The easiest and fastest way to instantly transform your business results is to change the strategy you follow. ~ Jay Abraham
Category Archives: Business Planning
Business Planning
How Employee Titles Help Grow Your Business
5 Reasons Employee Titles Are Critical to Your Business
Small business owners very often take exception to giving titles to employees. They don’t see the value in it. Since the firm cannot afford to hire multiple people for different jobs and each job many not require a full time person anyway, everyone must wear many hats. So how can we assign a title to anybody? It seems pointless.
Unfortunately, everyone wants a title. So the owner gives a very high title like Chief Marketing Officer or Chief Technology Officer. That way they cover all the related responsibilities in the employee’s area of focus. It feels better to the employee (he has an important title) and it gives the outside world an impression that the firm is bigger than it is.
The problem with this approach is that the structure of the organization is actually being undermined and there is no plan for the future growth of the firm. How do you know if an employee is really qualified to be a Chief Whatever Officer? What happens when you do grow and need to put a real senior manager in place and need to “demote” the employee by putting someone above him? It creates all kinds of employee and culture challenges.
Practice Good Business Practices
When investors and buyers look at your business they will ask for forward looking financial statements. The future profitability and growth prospects of your business have a direct impact on its value.
If you have a historically proven process for creating forecasts and a method for achieving them you can more appropriately justify your projections. This will hold more weight in the eyes of the buyer.
If you don’t have a forecasting and planning process in place the buyer will create his own based on his knowledge of your industry and his fears related to his lack of knowledge of your business. This will most certainly be more conservative than your projection and, as a result, will negatively impact value.
3 Steps to Exit Planning
Business Transition Planning is as Easy as 1-2-3
Business exit planning is a form of strategic planning. Just as you would plan business growth and the structure of your business that supports that growth, exit planning provides a look at the end game so that you have a clear direction as to where you are headed and by when.
Running a business means dealing with and planning for the prevention of many different issues on a regular basis. Exit planning deals with these same issues, but takes a longer view point. The objectives of the exit plan are to address these issues:
Why Do I Need an Exit Strategy?
Business Exit Planning
I’d like you to write down on a piece of paper the number of years from now that you would like to retire. Now, if you’re a business owner, think about what your company will look like at that time. How big will it be? How much in sales will it have? What will its profits be? How much does it need to be worth in order for you to retire in the style of living you want?
And lastly, what is your plan to create the business you just imagined and can you do it in the number of years you wrote down on that paper?
One of the biggest mistakes business owners make is that they don’t create a strategy to exit their business at the time they start their business and then never get around to creating one at all.
Why is it so important to have a business exit strategy? Let me illustrate with a quick story.
Implement an achievable plan. The future growth prospects of your business have a direct impact on its value. ~Martin Begley
5 Reasons to Join a Mastermind Group
Take your business to the next level!
There are many rewards to being in your own business. You have control of your own destiny by deciding what customers you want to work with and what projects you are willing to take and you have the opportunity make money based on your own efforts.
Courtesy of imcreator.com
However, even though you have these benefits it can be lonely, frustrating, and uncertain. When you are running an organization there is no one you can confide in or get objective opinions from for the hard decisions you need to make. Mastermind groups change this status quo!
A mastermind group is a group of non-competing small business owners and is designed exclusively for like-minded, results-driven leaders.
Small Business Strategic Plan
The Real Reason for a Strategic Plan
When I ask business owners if they have a strategic plan, they tell me “Of Course!” When I ask to see it they say “Well, I don’t have it on paper! But I know what it is.” Then they proceed to tell me their version of the plan which is typically a loose description of the products and services they provide their customers.
Courtesy of Pixabay.com
If you don’t know where you are going,
any road will take you there. ~ Lewis Carroll
This is not a strategic plan! It’s a service offering. I then ask, “Why are you providing those products and services?” This tends to be easier to answer. Most entrepreneurs got into their business because they had a passion for or an expertise in a certain product or service and they saw a business opportunity in it.