Plan for success

In the latest in a series of articles, Daniel Ronen, director at Portman Business Consultancy, reminds small business owners of the importance of strategic planning to growing their firm.

Working with small business owners and managers over several years, we have identified some of their most common frustrations:

Lack of progress in growing the business
Wanting to take the business to the next level but unsure as to how to do this
Implementing change - creating a plan of action and sticking to it

To add to this, there are often personal frustrations too:

Too much time consumed by the business
Weekends and evenings impinged upon because of business commitments
Friends and family time reduced

Sound familiar? Unfortunately this is all-to-common, although the practical step of creating a strategic plan-of-action can help to ease the way forward and ultimately help business owners create businesses that provide them with a particular lifestyle of choice.

Plans are nothing, planning is everything - and implementation is follow through...

In an era where long-term fixed business plans don't often work for the business that needs to react quickly to market change - plans are still necessary.

Having a focus - a path to follow, however short or long term that plan may be, helps to ensure that a business keeps on the right track.It helps to focus progress and importantly, provide something to measure success and progress against. Plans can be flexible, fixed, changed on a monthly basis - whatever works for your business. But you need a strategic direction.

So how to create your plan?

To start the process of developing a strategic business plan, it is necessary to take a step back and consider your business from a holistic viewpoint. Start by looking at some of the key areas which are often neglected.

What objectives have you set for your business, your financial, personal and strategic goals?
Can your team easily identify who is responsible for what? Are roles clear, and are they aligned with the goals of the business?
How is the business functioning - what processes are in place?
Do you have the right people doing the right things? If you do, are they happy - are your business processes working for them?

Make it possible

1. Run a diagnostic on your business - look at each of the critical functions, assess how they are working and whether there are 'gaps' to fill.
2. You are not on your own, get other people within your business involved. Run team research to assess how the business is working for them. It's incredible how what they say often translates with what the market is saying. And who knows, you may have some hidden 'rainmakers'.
3. Convene times for your senior team members to get together and work on solving the issues identified and start planning for the business future. It is important to share your earlier thoughts and investigations in the relevant areas of the business to help guide the team
4. Be supported in doing this. If you find the process of strategic planning difficult, engage external advisors to help support you and your business as you move forward.

Coming soon in this feature series

- Your elevator speech - nutshell communications

- Business health check - learn how to find out what to focus your efforts on for maximum benefit

- Learn your ABCs - understand how to classify your clients for maximum profit and minimum hassle

- Customer lifetime value - change the way you view your clients

- Perceived Indifference - solve the biggest cause of lost customers