At the risk of sounding a little controversial, let me make a statement here; there are a lot of parallels between running a business and preventing cancer.

Cancer is a debilitating disease that can begin in any part of the body, spread to healthy flesh and organs under its own steam, and if left untreated can destroy the host completely. But the treatments for cancer can be as damaging as the disease itself, a fact which results in numerous compromises between management, treatment and prevention.

But by far the worst aspect of cancer is its furtive approach. When you fall from a tree and break your arm, you’re aware instantly that there’s a problem, and consequently you’re able to take measures to remedy it. But cancers begin slowly and out of sight, often growing to an unstoppable level before you’re even aware that something is wrong. That, more than anything else, is the biggest issue with cancer.

Cancer starts with a single cell going out of whack (excuse the technical terminology). But imagine, if you will, that there was a machine that could detect a single cancerous cell and alert the body that something was awry. A single cell can be excised with a lot less damage to the host than if it were allowed to grow to many tens of thousands of cells. Therefore, if this machine existed, cancer would not.

All of which means that – as I’m sure you’ve heard before – early detection is the key to cancer prevention.

Like the human body, there are many furtive maladies that can affect businesses, and the similarities to cancer are undeniable. These business cancers can begin anywhere, and if left untreated can build to the point at which the prognosis is poor. But like human cancers, business cancers can be far more easily controlled or treated if detected early.

However, unlike human disease control there actually is a machine that can detect early onset of business cancer. It’s called feedback.

Whether a business supplies a service or sells a product, the customer is always king. More customers spending more money almost always means more profit, and happy customers will keep coming back again and again. Conversely anything that upsets a customer is ultimately going to upset the business. Yet many business owners or managers are unaware that their customers are getting frustrated, or not coming back, or spending less, until it’s too late.

Here’s a scenario; a business manufactures baby buggies. They’re state-of-the-art, they’re shiny and they look good. The business spends a fortune on marketing their baby buggies and initially sales are good. But their buggy has a major flaw; the collapse catches are fiddly and pinch fingers, and many mums are injured trying to fold down their buggies. Now as it happens, mums gather in herds (in places like daycare centres and play groups) and talk to each other. Soon the word gets around that these baby buggies are too difficult to collapse and sales slow down. The business then spends more on marketing – and sells more buggies. But the cost of the campaign offsets the profits from the new sales.

Ultimately the business fails due to lack of word-of-mouth sales.

Now imagine what would have happened if the management team of the buggy business had received several Slaps* from the early purchasers;

“It caught my fingers!”

“I can’t collapse it!”

“I’ve had to buy another buggy!”

*You’ll find out more about Slaps at www.iplug.go.nz

The problematic catch could have been changed at design level and the buggy improved before ‘word’ got around about it’s drawbacks. Then, when the mums gathered in their herds, the ‘word’ would have been good, and buggy sales would climb without recourse to expensive marketing campaigns.

The moral of the story is that negative feedback need not be detrimental to a business. In fact, when launching a brand new business or service or product, a whole swag of ‘nice one’s is not nearly as beneficial as a few decent, well considered criticisms.

Prepare for Slaps and welcome them.