Posted by Dave Lorenzo - Business Coach

The second component of The Cycle of Continuous Improvement is value creation, and the third is value demonstration. An excellent way to realize both of these tasks is to volunteer to solve problems. Anytime you hear your boss, coworker, or customer vent about a problem, immediately jump in and offer to help. Whether you are currently able to solve the problem or not is irrelevant. You can learn, and you can demonstrate your willingness to create value that is immediately useful to your customer.

For instance, let’s say your supervisor is having trouble with a piece of software. You can, with grace, offer to look into the problem for him. If you aren’t able to solve the problem immediately, you can seek out an answer for him. Once you do, you will be viewed as the person who fixed a nagging problem. Perhaps a colleague is always complaining about a tedious or tricky element of her job. Could you offer assistance? If you do, she will appreciate the help and probably have good words to say about you. When a customer complains about services or products, particularly those with which you are directly involved, you have an excellent opportunity to respond and demonstrate your value. Customers love nothing more than being heard and having their feedback honored.

All of these scenarios involve you noticing a problem, equipping yourself (through training, elbow grease, or sheer will) to solve it, creating value, and demonstrating it to your business partners. That adds up to continuous improvement, personal equity, and lasting security for you. Everybody loves a problem solver who makes life easier. Establish a reputation ongoing willingness to resolve problems and you establish yourself as an irreplaceable asset.

Filed under: First, Best or Different
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