What lessons have we learned in the last year and what conclusions have we drawn from them for the future – says Beata Drzazga
Beata Drzazga is a woman entrepreneur and visionary recently featured on the cover of Forbes. He often advises in business and in life. She summarized the previous year for us and revealed how to prepare for the upcoming challenges.
How to plan for the future based on past experiences?
Beata Drzazga: Based on my past experience, we know that there is no one perfect effective way to better plan for the future. You can only try to do everything with the best knowledge and try to draw conclusions from experience. However, we must always take into account that some percentage of our predictions and assumptions will not come true and not everything will go as planned, because the market is very volatile. This is accepted by us and it is always worth having a plan B. Therefore, it is good when an entrepreneur takes volatility into account in his plans. Life often corrects our plans, our intentions pale in comparison to reality and we must be mentally prepared for this.
Especially today’s situation shows how unpredictable life can be. We have just breathed a sigh of relief that Covid-19 is ending, and the war has fallen on us just beyond our border. No one expected how drastically our lives would change, that we would go through a lockdown, then inflation, an increase in costs, a several-fold increase in salaries, an influx of citizens from Ukraine and a complete unsettling of the geopolitical situation. Therefore, you must always be prepared for the fact that any plan can change. This is the best approach, because then we are not so stressed and we are prepared for everything. We are adapting to a situation that is different than ever before. What happened is a new experience and we have to rise to the occasion. I think every entrepreneur needs to be prepared for the fact that everything is changeable. Those who are afraid of change, unfortunately, are not suited to be entrepreneurs. That is why our character traits are so important.
What advice would you give to entrepreneurs who failed last year?
It’s hard to advise. I find it sad. There is nothing left for us but to stick bravely and treat each failure as a lesson from which we can draw conclusions. We can look at what happened and think about what could have been done differently, so that we can control it more in the future. If the entrepreneur still feels strong despite the failure and wants to continue working, he can just look for a market niche and try his hand there. You have to be attentive to what is happening, you have to look at failure in a positive way. Nothing teaches us better than failures, life and its difficult situations. We bravely get up from our knees and move on.
What impact does the current economic and market situation have on your plans and what actions can young entrepreneurs take to deal with this situation?
This situation really had a big impact on me. I’m watching everything. I see we have to tighten our belts tight. Think about what we must have and what we can give up. It is important to keep an eye on all costs and the entire finances of the company. I want to say to every young entrepreneur that he must take his company very seriously and devote a lot of attention to it now.
Which industries do you think will have difficulties and which will even have a phase of prosperity?
It’s hard to predict today. Even economists say that they were wrong on some issues, because we were all so surprised by the new situation, e.g. the aviation industry did not expect such difficulties as it is experiencing today. The health market didn’t expect that we wouldn’t get the money we expected. Therefore, I would refrain from any opinion here, because today everything is so unpredictable. But for a change, I would like to add that no one thought that the pandemic would accelerate progress in telecare, teleporadas, etc. No one thought that sometimes TV shows would work so well. This is the very positive side of these unexpected changes. The car industry, in turn, was completely unprepared for what happened in connection with the production deficit of small components and that it will affect the availability of new cars so much.
You employ over 3,250 people, how has the situation on the labor market changed in the last year from the perspective of such a large employer and what trends do you anticipate in this area?
What I have noticed is that the market is turning into an employers’ market again, and this market is moving towards a market of excellent professionals. A large number of job candidates allows us to find true gems even if we are not currently recruiting on a large scale, only selectively.
What do you consider your greatest successes and failures in the past year?
It depends on what kind of success we mean. For me, the most important thing is that despite such a difficult market situation, the company is stable and continues to develop. My personal success is that I received the President’s Individual Economic Award for the entirety of my activity. It’s also nice that so many other awards have poured in. I was completely surprised. I was also on the list of 100 women by “Forbes”, later in “Gazeta Finansowa” on the Pearls of Entrepreneurship list, and recently I was awarded as the manager of the year in private health care – Man of the Year 2022, success in health care. Another big surprise is that I found myself as a female entrepreneur on the cover of Forbes. Fortunately, there were no failures that I remember.
And what is your overarching goal for 2023?
Of course, the good of the family is my life. My next goal is for my child BetaMed SA and other companies in Poland and abroad to continue to develop, and for my employees to be healthy, happy and for us to work well together. And one more goal is that my help to people in business or in life will be useful and inspire them to be strong and not give up. It will be a great fulfillment for me. Receiving feedback that my words helped someone, motivated them to do something and give me more faith that it makes sense and that it is worth spending time and supporting someone.