Business is good for creatives. Clients are commissioning more and more work. While nothing is certain in this world, things seem to be pretty stable, even growing. Many of you are just enjoying the busyness. And, fair enough, it has to feel pretty good to be busy. So why mess with it?
The best time to do anything in business is when you do not have to. Borrow money, trim staff, hone your message, your core values. Fortune gives you the opportunity to question everything, not validation that you were right all along. More important is the very idea that, for most creative businesses, projects take a substantial amount of time. Decisions today will impact your business next year. You are literally setting the stage for what 2015/16 is going to look like in the next several months if you have not done so already. A better future, where your creative business is more resilient than it is today depends on your willingness to embrace change when it does not appear that you need to.
Let us take borrowing money as an example. If your creative business is and has been solidly profitable for the last few years and looks good for 2014, why would you borrow money? Certainly, it is never easy to get a lender to say yes even in the best of times. But if I told you to buy property insurance to make sure you are protected if something were to happen to your office/shop, you would easily see the value. No difference here. Look at your Line of Credit/Loan as insurance against dips that might come along. No one will want to give you money when you are in a dip, only when you are strong. Since you are strong now, go get the money as I do hope you have humility to know you may not always be.
How about trimming/replacing staff? Everything evolves and success tomorrow is predicated on those who most want to live there and not what yesterday afforded. Being able to keep everyone busy is not the same thing as looking to improve your team. A thriving business is a great time to attract those that want to take the success further. Dead weight does not get reborn or ignored, it just gets tolerated. You owe it to yourself, your art, and your clients to believe, fervently, in the upward spiral. Nature abhors a vacuum and if you allow yourself to create the void by jettisoning dead weight, vitality will be its replacement.
Honing your message/your core values? Who are you and what do you do? This is a never-ending question. And it gets to Why. Why you do what you do is everything. The result of undertaking this work now is a deep presentation of value to you, your staff and clients alike. You will know what your clients pay you (the most) for and you will be uncompromising in the effort. With wind at your back, it is (or should be) easy to refuse business that will damage the boat. Saying no not only to obvious misfits but also to the marginal yeses allows those who want to be all in with you, your art and your creative business, to, in fact, be all in. Now is the time to eat only the best apples. Letting go of a known thing is never easy, a bird in the hand for sure. However, making room for only the best, purest distillation of you, your art and your creative business will be its own reward far beyond today.
