When we think of great visionaries and innovators, it’s easy to give all the credit to just one figure. Sure, someone may be able to take ultimately responsibility for planning a business vision and managing others to accomplish it, but they are in no way the sole progressive figure in that task. For example, iconic figures like Steve Jobs stood on the shoulders of excellent engineers and technical specialists that designed his products.

This makes us question, to what extent can a new entrepreneur or small business owner develop business foresight and visionary thinking? Is it just a matter of genius? Or can this pursuit be leveraged in pursuit of excellent goals that no only hold value now, but over time, potentially helping you sustain a bold vision for some time?

In this post, we’ll discuss a few tools and plans you can leverage in pursuit of that goal. Thankfully, with a little foresight, you’ll notice that there’s a great deal of potential wisdom you can use before enacting a courageous new plan:

Researching Business Case Studies & Competition

The good news about planning a business is that many people have tried to do the exact same thing you’re attempting now. Many of them have failed, and many of them have succeeded. For this reason, there’s a treasure trove of potential lessons and case studies you could learn from in order to help you plan your decisions going forward.

Sure, not all of those stories may be relevant to your position. But you can certainly learn effective principles. For example, BlackBerry once dominated the smartphone market. Their CEO dismissed the advent of Apple’s iPhone because he didn’t think that anything someone could do on a web browser, they would want to do in an app. As such, they failed to innovate. You can find many examples of principles that hold true and analyze mistakes made in your exact sector, and that can yield some insight into your industry and how its best handling works.

Simulation & Virtualization

With simulation services, you can plan out entire manufacturing lines or potential measures, and determine your supply chain approach, and the structure of your business in the best way. Having high confidence in your pursuits is the first step towards making them a reality.

For that reason, services offered by brands like https://mosimtec.com/simulation-companies/ can be tremendously advantageous, allowing you to future-proof in the best possible way. It can also help you determine exactly how your investment will express itself as opposed to just paying and hoping for the best.

Consulting

Consulting isn’t cheating, and it doesn’t imply that you have no thoughts of your own. Quite the contrary in fact, using consultants to plug knowledge gaps can help give you more time to focus on the path forward as opposed to the infrastructure necessities of the now, though of course, you will sign off on any practical advice given when it comes to making the actual decisions.

This might involve cybersecurity consulting, talking through a rebrand, or perhaps cutting costs and downsizing by implementing the least amount of harm to your current worker set. This isn’t to say you have to enact all advice you’re given, but it can be very helpful to give yourself that space to think through what options you do have, backed up by industry experience you may not have but you can certainly pay for.

Solving Future Problems Now

Ultimately, visionary thinking should be focused on actual specific measures, rather than vague principles. So, think about the sorts of problems you’re looking to solve. For example, many car manufacturers are considering developing electric cars or reinvesting in their hybrid models. But the question about charging availability and capacity is also a pressing one, with many designers considering how to implement full-scale charging stations at service stations and in areas where coverage is minimal.

It may be that as you seek to innovate, simply resolving some of the problems that could come along as a consequence of that innovation is key. The more you can look to the future and resolve issues like that, the better positioned your business will become. Moreover, your visionary and forward-thinking potential then becomes grounded, effective and sincere, as opposed to only pie-in-the-sky or overly ambitious thinking. Put simply, all of that planning time and conceptual investment pays dividends, which is not something everyone can boast about.

With this advice, you’ll be sure to practice foresight and visionary thinking in a commercial context, but the right way.