You took a great idea and turned it into a comfortably profitable business.
You managed to meet all your near-term and medium-term goals.
But what about the long-term? Are you focusing on SURVIVAL or on GROWTH?
The current business climate is ferociously competitive and exceedingly complex. In such a ‘sink or swim’ scenario, a casual attitude to your long-term operations, strategy or execution can be akin to business suicide. In other words, to secure your company’s future, you have to find ways to make it GROW.
Also read: Tuesday Tips: Starting a new business? Read This First !
However, this is easier said than done.
So what are some of the best time-tested ways for a young company to implement a growth-oriented strategy and zoom ahead of its competitors?
Here are our Top 5!
#1: Have a plan
Many entrepreneurs make the mistake of not planning for their company’s future. If you are one of those who think that a great idea is enough to make your company successful/rich/famous – think again!
Entrepreneurs who run companies with a ‘seat-of-the-pants’ approach find themselves floundering to put out short-term fires instead of thinking about long-term strategic planning. Without a good plan, you will be too busy multi-tasking which will leave you with very little bandwidth to focus on future growth strategies like customer acquisition, brand-building and relationship management.
Don’t wing it. Plan it instead!
#2: Innovate
The word ‘innovation’ has been done to death in business circles, academic case studies and even TED talks. But it is still an important concept for the world in general and the business world in particular. Think of how many so-called ‘big’ companies lost customers, market value and reputations because they failed to innovate consistently and over a period of time: Kodak, Nokia, Yahoo, AOL, Blackberry – the list is unfortunately very long. Don’t add to it!
Remember that change is inevitable and without innovation, it can spell disaster for your company.
#3: Get your hiring right
Your people can make or break your organisation.
Hire people that are open to collaboration and working in teams rather than soloists looking for individual glory. Great companies are built by great teams working together to achieve a common goal. Talented individual contributors may make good leaders and even mentors (see next point), but they don’t always make effective team players. Focus on creating and nurturing great talent for the long term rather than on just hiring and on-boarding employees in the short term.
Create a rigorous hiring process to hire the right people and match then to the right job. Don’t skimp on onboarding and on-the-job training. ‘Must have the ability to hit the ground running’ is a desirable competency to have in your employees but don’t make it a necessary requirement for them to do their job. If you do, they won’t be the only ones to suffer – your company will too!
#4: Put a strong leadership team in place
You may be the company’s founder/owner/majority stakeholder, but to grow your company over time, you may have to loosen the strings a little. There’s only so much you – a single person – can do with your limited time so you need to have strong leaders to work alongside you. Understand the difference between ‘leaders’ and ‘managers’. It’s great to have competent managers running your different departments, but without strong leaders, your company will go nowhere and may even sink.
Make sure that everyone is on the same page with respect to the company’s vision, mission and goals. Otherwise, you will have an Apple-like situation on your hands (with growth a distant dream)!
#5: Know your market and customer base
Markets are changing very rapidly and so are your customers. You know what you’re offering but do you understand your market’s realities? Are you still renting out movie DVDs (a la Blockbuster) when everyone is subscribing to a streaming service (a la Netflix) nowadays?
Are you collecting market data and analysing it with the goal to use this data to grow your company?
Why not?!
If you don’t make an effort to know your market and stay relevant, you will miss huge opportunities to get closer to your customers and convince them that you have solutions to address their pain points. Stay on top of market trends and adjust your actions accordingly. Otherwise all your plans and big dreams for marketing, sales, advertising, hiring, training, project management etc will fail.
Which successful strategies have you utilized to grow your own business? Share your story here – inspire others with your wonderful example!
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