Tag: business strategies

LOOKING FOR TIPS ON GETTING TEAMS TO HELP INNOVATE AND IMPROVE YOUR BUSINESS?

Here are two of my strategies I use to help teams innovate to turn the business around or take it to the next level.

Staff and customers are fantastic sources for ideas on what to improve, yet many businesses don’t tap into these gold mines well.

1. Permission to fail.

When encouraging staff to suggest and try better ways to do things (that are not life threatening or financially crippling), make sure you give them permission to fail.

“Try it, if it doesn’t work, change it or try something else.”

It’s that simple. No big deal. Encourage your team to try new ideas they have.

The culture has to be one of giving permission to try.

I see so many teams frustrated and demotivated because they can’t implement their ideas. It is common to see morale turn 180 as soon as the team feel listened to and able to suggest ideas.

2. Ask customers for suggestions.

The trick here is to appreciate they can have a fixed opinion of what you can do.

They have put you in a ‘box’. Therefore you need to encourage them to think outside the ‘box’.

I will literally say something like, “if anything was possible, what features would you really love to see?”

Encourage them to forget what they believe you can offer, and to talk about what they would really love to have. Sure, some ideas will not be practical, realistic or feasible but in my experience, there is always at least one good idea that helps improve the business.

If they seem a bit stuck for ideas, ask them if there is anything your competitor does really well that they like.

3 Keys to Effective Meetings to Help Turn Your Business Around

I’ve facilitated over 15 meetings with clients in the past couple weeks, and hundreds more with all the businesses I’ve worked with over the years and there is a trend.

Businesses that are NOT achieving their profit targets or have productivity issues, are not having meetings.

And I mean ‘effective meetings’.


When I ask why a business isn’t having meetings, the two common reasons are: they take too long and they don’t work.


If you have this belief and are looking to turn your business around, here are my tips for effective meetings:


> Set an agenda/checklist of topics. You may or may not need this and it can be the same checklist every month so you don’t have to rewrite it. But it can help add certainty to the team. No one is wondering if their question/issue is going to get raised etc. And can keep you on track and prevent you missing important bits. If you, as the boss, don’t discuss it, then the team will assume it isn’t important, and you can’t blame them for not taking it seriously either. Note my points below to add weight to what you think is important.


> Focus on outcomes and what needs to be done. It is quite natural for everyone to want to explain the background or talk around the subject, and about the people involved. It’s human nature. However in order to keep your meetings short and sharp and prevent people from blaming meetings for taking too long, you need to encourage the habit of allowing just a couple sentences on the issue, decide if it needs fixing and then just go straight to the outcome you want and what needs to be done to get it. Short a sharp. Issue is raised, “great, what do we need to do about it? Who’s going to do it? When do we need it done by?” Bang, done. Next topic.

> Make sure you write down and clarify:

  • What needs to be done – outcome needed, what it looks like, how you will know it’s done
  • Who’s going to do it – check the person is comfortable doing it, knows how to do it or needs some support/help/equipment/training
  • When does it need to be done by?
  • Give permission to get it wrong. New procedures may not work and that is ok. You don’t want people fearing taking action to improve things.

The above prevent staff losing faith in meetings because they ‘don’t work’.

Communication breakdown is a major reason businesses fail. Effective meetings are essential.

Contact me if you need help identifying the kind of meetings you need or to facilitate the first few to coach everyone on how to have effective meetings.

Business Turnaround Example – Manufacturing

Turning a business around doesn’t have to take a long time, or a lot of hard effort. In fact it can be quite quick and easy.

I rarely need to work with a business more than three months to turn things around.

A common example I come across in the manufacturing sector is a business that has a good product and the owner has been doing it for 20+ years, but the profits just aren’t there anymore. Staff are the biggest headache. The next headache is sales. I’ve had many that are ready to close the doors they are so ‘over it’.

The top reasons I see for these headaches are:

  1. Poor hiring processes so less than ideal people are taken on.
  2. Poor induction and training processes so the less-than-ideal people (or even the good people) are not effective or are kept too long. The business runs for too long with the wrong people. Staff are like the wheels on the business vehicle. Wrong wheels and it is a bumpy, draining and even dangerous ride!
  3. Poor management with a lack of clarity on KPI’s and lack of proper enforcement of KPIs.
  4. Too many staff operating by unwritten ground rules rather than the desired rules. In other words they have figured out what they can get away with and keep doing it. This doesn’t mean they are ‘evil’ or have malicious intent. It is human nature to figure out what ‘works’ and staff just do what the others do and what appears to be ‘acceptable’.
  5. Vision, mission, values, benchmarks, and processes are hidden, assumed, imagined – they need to be visible and documented and regularly referenced.
  6. Sales headaches can be due to many things, and are often due to failing to change fast enough with changing customer demands, inadequate business development strategies, inadequate communication of benefits, poor product selection, and incorrect pricing.

The solution that I find works, is quite simple and consists of:

  • Confirming the vision and values of the business.
  • Communicating this with the team and making it visible.
  • Staff interviews to get their take on what needs improving and their career goals.
  • Regroup as a team and go through the improvement suggestions and immediately start implementing changes.
  • Implementation of a good hiring, interviewing and training program.
  • Coaching and training on leadership for the business owner and managers.
  • Making the ‘invisible visible’. Too many businesses hide processes, KPIs, vision statements, values. These need to be visible.

Time to see improvements is often within a week and even the same day I hold meetings with staff. To implement priority improvements is usually a one to three month process and in some cases the changes continue happening well beyond this period – which is what you want. You want your team to be continually improving things. Better to be green and growing rather than ripe and rotting!

If this sounds like something you’d like to explore or if you have questions on whether it would work in your business, I’m more than happy to come and meet with you and hear about your issues and how things are run. From this chat I can confirm if I can help and what the process would be.

Give me a call (0400 520 471) or contact via this contact form.

 

CLEAR Business Development Steps – Part 2

Part 2 in the CLEAR business development planning system is ‘L’ – what are your target Customers (identified in Part 1) looking for?

Not what you want to sell them, what do THEY want to buy? And why? Successful business development requires us to regularly walk in our customer’s shoes and appreciate what they are looking for. Part 2 helps us check-in, reflect and counter our bias wanting to sell what we have and what we believe they need.

LOOKING FOR?

What are your target Customers, that you have decided you want, looking for throughout their journey in searching, assessing, buying, and using your product/service?

You want to create raving fans because word of mouth is by far the cheapest and most common lead generator in any kind of business.

What are your Customers looking for specifically?

Not just shallow stuff, I mean the deep and meaningful stuff. The emotions of using or buying your product/service, the core drivers such as pain points they are wanting to eliminate. And any new innovations or trends they might be aware of. The clearer you are on this the more your message and marketing actions will hit the right buttons. Leads and conversions will increase.

How to Identify What the Customer is Looking for?

To succeed in business development you MUST be in-tune with your Customers needs. And it’s an ongoing process. You never stop seeking to understand your customers.

The fisherman that doesn’t pay attention to the lack of bites, change in preference of bait and where the fish are moving to doesn’t eat!

Here’s a reminder of some of the ways you can confirm what your customers are looking for and I can help you identify suitable strategies and the format:

  • Brainstorm ideas on a whiteboard with the team, especially those talking to your Customers a lot. Segment your Customer’s experience down into it’s stages and list the things they are looking for in each stage – and review if you are providing them.
  • Ask them when next speaking with them. Can be a casual question or more detailed discussion over coffee, lunch or brainstorming session with their team.
  • Suggestion box on your counter – make sure staff encourage Customers to fill out the form and keep the form really simple.
  • Online survey or post purchase survey. Keep them short! No more than 5 questions. It is important to design your surveys well otherwise they won’t tell you anything useful. I can help you if you need.
  • Testimonials – notice what your customers say they liked! This is gold and gives you great insight to what they valued. Make sure you weave this into your marketing copy.
  • Read. make sure you stay up to date with your industry and where it’s going. Subscribe to online forums, newsletters etc. Take note of what the trends are overseas because this can give you a competitive advantage if you are one of the first to introduce a new feature/service/product here in Australia.
  • Attend conferences, tradeshows etc.

Make a list.

Then make sure you are covering these features/feelings/benefits in your marketing material, website, emails, conversations, POP displays, newsletters etc.

WOW FACTOR – where’s the WOW?

To create raving fans that work for you as your marketers and sales team, you need a wow factor. It’s not hard! Or expensive. Often just the simple little touches add the wow factor. I was standing in line for Christmas and a shop assistant was handing out bottles of water – not expensive but was a welcome jesture and made me feel significant as the customers. Remember one of the six core needs we all have is to feel ‘significant’. I love the fact with Uber I don’t have to pay cash or take a card out of my wallet and go through that process of tapping, waiting for the machine to connect and approve payment, waiting for the taxi driver to print his receipt and then print mine.

What can you do to add some wow? Something worth talking about?

Knowing what your Customers are looking for will help you identify a wow factor. Is it an easier way to purchase, a thank you note/gift, a follow up call, an easier delivery system, a simplified booking system, better labeling, better presentation, better Customer service…?

January is a great time to touch base with Customers and ask them what they’d like to see you provide in 2017, or what they’d like improved. The trick here is to encourage them to suggest anything, regardless of what they think your limitations are. Customers have a preconceived idea of what you can provide…right or wrong.

If you need help coming up with a wow factor, let me know.

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So there you go. Steps C and L in the CLEAR business development planning strategy.

Identify your Customer and identify what they are looking for and make sure you are not just meeting but exceeding their expectations. And make sure you are covering what they are looking for in your marketing.

Next step is Earnings. What you want to Earn and how. I’ll cover that in Part 3.