You can’t steer a parked car
Why action is the missing business system
By Aaron Montgomery
You can’t steer a parked car
Why action is the missing business system
By Aaron Montgomery
Vadym – stock.adobe.com
If you own a print shop, apparel decoration business, or graphics company, there is a good chance you have a list somewhere that could frighten a grown adult. Maybe it is on a whiteboard. Maybe it is in a notebook. Maybe it is in your head, or maybe it is scattered about on sticky notes, scraps of paper, and boxes.
You need to follow up on quotes, fix the website, train a team member, update pricing, post on social media, finish production, call the customer who “just has one quick question,” and figure out why the heat press is making that sound again.
So, you plan. You research. You think. You tweak. You talk it through. You make a better list. Then you make a cleaner list of the better list. You even run it through AI to help you get organized. You want to make the right move. You do not want to waste money, damage your reputation, upset a good customer, or create one more mess you have to clean up later. Planning feels safe.
The problem is that planning can start to feel productive, even when nothing is actually moving. Planning creates clarity, but action creates results. You can’t steer a parked car. You can turn the wheel all day long, but until the car moves, nothing changes. Business works the same way. You can think, plan, study, and adjust the idea forever, but real learning starts when the idea hits the real world.
The art of success
You need a system to execute that can become a repeatable rhythm of turning decisions into action, action into feedback, feedback into learning, and learning into better systems. It means you stop waiting for perfection and start moving with purpose. This is not a random hustle. It is not throwing spaghetti at the wall and hoping your shop becomes profitable pasta. It is a structured movement that I call the art of success. The art of success first requires that you know what you are as a business. You have named the result you want. You have worked on the value you bring to customers. Now you need action that helps you learn what works, what misses, and what needs to change.
That matters because many shop owners confuse action with busy work. Busy work is answering every email the moment it arrives. It is chasing every new idea because it feels exciting. It is saying yes to every customer request because you are afraid the phone may stop ringing. It is staying at the shop until midnight and calling it dedication, when it may really be a lack of structure, wearing a cape.
Before you add one more thing to your already crowded plate, ask a few simple questions: Does this action match who we are as a business? Does it move our No. 1 outcome forward? Does it improve the value we deliver to the right customers? Does someone own it? Will we review what happens?
A shop can be busy and still not grow. You can print all day, quote all night, post every morning, and still feel stuck. That is a clue that movement alone is not the answer.
Let’s walk through the art of success in plain language. The first step is to go into any action with a plan. Not the 47-step master plan that requires three spreadsheets, two energy drinks, and a prayer circle. But a basic idea of the next step and a general idea of where you hope the action leads you.
Maybe the action on your to-do list is to increase repeat orders. A small plan could be to email your top 20 customers with a simple reorder reminder. Plan small enough that action can happen immediately.
The next step is straightforward. Take the action. Send the emails, in the case of our task, to increase repeat orders. The important part of this step is to take the action without any preconceived idea of the outcome. Assume the best and let the results be what they will be. But take the action and do not pause for perfection.
The next step is we need to experience the results. But your customer cannot respond to the emails if you never sent them. So, once you send them, just experience the result and do not label it. Good, bad, failure, success, OK, not great, etc. Those labels do nothing except steal any information and learning inside the result.
And only once you have experienced the result, can you then start the learning process. Now you can begin to analyze the result by asking better questions. What worked? What missed? What surprised us? What did customers respond to? Where did our instructions create confusion? What did this reveal? You are not trying to prove you were right. You are trying to learn what is true. This is where the gold is. A poor result can still be valuable if it shows you what to adjust. But if you label the result and didn’t experience it, that gold will be lost.
Maybe your reorder email got no response because the subject line was weak. Maybe the offer was too vague. Maybe you sent it to the wrong group. Maybe your customers need a more visual reminder. Maybe the timing was off. But regardless of the result, you now know more than you did before.
The real problem is not being wrong. The real problem is staying stuck because you are afraid of being wrong. Therefore, the next step is to take another action and start the loop over again. Choosing the next best step. Not the same step with more frustration. Not a wild new idea that ignores what you just learned. A better step.
Then the cycle keeps moving. Plan. Act. Reflect. Learn. Act Again.
Image courtesy of Aaron Montgomery
Taking action
This process and mindset should be companywide. Every action needs an owner, a deadline, a review point, and a next step. If nobody owns it, it is a wish. If there is no deadline, it floats. If there is no review point, learning gets lost. If there is no next step, the business stalls.
The opportunity for team learning using a tool like the art of success multiplies your efficiency and problem-solving. But keep it simple. You could use a weekly check-in, an action board, or track a few KPI that matter. Other simple group learning tools are to keep an issue list, make reviewing completed projects part of the culture, and updating SOPs when something changes. The goal is to make learning visible.
Many businesses take action, get feedback, and then move on too quickly. The lesson stays in someone’s head instead of becoming part of the company. Then, three months later, the same problem shows up wearing a different hat. A confusing customer onboarding call should become a better onboarding checklist. A pricing objection should become clearer value language. A missed deadline should become a better project timeline. A quality issue should become a production checkpoint. A customer complaint should become a service standard. A great review should become proof of what to repeat.
This also means execution requires saying no. Real execution is not only about doing the right things. It is protecting the space to do the right things. Every yes creates work. You may need to say no to misaligned jobs, rushed orders that wreck your schedule, customers who do not fit your value model, shiny ideas that pull you away from your No. 1 outcome, or work the owner should no longer be carrying. If everything is a yes, nothing is truly a priority.
Making a culture of learning from action helps you move from planning paralysis to progress and from hustle to rhythm. You do not need to do more just to feel like you are growing. You need to do the right things in the right order, then learn from what happens.
Your shop does not need more chaos dressed up as ambition. It needs clarity, intention, and structure. You can build that. One small action at a time. Keep the car moving, keep your hands on the wheel, and make the next turn with what the road just taught you.
Aaron Montgomery is a business facilitator and author of “The FUNdamentals of Business Success” and “The Gratitude Shift: A Simple Path to Find More Peace and Joy.” With nearly 30 years of experience guiding small businesses, Montgomery helps people fall back in love with what they do each day. For more visit consultaaron.com.
