Overnight failure/success Companies and brands are overnight successes, or overnight failures.

Essentially life happens gradually, then suddenly.

Gradually because it’s the small things done consistently, every day, that mean we either succeed or fail; opportunities are missed or taken, customers are looked after or ignored, staff are engaged or become disenchanted.

But we don’t always notice when things are going awry because we still have profit, and profit can disguise many sins.

But all of a sudden the profit runs out and the business falls over.

Of course it didn’t happen suddenly, you just suddenly noticed.

On the flip side success doesn’t happen overnight either; it’s the small things done consistently well, that might not seem to be paying off at the time, that lead to it.

Then all of a sudden profits pop and your company is an overnight success that took five years to develop.

This is how life works, but people focus on the ‘suddenly’ part, but that’s not how it happens.

Success is gradual, and gradual is critically important because it’s the only part you can do something about.

Sam Hazledine, author Unfair Fight