaluated on a continual basis using market research.
The views of reputational agencies can also give your company an idea of how independent stakeholders perceive your brand.
Some companies carry out rebranding activities as a way of healing the wounds on its brand.
However, merely changing the corporate colours of your organisation without re-engineering the whole organisational culture and processes, has been found to be ineffective during rebranding exercises.
In addition carrying out spiritual activities such as embodying the society’s needs in your strategic plan can enhance the corporate brand.
Active involvement in activities, which improves the quality of life of the society, improves the spiritual and physical fitness of the corporate.
If the company grows spiritually and physically, it creates shock absorbers which will reduce the impact of the crocodile attacks.
On our way back from the dam I analysed my situation and realised how unprepared I was to die.
For instance, I do not have cash generating streams which would cater for my children in such eventualities neither do I have life assurance policies which can cushion my family after I am gone.
Companies are encouraged to put risk management structures that can reduce the loss of profits to their companies due to many unexpected eventualities such as arson or any sudden cause of business interruption.
As the business environment deteriorates for your competitors, be prepared that desperate crocodiles will emerge from nowhere.
Therefore remember to be physically, spiritually and mentally alert always to ward off menacing crocodile attacks.