gains in one or both of the other areas, can be confronting for any of them. This may be the first time they have been encouraged to think about these other options, as part of their overall vision for the business future. The intent becomes even more pronounced when they discuss the trade-off with a business partner and/or spouse.
People understand that with the scarcity of resources, they could not achieve increases in all three areas of their business operations within a ten month period, unless they employed several full-time consultants. They would also need to be willing to entertain an extended period of turbulence, as the business is dissected and re-built from different directions.
From the very beginning of the change journey, the business owner should feel confronted by their own personal goals and making these congruent with their business goals. The goal-setting process (for personal or business applications) will almost always start with the vision and include a mission and a stated set of values. These personal VMVs are then measured against the business VMVs to ensure congruence. If there is a difference (and there usually is) this is the first change requirement that we would work on, in their business model.
The underlying messages and themes that we are going to share with you in this book are packaged and presented in understandable and implementable nuggets. The intent is to deliver each of these practical and proven business concepts in “bite-sized pieces” for you to recognise, understand, implement and measure, before returning for another. Some of the core concepts we need to embed within our business practice, include:
We need to measure everything we do, so that we can improve it
We need to focus on one area at a time and not change too much at once
We need to make incremental changes not massive changes
We need to implement strategies that will ensure we are not working in the business
We need to structure the operations which will make our business most attractive to buyers and will deliver us the highest value at sale
We need to Increase our margins by adjusting our profit drivers (so the value increase is less about pricing), and
We focus on fixed and variable costs, supplies, channels and potential partnerships, to enhance and extend our outcome-activity ratio.
What Can Go Wrong?
In most cases, business owners have had some exposure to business consulting or coaching, with little or mixed results. In a lot of cases, this may have less to do with the programs and more to do with the turbulence or confusion it can create in an uncontrolled change interval.
The temptation (particularly when you have just acquired a business) is to make a list of changes you would like to implement and then rush into changing them all at once. The result for most businesses is turbulence. Employees do not perform at their peak if everything around them is being changed, including the rules they work by and the accountabilities with which they are measured.
The three key principals for managing organisational or operational change in any organisation is (1) To keep change to minor, incremental changes over time, changing one area at a time if possible, (2) To have a change interval, followed by a period of consolidation (to embed the changes), before looking to implement another change interval, and (3) Communicate the intent to all team members and explain what outcomes you are trying to achieve. These three simple rules will help your changes to be received positively and to become standard operational procedures within a much shorter time.
Once you have set up your structure and prepared your growth and change program, you are ready to build your racing business vehicle to be competitive in the races you enter and ultimately, to be dominant in your industry.
What Happens When your Business Accelerates?
This book is presented as an easy-to-read operators guide for small high-growth businesses, but as you continue to understand the process, you will begin to see this as far more. Once you have completed a diagnostic review of your current business, ensured the processes are documented, the kinks ironed out, the tweaks implemented and the improvements measured and proven, you will find that your own role will transition from operator, to driver, to owner and later to the entrepreneur. At present, you might be working hard in your business and looking for a way to reduce your working hours without reducing your income.
One of the most common first reactions that business owners have to the suggestion that they need to be out of their business, is “My business can’t do without me.” This is all too common thinking, for managers as well as the thinking some business owners have for key personnel. In most cases, there is no foundation to this thinking.
In August of 2011, Apple announced that their charismatic leader and chief innovator was stepping down for health reasons. Analysts predicted a share price plunge, from its then present position of $368. As we know, Steve Jobs died a month or two later but some 12 months after his death, the shares were trading at $624. If such a pivotal key person can make such a small difference in his exit, in one of the largest companies in the world, what impact do you really think your exit would have?
The longer-term objective for us as authors and management consultants is to have you hone the skills of assessing, buying, building and either selling businesses or building a portfolio of cashflow businesses that can provide you with far greater returns than property or equities in publically listed mature companies.
Somewhere along this continuum you are going to choose to stop your journey and this could become your “comfort-zone” for months, years or even decades. We are hoping you revisit this book when you become restless and continue your journey to entrepreneur and develop your E-factor to the point where you collect cashflow companies like properties in a game of monopoly.
CHAPTER 2
‘THE DREAM’ – VISION, MISSION, AND VALUES
Vision, mission, and values are the foundation on which great efforts in organisation are built. Whether in the competitive arena of the racetrack, on the fast-paced business racetrack or some other human group effort, these three elements are critical in driving your collective resources towards a successful outcome.
It is all too commonly the case that owners and managers of small to medium enterprises (SME’s) dismiss the significance of vision, mission, and values as mere ‘fluff’ when considering the future plans of their organisation. Seldom in fact do we find an appropriate level of focus and commitment directed towards these things when embarking on a commercial venture and this may be one of the key factors in the low level of success in the world of the SME. After all, it is difficult to succeed on a journey for which there is no clear destination (vision), no stated ‘reason to be’ (Mission), and no set of rules to govern behaviour and decisions (values).
Each of these form an integral to the success of any business or group effort whether or not they are boldly and formerly stated or subtly communicated and understood through commitment to action.
All great journeys, projects, and endeavours begin with
