You Can’t Make Progress Until You Tell Yourself the Truth
The Make Progress Report
What if the biggest thing standing between your business and progress isn’t your competition?
What if it’s your unwillingness to face what’s changing?
Look at what’s happening in the pizza business.
Papa Murphy’s parent company recently announced plans to close approximately 45–50 locations. The company operates with a distinctive model: employees prepare the pizza, customers take it home, and customers bake it themselves.
For years, being different helped the brand stand out.
But today’s pizza customer has more choices than ever—and consumers are increasingly selective about where they spend their money.
That’s where today’s progress lesson begins.
Your Business Can Be Good—and Still Need to Change
One of the hardest truths for business leaders to accept is this:
What got you here may not get you there.
Papa Murphy’s still has brand recognition. It still has customers. It still has a differentiated product.
But leadership had to look store by store and ask whether the economics were working.
That’s not failure.
That’s assessment.
And every business leader should be doing the same thing.
Tell Yourself the Truth
Ask yourself:
What has changed in my market that I haven’t responded to yet?
Maybe customers are buying differently.
Maybe your pricing no longer matches perceived value.
Maybe a product that once differentiated you has become less relevant.
Maybe technology has changed customer expectations.
Maybe you’re holding onto a strategy because it worked five years ago—not because the evidence says it’s working today.
Don’t start with what you think.
Look at the evidence.
This Week’s Make Progress Play
Pick one important area of your business and answer four questions:
- Where are we really?
- What does the evidence say?
- What has changed around us?
- What do we need to change because of it?
That’s your mini business audit for the week.
Don’t try to fix everything.
Find one truth, one gap and one move.
Because sometimes progress isn’t about working harder.
Sometimes it’s about having the courage to admit that something that used to work doesn’t work the same anymore.
You can’t make progress until you tell yourself the truth.
Make Progress. Every Day.
