[Strategy: Growing a business]
Most businesses have a very poor understanding of strategy and how it impacts on them
move them to the next level. The major difficulty here, in my experience, is that it is often less to do with the technical skill and more to do with the attitude or belief that the person displays. Many businesses rely on making successful tenders in
order to grow the business. I have worked with people who have attended all the right courses, put together good presentations and say the right words and still don’t win the business. How can this be? Confidence is key. Building and maintaining confidence is the one thing that is common to all the work I do – whether I am working with the largest major contractors or with individual owners, I find that at some level confidence has been eroded. My job is often to remind people of just how good they are – and to give them processes which help them to carry that into the future.
4 Results
It may seem self-evident that if you can do everything I have mentioned above then the results will follow. Again, I think this is the wrong way round. At the outset you have to be clear about the results you want from all the work you are about to put into making a significant shift in the business. Napoleon said that ‘to lead is to think ahead’ and there
is no doubt that if you hold a position of leadership, a significant portion of your time has to be spent thinking about where the business is heading. If you are clear about the direction, then there is a good chance you will get there – if you are not clear, then you won’t even know if you have arrived and that will be reflected in your results.
Case study: making it happen
I spent a total of 18 hours working with a small business based in west London that was turning over £1.7m a year. The principal wanted to grow the business by 1.5 times over a two-year period and felt this could be achieved but wasn’t sure exactly how to make it happen. I worked with the principal, defining the outcomes to be achieved and detailing clearly what success would look like. Over the next three months I worked on getting this person to really believe in themselves and the value of the product they were delivering. I also worked on tender presentations with the top team. The result was that by the end of the three months a new tender had been secured which doubled the firm’s turnover to £3.4m. They continued to build on this success until, three years later, they sold the business for £12.5m.
Summer 2010 ECA Today 55
SHUTTERSTOCK
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