Blog Archives

June 25th, 2014

6/25/2014

Building Business Stamina
Planning long-term success

A well planned business has the potential of immortality. It could serve and outlive generations of owners, managers, employees and customers.

Building bigger and faster may burn you out.

What then are the factors for business growth and success?

There has to be a focus on building deeper. The business needs to continually innovate and adapt to changes in the market. Always ask these two questions:

1. What is my competitive advantage?

2. How can I sustain competitive advantage?

Know How To Innovate

History teaches us that the current fossil coal economy actually started with the Iron Age when humans burned coal to turn iron ore into metal. Today through innovation we are able to build steel and glass city towers but, from very much the same chemical-technology.

The winds of change in science may now shift our source of energy towards carbon energy from photosynthesis. A business focused on such cutting edge thinking may just create the next energy corporate giant from using plants to fuel an economic boom in bio-technology.

Adapt Or Die

Survival of the most adaptable is a natural principle for continual business success.

We all have the capacity to start and grow a business. The challenge is in being able to sustain the business by shifting from owner-operator to owner-leader.

Create a management system that supports business leaders, managers and employees in achieving personal goals of good quality living. This will encourage them to contribute innovative ideas to the business and to help in succession planning. This also encourages former owners and employees to continue supporting the business by becoming advocates in the communities they live in.

Creating sustained competitiveness requires a culture that values thinking time. This may appear to take people away from work but remember, a stimulated mind can refresh the body.

Stimulate Discussions

A good way to create thinking time is to invite outside consultants to stimulate discussions by introducing fresh ideas and knowledge. This can continue to encourage innovative thinking long after the consultant has left.

For the business to benefit, create feedback channels within your management systems to channel innovative ideas to the top leadership and senior management.

The key to continual business growth lies in the ability to act on market knowledge in a timely manner. Having the right ideas to make the right decisions is critical for long term business success.

Siddha Param
International Business Consultant
Reboot your business plan for sustained high growth.

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June 18th, 2014

6/18/2014

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Achieving Biz High Growth
A sustainable action plan

A Business driven by a passion to excel creates opportunities for high growth.

Real World Planning
A business needs to focus on achieving goals that are profitable for:
1. The organization; and,
2. The individuals involved in performing the necessary work.

Sharing the success of the business with the people who contributed to the success of the business encourages continued individual commitment that leads to sustained success.

Hire qualified and competent individuals to produce quality in a timely manner. Training and guidance should be adopted to ensure the full potential of the individual is utilized for maximum performance. It is important to invest in continual skills. This ensures responsiveness to changes in the market.

There is a learning curve that determines how fast you and your team can learn, adapt and respond to changes in the business environment. Be aware of this when planning for skills upgrades.

The Passion that drives you
For longer term success and high growth it is essential that you identify what drives you to perform the repeated actions that lead to achieving goals. Once you know you strengths you can build on them through continual learning, advice and practice.

Leverage on your strengths. Identify areas where you need specialist support. Hire the best individuals possible to provide quality services.

Many hands make light work. A team of specialist in the different areas of business working towards achieving an identified business goal leads towards success.

Encourage every team member to contribute their knowledge, skills, personalities and experiences to the team objectives. This can turn a good idea into in series of well executed actions that lead towards the set goal.

Achieve Ambitions through practical action.
You need to understand the strengths inherent in your business. Identify your organization’s capabilities and capacity to deliver to customers. Maximize the utilization of your resources to get maximum benefit from your investments.

Identify the market niche that you have the capacity to satisfy consistently. Plan a marketing strategy that enables you to reach the most number of customers within you niche. The big fish in the pond gets noticed.

Celebrating the local hero image can put a spot light on your business in a way that gets you noticed in the wider market through publicity. Promote your local success story in similar niche markets in other communities allowing for exponential growth in market opportunities.

Make sure you are in a position to build up capacity quickly enough to deliver quality in a timely manner should sales increase rapidly.

Continual high growth demands that we continue to deliver satisfaction to customers even as we expand the business. This is best achieved with periodic objective analysis and advice from independent consultants.

Siddha Param
International Business Consultant
Reboot your business plan for sustained high growth.

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June 11th, 2014

6/11/2014

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Creating High Growth Opportunities
The market responsive organization

Build Business Communities
Working with a business community to provide a variety of products and services can increase your visibility in the market. A cluster of businesses promoting a venue as a “go to” location for a variety of products and services can increase customer traffic for individual businesses.

This is why businesses in a particular community should explore the idea of promoting venues where customers can find them.

Farmers markets and departmental stores perform the function of bringing together a variety of products into a specific location to create a one-stop shopping area. Trade fairs too work on the same concept. Promotions and marketing cost can be shared.

These days virtual malls and on-line directories are increasingly playing a similar role of being one-stop virtual venues for customers to find businesses.

Create Warm Contacts
People prefer to do business with people they are familiar with. They need to know your background and your capacity to deliver quality in a timely manner. Being a part of a social community beyond the business environment can further increase your visibility and allow people to get to know you.

Get active in community organizations or specific projects. Beyond the immediate personal fulfilment there is the added benefit of being recognized as a caring individual. This transforms prospective customers in the community into warm contacts making it easier to develop a business relationship.

Identify potential prospects and enquire if they need your services. Spend time researching their needs. You can then invite them for personalized product demonstration sessions.

Social Media and Physical Venues
Reach out and introduce yourself and your offerings to your social media contacts. Work towards converting virtual contacts into physical meetings. Have a familiar venue where prospects can meet you.

Encourage virtual contacts to meet you at your regular physical venue. It gives them an opportunity to place you in the context of a business community.

A business venue acts as a convenient location outside of an office environment. This encourages building of business relations in a relaxed atmosphere. There will also be less opportunity for distraction from office work.

All these actions conducted in systematic and consistent manner creates opportunities for you to understand your market. It also allows you to get feedback on your business offerings and the changing demands of customers.

Market knowledge is an essential ingredient for continual business high growth.

Siddha Param
International Business Consultant
Reboot your business plan for sustained high growth.

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June 05th, 2014

6/5/2014

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Multiplying Actions for Higher Growth
Your stakeholders - your team members

High growth business leaders always leverage all the resources at their disposal to multiply the results of their action plan. An effective way of doing this is to reach out and show your stakeholders you care about them. People you care about will show their appreciation by going the extra mile to help you succeed with your plans.

Stakeholder Team Members
Remember that your stakeholders who include customers, staff, suppliers, investors and the larger community are motivated by leaders who show they care for their wellbeing. Your stakeholders are your team members. Make them feel they are important contributors to the success of the business by communicating your action plan. Get feedback and show appreciation for their contributions. Encourage a buy-in of your vision. This encourages alignment of goals by stakeholders with your plan.

High Growth Leaders Respect People
High growth leaders get to know the human individuals who are part of the stakeholder team. This means getting to know individual employees at all levels of the business from the directors to managers all the way to staff at the operational level. Get feedback from your receptionist. This person is very often the first person a visitor meets.

If services or functions are out-sourced high growth leaders will get to know the human individuals involved in the task. A supplier is not just an organization. The individuals carrying out tasks have a story to tell about their successes. High growth leaders will spend time getting to know their stories.

Customers too have a story to tell about their experiences with a product or service. High growth leaders know these stories are the true measure of the success or failure of the offering. Positive customer experiences are the best testimonials. They show that the high growth leader has got it
right translating a vision into actionable goals that touched lives in a positive way.

High Growth through Stakeholder Investment
High growth leaders seek out and encourage investors to finance the business by selling a business vision. This can be done through a business plan that explains practical steps for creating a supply chain from ideas to decisions to suppliers to operations that deliver satisfaction to paying
customers.

A sustainable supply chain that generates healthy long term return on investments is built on the numerous actions of human individuals. The story of how wheat from the fields of the prairies of Canada is harvested, shipped, processed, sold and resold to ultimately be turned into loaves of bread at local bakeries worldwide for breakfast in places like Singapore, Vancouver or Boston is a fascinating one of thousands of people across the supply chain.

A high growth leader of a successful bakery will go that extra mile to reach out to individuals from farmers to truckers to show they care for their well-being.

Loyal customers love to support and promote a bakery that shows it cares for people. This is the best guarantee for continual delivery of quality that leads to business high growth and success.

Siddha Param
International Business Consultant
Reboot your business plan for sustained high growth.

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