Hope vs Engineered
This Week@work take full control of your future. Hope alone doesn’t work for 94,6% of companies started, that fail to sell…rather engineer it and become part of the 5.4%
Tag: business strategy
Get it Right from the Start
This Week@Work the reason behind your business often has very little to do with the products and services you supply, it has more to do with what makes your business work.
In a recent discussion with Nick Johnson from Berenzweig Leonard LLP, we go through this and other critical factors to consider when setting up a business. For the full discussion, click here.
Set targets your team can get behind
This Week@Work cold, dry financial targets often do little to instil purpose in your team but by translating these numbers into units of product and delivery, targets become more interesting, and more likely to inspire results.
What does it mean to be a ‘leading business’ in your industry?
In the world of small businesses, defining and achieving industry leadership can be a complex but rewarding goal. This article discusses what it truly means to be a leader in your industry and outlines practical steps to move from a vague vision statement to a measurable and achievable business objective.
What Does It Mean to Be a Leading Business?
Many companies state in their vision or mission that they aim to be the leading business in their industry. However, when pressed to explain what “leading” actually means, business owners often struggle to provide a clear definition. Without a precise and measurable definition of leadership, this goal can become an empty claim.
The Importance of Clarity
To become a true industry leader, a business must first define what leadership means in its specific context. Is it about market share? If so, who constitutes the market? For example, if you are in the business of manufacturing luxury furniture, you need to break down what “luxury furniture” includes. Is it dining room tables, sofas, chairs, or lounges? Understanding your market and product specifics is crucial.
Setting Realistic and Measurable Goals
Let’s say your focus is on luxury dining room tables. The first step is to determine how many such tables are bought annually in your target market. If you identify that 500,000 dining room tables are sold each year in your defined geographic region, you then need to ascertain how many of these qualify as high-quality luxury items. Suppose 5,000 of these meet the high-quality standard. This gives you a tangible target to aim for.
Understanding Market Share
To claim industry leadership, you must know your competitors and their market shares. If you have ten competitors and the market is evenly split, each would sell about 500 tables annually. If your goal is to be the leading supplier, you need to sell more than 500 tables per year. By consistently increasing your sales figures—say from 500 to 600 to 1,000 to 1,500—you can objectively measure your progress towards market leadership.
Enhancing Business Operations
Achieving and maintaining a leading position requires continuous improvement in various aspects of your business. This includes enhancing the quality, price, service, delivery, durability, and brand reputation of your products. By systematically improving these areas, you can increase your market share and solidify your status as an industry leader.
Claiming to be the leading business in your industry is more than just a statement—it requires a clear, measurable, and achievable plan. By defining what leadership means in your specific context, understanding your market, setting realistic goals, and continually improving your business operations, you can move towards becoming a true leader in your industry.
Your business is unlikely to be your retirement pot
94.6% of all businesses started, fail to sell and it’s often because the owner, although brilliant at running the business, doesn’t understand the principles of buying and selling a business.
How to boost your “boring” business.
This Week@Work boring businesses doing brilliant things to attract talent, build brand and bolster their bottom line share lessons for all of us.
Sales needs a system
This Week@Work scaling growth through funding raised a bunch of questions that we should all have answers to. I loved the conversation with you Master Artisan Sourdough Baker Barry Cork and Rick Hooper… and will follow the breadcrumb trails of your certain success.
Unlocking Business Growth: Navigating Stagnation, Stuckness, and Chaos
In the world of business, growth isn’t always a straightforward path. Many business owners, regardless of their experience, encounter three common growth challenges that can leave them feeling frustrated and exhausted. Let’s delve into these challenges and explore strategies for overcoming them.
1. Stagnation: When Growth Hits a Wall
Stagnation in business is like running on a treadmill—you’re expending energy, but you’re not getting anywhere. Business owners often attribute this to external factors, like market conditions or economic fluctuations. However, it’s crucial to recognize that stagnant growth often reflects an inward-looking, passive approach.
The solution? Start by re-evaluating your business mindset. Instead of dwelling on external factors, shift your focus to what you can control. Embrace change, be proactive, and actively seek out growth opportunities. Blaming external factors won’t drive progress, but a change in attitude and approach can.
2. Stuck Growth: Spinning Your Wheels
Stuck growth is akin to trying to move a car out of the mud—you’re putting in effort, but the wheels keep spinning. In this scenario, your business might be making deliberate efforts to expand, but the outcomes remain disappointing.
To break free from this situation, it’s necessary to reconsider your approach and actions. Understand that what worked in the past may no longer be effective in the current business landscape. Re-evaluate your strategies, investments, and operations. Seek expert guidance if required. Don’t persist with the same methods if they’re not yielding results.
3. Chaotic Growth: Thriving Amid Turbulence
Chaotic growth can be both exhilarating and overwhelming. Your business is expanding, but it feels like you’re constantly putting out fires. Daily operations become increasingly complex, and you’re pulled in every direction.
To regain control during chaotic growth, focus on establishing a robust foundation. Reorganize your business structure and operational processes. Simplify workflows, delegate responsibilities, and introduce systems that can handle growth efficiently. Building a structured foundation will prevent you from getting bogged down by the daily whirlwind.
Regardless of the growth challenge you’re facing, it all begins with a shift in attitude and approach. Recognize that your business and the business environment are in a constant state of evolution. What worked in the past might not be effective today. Embrace change, take control of your business’s destiny, and adapt to the evolving landscape.
In the words of Thomas Edison, “Opportunity is missed by most people because it is dressed in overalls and looks like work.” Don’t let these challenges deter you; instead, view them as opportunities to evolve and thrive in the ever-changing business world. Unlock your business’s growth potential by adopting the right mindset and strategies.
To listen to the full discussion from the show:
BUSINESS LEADER: Rituals, routines, habits: The blueprint for transforming your business growth
In this article, first published in Business Leader, Pavlo shares Rituals, Routines, and Habits: The Blueprint for Transforming Your Business Growth.
Once your business has achieved a ceiling of performance, how you invest your time and attention determines your future success. To understand how we invest our time and attention, we can look at the habits that drive us, consciously and unconsciously, every day. Our habits form behaviours that manifest both good and bad outcomes.
Habits form when you do something that makes you feel good and can be initial and ongoing. Here’s an example of each.
A cigarette makes you feel good when you light and drag on it. You might feel awful after, and swear to stop smoking, but you won’t and don’t. I’ve observed this as a non-smoker for years. So why did you start smoking in the first place? Was it to be cool or fit in?
Whatever it may have been, you likely developed a habit around it – a morning and evening smoke or when things get rough in life. Mostly, you don’t even think about it. You light up and draw, reminding yourself that you are going to die one day or promise yourself you’re going to give up next week.
A good habit might be brushing your teeth twice a day. Don’t do it and feel uncomfortable. Do it, and you feel virtuous, clean, and fresh. You likely do it now without even thinking. It’s a habit.
Both are mainly unconscious. You do both whilst thinking or doing other things. And yet, these acts bear consequences. They shape your future despite your aspirations and intentions.
What does this have to do with business growth?
Upon reaching a certain level of business performance, your time and attention, more than money, skills, strategy, and advice, are the greatest determinants of future growth.
Understanding what guides your time and attention becomes the most critical insight into your company’s future and leadership imperative.
There are primarily 3 drivers:
Rituals
These are considered actions and behaviours intended to yield a clearly defined outcome. For example, 20 min of exercise, followed by 10 minutes of meditation first thing every morning. It is deliberate, purposeful, and practised.
Routines
Patterns of behaviour set by circumstances. For example, a weekly routine that sees you go to work differs from a weekend routine that does not. In each case, the routine is governed by the day’s or event’s logistics and requirements.
Habits
Both routines and rituals can become habits. A ritual that becomes a habit loses its purpose since rituals are meant to be intentional and purposeful, requiring conscious, practised presence. Routines lead to habits more often. But habits also form based on past behaviours, responses, practices, and circumstances. It makes them the hardest to see, understand and change and skews your ability to evaluate how you invest your time and attention.
As a business grows from one level to the next, fundamental changes are needed to support the growth. How you lead, manage, and behave as a business owner in a company generating £5m annual revenues is fundamentally different to what is needed for a company generating threefold that. And to get a company from there to that future revenue requires different routines and habits to those that got you there in the first place.
So, can you change your habits to enable this growth?
Popular culture says yes. Identify the habit, understand the trigger, replace it with better behaviour, reward yourself each time and after 21 or 33 and ¾ days, a new habit is formed.
I don’t buy it. Many business owners backslide from leading growth into operating the business. What’s needed is more than willpower and six steps to success in habit formation.
By creating a monthly ritual that holds you accountable to your intentions and goals, using a trusted observer who asks the right questions, challenging and debating your answers, and using data and evidence to maintain clarity and truth, the likelihood that you will always practice the right habits for the right time is greatly enhanced. Consciously investing time and attention to growth, rather than having time and attention absorbed by old habits, is the key to unlocking your full potential in life and business.
Embracing Relentless Uncertainty: A Business Owner’s Guide to Thriving in Chaos
In the fast-paced and ever-changing landscape of today’s world, uncertainty has become an inevitable part of life, especially for businesses. The overwhelming influx of variables and challenges can leave even the most experienced entrepreneurs feeling stuck and unsure of their next move. However, there are tactics that can empower you to navigate through uncertainty, seize opportunities, and drive your business forward with confidence and vigor.
In a recent podcast of The Money Show, Pavlo Phitidis explored some essential strategies that can help you embrace and conquer relentless uncertainty.
1. Drip Feed Your Psychic Energy
To combat the mental exhaustion caused by a barrage of uncertainties, learn to draw inspiration and energy from both your past successes and your vision of the future. Reflect on your past achievements to boost your self-confidence and envision a successful future to fuel your motivation. This balance will help you maintain your focus and determination amidst the chaos.
2. Simplify and Group Variables
Facing a multitude of variables simultaneously can lead to a chaotic and overwhelming experience. Instead, simplify the complexity by grouping related variables together. Categorize challenges into themes such as customer issues, capacity problems, and supplier concerns. This organization allows you to tackle each group with a clearer, more effective approach.
3. Visualize and Shape the Challenge
Visualization is a powerful tool for comprehending intricate challenges. Grab a whiteboard or a piece of paper and visually map out all the moving parts and variables involved. This process will help you identify the significant issues rather than getting lost in a sea of minor problems.
4. Break It Down Into Steps
When confronted with an overwhelming challenge, break it down into actionable steps. Focus on the first step and the desired outcome, leading to the second step and it’s outcome, and so on. This approach allows you to test the waters without risking everything upfront. However, be cautious not to abandon an idea prematurely, as some endeavors may take time to gain traction and show results.
5. Envision Multiple Scenarios
The future is uncertain, but that doesn’t mean you can’t prepare for it. Envision various scenarios, both favorable and unfavorable, to understand potential outcomes and associated risks. This foresight enables you to be proactive and make informed decisions based on the situation at hand.
6. Rely on Data to Objectify
Data is an invaluable asset in navigating uncertainty. Analyze what can be measured and what is tangible. While it may not be feasible to quantify everything, leveraging data can provide invaluable insights and clarity during critical decision-making processes.
7. Get It Out of Your Head
When grappling with complex challenges, avoid keeping everything confined to your thoughts. Talk it through with a trusted colleague, mentor, or even write it down. Hearing yourself or reading your thoughts aloud can shed new light on the quality of your thinking and uncover new perspectives.
8. Seek the Right Guidance
Consult with experienced individuals who have faced similar challenges. Remember, expertise is not solely measured by time, but also by the depth of learning from mistakes and experiences. Engaging in discussions with the right people can provide you with invaluable advice and insights to make more informed choices.
9. Embrace Decisiveness
In an uncertain world, decisive action is a game-changer. Embrace the unpredictability and recognize that taking a stance is essential. Choose a path, and once decided, act deliberately and boldly. Your courage and conviction will set you apart from competitors, enabling you to shape the market rather than reacting to it.
Embrace the chaos, and by doing so, you will not only survive but thrive, becoming a driving force in reshaping your industry and creating a brighter future for your business.