TIME TO GROW UP?

Louise Penny said that:

“Life is change. If you aren’t growing and evolving, you’re standing still, and the rest of the world is surging ahead.”

The same applies to business. You might be happy to carry on doing the same old thing, the same old way as you’ve always done, but it’s a fairly sure bet that your competitors (some of them at least) are not. They will be looking for ways to improve, ways to grow. And, in this fast-changing world of ours, your customers will be expecting you to be improving too. So, what do you need to do? Beat your competitors to it!

Many think that they just need to get a coach involved, and that will do the trick. Whilea consultant or coach can be a great help, often their support is more in keeping you on track with the changes youhave identified as needed. They can be a great sounding board, will help you plan the steps you must take, and keep you accountable forachieving those steps. But, often, it’s only those in the business, at the coal-face who can see what improvements need to be made.

Growth is necessarily a collaborative effort — the whole team needs to be involved, as Steve Jobs noted:

So, who needs to be involved?

• The consultant — ideally a CPA or similar (in that they understand the financial statements) — can provide a set of “outside eyes” as I call them. They can identify things you are not doing, or not doing well — things that the course of time has made you blind to. And, of course, they will have an in-depth understanding of your financial statements, which will identify areas to focus on.

• The team on the shop/factory floor can tell you what is not being done efficiently, what is not really working. They can tell you where scheduling of production is causing conflicts, and what stock shortages they experience too often. It’s quite likely they will also be aware of things that could be done in a smarter way, or equipment/systems that would improve your processes.
• Other team members will be able to tell you where things are not going well internally — particularly with regard to internal communications, or adherence to prescribed systems. For example, you may discover that for certain types of products orders are passed on from the sales team lacking sufficient information for them to be fulfilled without much internal tail-chasing.
• The accounting team should also be able to help you understand where the financial statements suggest:
• Opportunities lie — such as improving debt collection to improve the bank balance, while also increasing collection rates (because the longer an amount is owed the lower the likelihood of collection), or
• Obstacles exist, such as too much stock being held, which reduces cash held,and can lead to higher stock obsolescence.

So, how can you help grow your company? I suggest the following (in no particular order):

1. Form a team, as discussed above.
2. Understand the financial statements — look for opportunities to capitalize on, and obstacles to remove and put in place an action plan do these things (complete with tasks assigned and planned completion dates — which are followed up).
3. Drill down in all the data you have, to see what you can find. For example, see what products you are selling for what margin:
4. Does this reflect just a certain type of product or products from a certain supplier?
5. Is there some way to increase the margin on the lower-margin items — or drop them from your offering?
6. Are there alternative products you could be selling ore profitably?
7. Are there complementary products you could cross-sell to, or higher-grade products you could up-sell to?
8. See what you can do to utilize your CRM (customer relationship management) system better. Knowledge is power — the more you know about your customers at a personal level — their likes, and dislikes, interests and families — the more you are able to interest them in growing their relationship with your business. Remember, you want to:
9. Get more customers of the type you want to have,
10. Get them to come back more often, and
11. Get them to spend more when they come.
12. Along with the above plans, develop and implement a plan to find more prospective customers, to improve your conversion rates of prospects to customers, and of quotes to orders.
13. Remember that inflation exists for your customers too — they face cost increases just as you do — so putting your price up will not cost you as much business as you think, possibly none! Put in place a price increase policy — linked to a core raw material, or inflation, or whatever — and stick with it.
14. Talk to your customers (scary thought):
15. What would they like you to change?
16. What issues have they faced in dealing with you?

We all like being listened to, and are more likely to be loyal if we feel like we are heard. Just think of the good PR in that!

1. Look for other ways to build customer loyalty. For example, segment your customers — is there a group you can give special privileges to that will increase your sales, such as an invite-only pre-season showing?
2. Talk to your suppliers (another scary thought). They also will like being heard, and you will need their support if you want to make changes to streamline your logistics.
3. Review your systems:
4. Are they documented?
5. Are they efficient?
6. Does everyone know what they are supposed to be doing?
7. Is the documentation readily accessible to all team members, so they can step in to help when necessary?
8. Talk to your team (scary thought, again):
9. What frustrations do they face in their roles?
10. What improvements can they suggest?