Business leaders are challenged daily by the fundamentals of strategy, structure and process.

I have examined these three key segments of a strong business plan and scrutinized the dimensions which drive them. My goal for preparing this post (about developing a healthy, sustainable business) was to keep the solutions simple, tangible and *SMART. Here are my five top tips for focus and attention which might just shape a change for the better in your working routine:-

1. My first tip is to get on top of your Time management: A strong business should apply the right amount of activity to Strategy, Revenue stream and Admin, and a robust business plan should specify exactly how much emphasis and time should be placed on each segment. Have you determined yours?

In the age of the smart phone and other media devices, it is easy to allow routine distractions to affect your workload and business activity. Getting into the mindset of your business drivers will help you to reshape your routine more positively.

My own business plan specifies that 60% of my time should be spent on revenue stream, 30% on strategy and 10% on admin, and I am now extolling the virtues of this on my training days.

2. Define your sales model. Let’s be clear about this: a true sales model looks holistically at the 5Ps: Product, Presentation, Promotion, Price, People. In my experience most businesses place a bias towards two or three of these areas at the expense of the rest. Looking at all five in depth will help you stay grounded, current and focused. Get it right, and you will earn the praise of your team and the respect of your peers because this will become naturally noticeable in your marketplace. More importantly your customers will refer new business to you by recommendation. This is just the tip of the iceberg on this subject, so for more information and some tangible solutions to getting your Sales training “on point,” please feel free to email your needs to: info@williams.coach 

3. Referral relationships When examining a customer’s journey with your business, there will be none more satisfying, both culturally and commercially, than those who came by recommendation. Therefore you will be missing a trick if you don’t identify for your tool kit, a critical path to developing referral relationships. (Imagine the cost savings on advertising and time as just two of the many benefits). See my recent post on effective networking for more insight into just one of the ways you can add value to this area of your business.

4. Know your position. Do you know where your company stands in comparison to your peers? Are you confident you have a handle on your price point and service standards? Knowing where you fit helps you to position everything you do, be it brand related, the tone of voice in your marketing “speak” or the quality and manufacturing of your product and its offering.

There is a simple exercise I can recommend to you which will help you to position your company properly. Please get in touch or email: info@williams.coach

5. Communication. The key to the success of any business has to be built on good communication. Utilising the most important communication skill, listening, business leaders can gain tangible benefit to the way they write their strategic business plans in the first place. Listen to your customers, who after all, are vital to delivering a healthy bottom line. More importantly, listen to your workforce. Those at the “coal face” of your business know all about the nuts and bolts of it and you can miss so much when you aren’t asking the right questions. These people are the lifeblood of your business. Their welfare and job satisfaction is in the hands of those who manage them. Do you have a workable solution to your people development? Whether it is a course in leadership skills your team need or some one to one coaching for individual managers, I have developed some very useful material which can be tailor made to suit your company and specific requirements.

Please get in touch if I can help you to enhance your business plan in any or all of the above categories. info@williams.coach

 

I do hope that you found this post useful and thanks for reading.

* SMART = Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Realistic and Timebound