It’s the boss’s job to create change. The boss might be the marketing professional who’s in charge of a department or an account, the CEO or other senior officer who is heavily involved in marketing, or the business owner whose marketing efforts could spell success or failure for his or her company.

Why the boss? Because the boss can sense when something needs changed. It’s stale. It feels like the 50th snowfall of the season.

It’s poor sales. Downward trends. It’s everyone talking excitedly about your competitor.

You may know changes need to be made. But sometimes, Ms. or Mr. Boss-Business Owner-Marketing Director, you get a tiny bit lazy. Or you get that disease that makes a little voice in your head say:

“This time… this time… somebody else needs to get off their butt and come up with a solution — and implement it. Impress me. Get it done!”

I mean, after all, you’ve been the one to do it all those times in the past, right? It just can’t be your job to create and implement a major change and save the company’s bacon every time — can it?

Well, as a matter of fact, it is your job to create change. Creating change — changing focus, desire levels, preferences and buying habits of potential customers — is at the very core of marketing.

Your work (that is, your marketing campaigns) usually involves changing to new ads…changing looks, sounds, words… maybe even changing brands and logos.

Now, let’s face it, change is hard. And who wants to do it again if you’ve already done it before? Even if you had a good result, chances are it was a tough process.

So when you sense a change is needed, you’re not happy about it. You know it’s going to be a lot of work. But you also know it must be done, and you must do it. You have the view from 50,000 feet. You are engaged, clued-in and experienced. You are the best woman or man for the job.

I’ll bet you wish someone would just tell you exactly how you should change your message/image/position/offer, don’t you? But sorry, no one can tell you — except you.

Sure, you use research and input from customers and staff— but it’s you who makes the decision and recommendation.

Don’t shy away.

Jump in.

The answer will come, because the answer is there. You just have to uncover it.

Yes, it’s difficult. You may be facing an issue or a problem that perhaps no one else you know or have heard of has had to face.

But consider the words of author Brian Tracy: “Your decision to be, have and do something out of the ordinary entails facing difficulties that are out of ordinary as well. Sometimes your greatest asset is simply your ability to stay with it longer than anyone else.”

So what’s your approach? Go for it. Take a leap. Focus on the process.

In The Peaceful Warrior, Dan Millman writes:

“The secret of change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the old, but on building the new.”

What did he mean? He meant forget the current system. Focus on something completely new. You must leave first base to get to second.

Once that “lucky strike” hits, do one more thing: sell it to your staff first. Sell — don’t just decree. Your employees need to be believers if they’re going to make believers out of customers.

Remember, if you need change, you — the boss — are the one that must create that change.