Strategic Planning What is your Businesses Reason for Existence
Strategic Planning What is your Businesses Reason for Existence
It is no wonder that the average business struggles to reach the size, profitability and success that urged the founder to start it in the first place.
What can you do to ensure that your business remains focused?
A Strategic Plan will guide your business, assist you with important decisions and keep you and your employees on track. It will identify your businesses reason for existence and define exactly what success means in your business world. Most importantly it will guide you and your employees along the path to business success.
You need to compile your Strategic Plan into a document. It is simply not good enough to state that it is stored in your head. You will find that once you have committed it to paper (or electronically) you and your business will start rapidly moving towards the goals you have identified in your Strategic Planning Document.
What do you put into a Strategic Planning Document?
* Be concise and to the point, you do not want to produce something that is difficult to read and update and irrelevant by the time it is completed.
* Include a statement on your vision for your company at the beginning of the document. This sets the tone for what is to follow. State exactly what it is that you are trying to achieve with your business.
* What is your Businesses Reason for Existence? Put this vision in terms of the problems that you solve for your clients. Always think in terms of your clients perspective because at the end of the day that is the only perspective that is really important to your businesses success.
* Identify the key Goals that your business needs to achieve to be successful.
* Define how you will know when you have reached the goals by associating a measurable rage of values with the goal i.e. Key Indicators
* Put a Specific Date on when each of the goals will be achieved and Regularly Measure your progress towards reaching them.
Some examples of business goals include:
* Financial Profitability Figures
* Company Growth
* Market Acceptance and Penetration
* Customer Satisfaction.
* New Product Innovation
What do you do with your Strategic Plan when you have finished it?
* Treat your Strategic Plan as a work in progress, business environments change rapidly, be prepared to alter your direction in response to customer, operational and competitive changes.
* Make sure you schedule a regular review and updating of the Strategic Plan. Even if your goals remain the same, regular review will commit the plan to your subconscious ensuring that you are always moving towards your goals.
* Use the Strategic Plan to help you make decisions in your business. Ask yourself “Will my decision move me closer to or further away from the goals in my Strategic Plan?”. If the decision moves you away from your goals then you should either not move ahead with the decision or you need to re-evaluate your Strategic Plan.
* Share the contents of your Strategic Plan with your staff. You may not want to disclose all of the business goals, but it is vitally important to communicate your vision and relevant goals with your employees.
How does a Strategic Plan differ from a Business Plan?
A business plan is a more formalized in depth document and generally takes months to develop. The problem with Business Plans is that they tend to make many (often invalid) assumptions and they are generally obsolete by the time they are finished. Business Plans, once produced, are rarely reviewed and updated.
A Strategic Plan is a working vision of where you are taking your business. When regularly reviewed and updated it remains relevant and aligned with your business.
There is not one thing that you could do immediately, right now in your business that will have as much positive long lasting impact as developing your Strategic Plan. Do it now, can you afford not to?
Strategic Planning What is your Businesses Reason for Existence - To learn more about this author, visit Justin Woolich's Website.
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As business owners and managers we are quite often caught up in the day to day work of running our businesses, dealing with clients, managing staff, developing new products and more often than not fixing problems. After all of this “work” is done there is no time left (or more importantly no energy left) to spend on what I consider to be the most important work that we face as business owners and managers, Business Development.
It is no wonder that the average business struggles to reach the size, profitability and success that urged the founder to start it in the first place.
What can you do to ensure that your business remains focused?
A Strategic Plan will guide your business, assist you with important decisions and keep you and your employees on track. It will identify your businesses reason for existence and define exactly what success means in your business world. Most importantly it will guide you and your employees along the path to business success.
You need to compile your Strategic Plan into a document. It is simply not good enough to state that it is stored in your head. You will find that once you have committed it to paper (or electronically) you and your business will start rapidly moving towards the goals you have identified in your Strategic Planning Document.
What do you put into a Strategic Planning Document?
* Be concise and to the point, you do not want to produce something that is difficult to read and update and irrelevant by the time it is completed.
* Include a statement on your vision for your company at the beginning of the document. This sets the tone for what is to follow. State exactly what it is that you are trying to achieve with your business.
* What is your Businesses Reason for Existence? Put this vision in terms of the problems that you solve for your clients. Always think in terms of your clients perspective because at the end of the day that is the only perspective that is really important to your businesses success.
* Identify the key Goals that your business needs to achieve to be successful.
* Define how you will know when you have reached the goals by associating a measurable rage of values with the goal i.e. Key Indicators
* Put a Specific Date on when each of the goals will be achieved and Regularly Measure your progress towards reaching them.
Some examples of business goals include:
* Financial Profitability Figures
* Company Growth
* Market Acceptance and Penetration
* Customer Satisfaction.
* New Product Innovation
What do you do with your Strategic Plan when you have finished it?
* Treat your Strategic Plan as a work in progress, business environments change rapidly, be prepared to alter your direction in response to customer, operational and competitive changes.
* Make sure you schedule a regular review and updating of the Strategic Plan. Even if your goals remain the same, regular review will commit the plan to your subconscious ensuring that you are always moving towards your goals.
* Use the Strategic Plan to help you make decisions in your business. Ask yourself “Will my decision move me closer to or further away from the goals in my Strategic Plan?”. If the decision moves you away from your goals then you should either not move ahead with the decision or you need to re-evaluate your Strategic Plan.
* Share the contents of your Strategic Plan with your staff. You may not want to disclose all of the business goals, but it is vitally important to communicate your vision and relevant goals with your employees.
How does a Strategic Plan differ from a Business Plan?
A business plan is a more formalized in depth document and generally takes months to develop. The problem with Business Plans is that they tend to make many (often invalid) assumptions and they are generally obsolete by the time they are finished. Business Plans, once produced, are rarely reviewed and updated.
A Strategic Plan is a working vision of where you are taking your business. When regularly reviewed and updated it remains relevant and aligned with your business.
There is not one thing that you could do immediately, right now in your business that will have as much positive long lasting impact as developing your Strategic Plan. Do it now, can you afford not to?
Strategic Planning What is your Businesses Reason for Existence - To learn more about this author, visit Justin Woolich's Website.
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David AchesonDavid Acheson is the founder of DCJA Consultancy. DCJA Consultancy is a management consultancy business specialising in B2B sales consultancy. They offer bespoke and packaged sales consultancy including Sales Optimisation Review, Interim Sales Management, Sales & Marketing Review, 1:1 Sales & Management Staff Analysis, Management Training, Solution Sales Training, Creation of New Pay Plan, KPI's, run Customer Feedback Campaigns, assist with Recruitment, Coaching, Appraisals and set up Strategic Marketing Campaigns. David spent his early career in accountancy and then moved into sales in 1982, working in Office Equipment, IT, Advertising, Training, Outsourcing and Consultancy. He has held many Senior Positions in SMBs and Global Organisations including Head of Sales Operations & Head of Business Development. His knowledge, skills and great experience of the Sales Industry has led to David making keynote speeches and running educational sessions to key businesses through organisations including The Chamber of Commerce and Business Link. - Visit David Acheson's Website |
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Staging DivaDebra Gould, aka The Staging Diva®, is President of Six Elements Inc., an internationally recognized home staging company. Inspired by many requests from aspiring home stagers wanting to start similar businesses, Gould created the Staging Diva Home Staging Business Training Program. Gould has trained over 1000 Staging Diva Graduates worldwide to start staging businesses. Buying decorating and selling six of her own homes in four years lead to an interest in real estate staging which she turned into a career with the launch of sixelements.com in 2002. Since then she has staged hundreds of homes in addition to teaching home staging training. Gould is the author of several home staging resources including a series of popular ebooks made up of a Design Guide, Color Guide and Portfolio Guide. For more information about Debra Gould visit stagingdiva.com. - Visit Staging Diva's Website |
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Anne BarrAnne Barr has over 26 years experience in sales and marketing, six years as a franchisee. She has assisted over 367 business owners and purchasers to achieve their goals in career change, transition and exit strategy. She holds the designation of Certified Franchise Executive from the International Franchise Association, Certified Business Intermediary from the International Business Brokers Association and Board Certified Broker from the Texas Association of Business Brokers. Anne is active in professional organizations, networking groups and volunteers for non-profit entities. As owner/operator of four successful businesses, Anne has proven people skills and enjoys helping clients find the right "fit" in business ownership. Visit www.FranchiseOpportunitySpecialist.com for more information about me and my company. - Visit Anne Barr's Website |
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Jeff FosterWebBizIdeas.com is a Minneapolis website design company founded to help people start an internet business by providing them with website, business, and internet resources that help foster the growth of successful online businesses and develop innovative Internet business ideas. We specialize in internet consulting & internet marketing. - Visit Jeff Foster's Website |
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John BrennanJohn Brennan Ed.D. Dr. Brennan is President of Interpersonal Development, LLC, a training and development firm. Interpersonal Development has provided sales training and coaching to more than 3,000 sales reps from over 100 companies. A native of Australia, Dr. Brennan received his doctorate from the University of Rochester. His dissertation researched the effectiveness of Behavioral Modeling Technology in training people in interpersonal skills. While he has spent most of his career designing or delivering training, he was also a Vice-President of Sales of a training and development franchise with operations in 25 markets. Dr. Brennan has designed and delivered sales training in North America, Asia, Europe, Australia and the Middle East. He has been a guest speaker at numerous national and regional professional conferences. When Microsoft wanted Best Practices articles on sales for their web site, they called Dr. Brennan. The results are at http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/FX011387391033.aspx His firm’s clients have included Volvo, The Prudential, Merrill Lynch, Eastman Kodak, Gannett, Equifax Europe, the Economist Group and countless small businesses. - Visit John Brennan's Website |
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