Some businesses move from year to year making small adjustments but never stretch themselves for the big achievements. Other more ambitious businesses, and their leaders, try to find a way to achieve leaps forward that at first sight look too hard or possibly foolhardy. Some succeed and others fail. Without setting ambitious goals, taking calculated risks, implementing careful strategic planning and proactive problem solving along the way, the big leaps are rarely made. I would like to draw an analogy with a group of middle aged mountain bikers that I ride with most weekends, typically covering 12-15 miles on local technical trails. There was a collective desire for a more challenging project to stretch us. Various options for a suitable longer trek were discussed at “team meetings” - aka post-ride drinks at the pub. This compares with business strategy meetings where ideas are floated, discussed, filtered, and prioritised. In January 2018 the … [Read more...]
Brexit – Let’s face it!
With Brexit dominating headlines, the importance of having the best leadership team, who will be able to derive and implement strategy to steer a company or organisation through change and uncertainty is of paramount importance. Deal or no deal will have a significant impact on our entire economy which executives and managers will have to address. No deal will certainly not mean no action required, in fact it most certainly will mean the opposite. The outcome may be viewed as providing significant opportunity and or challenge which will impact on all sectors of the economy and all commercial functionality whether it be sales, marketing, engineering, research. manufacturing, logistics, IT, human resources, finance or legal. Uncertainty must be addressed and not be allowed as an excuse for inaction; contingency planning is necessary. We are fortunate in having a fabulous pool of talent, skills and experience in the UK; a significant proportion of which is currently … [Read more...]
The importance of integrating your systems for business success
It’s very easy to buy software today – gone are the times when you needed to go out and buy a disk and install something. Now you go online looking for a CRM system and, within minutes, you are using one on a free trial, and it works on your desktop, laptop, tablet, phone – anywhere you need it. This ease of access has a couple of effects: first, it’s easy to sign up for something without fully understanding the functionality on offer and, second, there are a lot of people after your monthly subscription, so there is a variable quality of product on offer. In short, it’s a bit of a minefield. Smaller businesses who are not willing or able to implement a modular enterprise system like SAP, Microsoft Dynamics, or one of the larger Sage products, for example, are potentially left with numerous different solutions. These may cover accounting, CRM, e-commerce, order-processing, inventory management, and other specialised business … [Read more...]
>What Drives Your Success?
>Understand your business better and find out how you can shape it for the future. Try our online self assessment now. It's completely free and without any obligation. Once you've answered a few straightforward questions, you'll be able to download a comprehensive report showing your strengths and areas for improvement. Your results remain confidential and will not be shared with any third party. Once you've received your report, one of our accredited business advisers will contact you to answer any questions you might have and to discuss improvement actions.Our Success Driver assessment measures key indicators within your business that are critical to success. Evidence suggests that businesses with strong success drivers are more like to succeed, delivering greater profitability over a more sustainable period. During difficult economic conditions, the success drivers provide a good indicator of a business being ready to react to opportunities presented by an improving market. We … [Read more...]
>What Drives Your Success?
>Understand your business better and find out how you can shape it for the future. Try our online self assessment now. It's completely free and without any obligation. Once you've answered a few straightforward questions, you'll be able to download a comprehensive report showing your strengths and areas for improvement. Your results remain confidential and will not be shared with any third party. Once you've received your report, one of our accredited business advisers will contact you to answer any questions you might have and to discuss improvement actions.Our Success Driver assessment measures key indicators within your business that are critical to success. Evidence suggests that businesses with strong success drivers are more like to succeed, delivering greater profitability over a more sustainable period. During difficult economic conditions, the success drivers provide a good indicator of a business being ready to react to opportunities presented by an improving market. We … [Read more...]
