Being proactive is an integral part of running a business. Whether you’re an employee, a CEO, or anyone in between, being proactive is one of those traits that’s seen as essential to success and one of the company’s key assets.
And the truth is, proactive behavior does usually live up to its reputation, especially when comparing proactive vs. reactive behavior. You’ll find many examples of ways that being proactive can transform a business, and some of the most successful people in business got where they are because they dared to be proactive and dictate the circumstances that define them.
But even though it comes with many rewards, becoming more proactive in your behavior and management is not easy. For many leaders, it can seem that the endless list of fires they need to put out doesn’t allow them to think ahead or to solve less urgent problems.
Luckily, that doesn’t have to be the case.
Let’s look at what being proactive means, the differences between proactive vs. reactive management, and why you should do your best to become more proactive in everything you do.
What is Proactive Behavior?
Proactive behavior can be defined as a preventative and problem-solving process that a person has for dealing with obstacles. In other words, a proactive person is someone who tries to get ahead of problems before they occur or actively looks for ways to make processes or situations better, even when they are not urgent.
To put this in an example, let’s imagine a new employee at work. Soon after starting, they notice that other workers spend a lot of time lined up in front of the printer, waiting to get their documents printed so that they can then go and file them in document storage.
If they had a proactive approach, they could go to their superior and talk about the possibility of streamlining the process, possibly by going digital and eliminating the paper document storage altogether.
In another example, a manager might notice that their sales team is running into a consistent problem when dealing with clients, which leads to complaints and a decrease in the number of deals they can close.
Instead of dealing with each issue separately, a proactive manager would identify the pattern and look for a broader solution to the problem, such as additional training or a restructuring of the sales process.
To put it simply, being a proactive leader or employee is about not being content with the way things are and not limiting yourself to solving the most immediate and urgent issues that arise, which is a reactive approach.
Instead, being proactive vs. reactive means that you look at the bigger picture, think long term, and try to implement lasting change in the things that you can control.
Proactive vs Reactive Management
In management, proactive vs. reactive styles are a significant differentiator in terms of how a company is run and how issues are dealt with. And in most cases, being proactive produces much better outcomes while also allowing the leader to get much more satisfaction from their work.
Because of that, my program, Managing Happiness, is focused on empowering business leaders to take control of their time, their company, and their goals instead of remaining reactive and constantly putting out fires that could be prevented altogether.
While a reactive leadership style may seem appealing to those that want to avoid confrontation or challenges, it produces much more stress. That’s because without strategic thinking and looking at ways to solve problems, the same pressing issues will keep happening, again and again, causing a lot of frustration for everyone involved.
The avoidance of taking action and planning means that it’s much harder to predict when an emergency might occur. And that will also have a significant impact on the negative outcomes that result from the situation.
Meanwhile, a proactive manager spends a significant part of their time at work thinking about strategy and adding more structure and systemization to various processes and tasks. They actively pursue issues that are present or might develop in the future and try to find ways to solve them in a way that isn’t just a temporary solution.
Sure, this type of approach requires the leader to control their time and make an effort to find out what could be improved. But at the same time, being proactive can be very liberating. It gives more control over how a person spends their time, allowing them to focus on what’s really important instead of getting bogged down by endless distractions.
Benefits of Proactive Management
It’s clear that proactive leadership and overall thinking have a lot of benefits. Being in control of yourself, your environment, and the company you run or are a part of can be a powerful driving force that helps produce lasting change and consistently improve.
But how exactly can proactive management help you and your company?
To really drive down the benefits of this type of philosophy, let’s explore some of the most powerful benefits it can offer.
Better Preparedness
As a leader, you probably know all too well how much damage an unexpected crisis can cause. But while it may seem like some issues are all but impossible to predict, being proactive can allow you to come up with a comprehensive crisis management strategy that will enable you to know exactly what to do in any given situation.
Proactive leaders actively seek out opportunities to prepare for the future instead of waiting for things to happen, which helps prevent many of the biggest crises from occurring. And when they do happen, there’s an action plan and processes that can help minimize the damage and move forward as quickly as possible.
Better Understanding of Your Business
Analyzing risks and being proactive goes beyond just avoiding financial or reputational damage. It can also have a massive impact on how you understand your company, the market you operate in, and the trends and patterns that govern it.
When you take a structured approach to solving problems and preparing for challenges, you start to recognize common themes that might point to bigger issues that need addressing.
These insights are invaluable for any leader because they can result in company-defining change, which allows gaining the upper hand against everyone else in the market and even changing the rules by which the market opiates.
By acting instead of waiting for things to occur, you can become the trend-setter and innovator that brings new ideas to the table, optimizing processes and introducing solutions that have not been available before.
Have More Time
It may seem counterintuitive, but spending more time on proactive activities actually gives you more time in the long term. That’s because once you set the processes in place and know how to respond to issues, you won’t have to scramble and disrupt your workflow and can instead rely on the work you already did in advance.
For leaders, having more time means being able to pursue new ideas, finding new paths for growth that haven’t been tried before, and innovating products to improve customer satisfaction. In other words, by being proactive, you will give yourself more opportunities to be proactive in areas that you couldn’t find adequate time for before. And that’s a great position to be in as a leader.
Change the Company Culture
It’s no secret that company culture begins from the top down. And that means that how you spend your time and how proactive you are in solving problems will impact how your employees work as well.
As you start implementing more strategies that solve problems and innovate the way the company is run, your team will start emulating your example. People will start actively pursuing ways to better their own work or areas they feel they can impact.
This can positively impact how your company operates, with people being much more willing to go to you with ideas, suggestions, and feedback. At the same time, a proactive and ethical leader will be much more likely to seek out others’ opinions, which will further help discover areas that are lacking and make it easier to come up with practical solutions that everyone is happy with.
You may not know exactly how to improve a particular issue in a department, but if you can openly talk about it with someone working there every day, you will get a much better idea of where the heart of the issue really is and how much effort or resources it would take to fix it.
Working in a company that values the opinions of its employees is much more exciting for everyone involved, so a proactive company culture can also contribute to employee retention, which is a huge benefit on its own.
Final Words
Being a proactive leader is one of the most critical aspects of success in business. Instead of trying to put out fires that are simply a symptom of more significant issues, proactive vs. reactive behavior allows you to solve problems on a larger scale, streamlining the way your company operates and making employees happier in the process.
What do you think about being a proactive leader? And what strategies do you employ in your workplace to ensure that you and others are challenging themselves to solve problems? Share in the comments below!
