Delegate to grow

If you can't delegate you'll never grow your business past the point where you are working as hard as you can.

- Most business need more staff as they grow. Delegation is an essential technique for successfully distributing the tasks that you perform currently to these new staff

- One day your business will have to run (and continue to grow) without you. Even if this day is not in your plans yet, a resilient well-run business cannot rely upon one person

- Development and growth are great motivators for most people – so you should be actively seeking to increase the responsibility you give to your staff

- Your objective should be to delegate everything you do

How do you delegate successfully?

- Classify your staff to assess their readiness for delegation – plot knowledge & ability against attitude, decide who is ready now and what needs to be done to ready the others

- Evaluate what you could or should delegate – and start with the assumption that everything could be delegated if you really wanted to

- From the above two points identify who could do what

- When you have chosen someone, clarify what the value proposition is from both sides – what would you gain and what would they gain. Why would they want to do it?

- Clarify expectations

o Timescale

o Definition of success

o Level and limits of authority and responsibility

- Give them time to come up with their own plan to achieve this – and then agree it together

- Communicate the change and the reasons to all staff (and externally as necessary)

- If necessary provide time management or other training

- Once you have delegated, plan and carry-out regular reviews

o Provide guidance so they stay on track

o Share your experience

o Give praise and feedback – make sure they are learning

o DON’T take it back at the first sign of trouble

When not to delegate:

- When you don’t understand the problem

- When it’s too late

- Key tasks that amount to “ownership”, such as setting strategy, values and culture

What stops you delegating?

- Fear

- Lack of trust in others

- Insecurity about your own role, capabilities and knowledge

It’s about LEADERSHIP.


This seminar "The Owners' Trap" will give you techniques for effective delegation - as well as the other steps you need to take to take your business on to the next level..

Learn how to raise your game by visiting my website.

Follow-up for sales!

Sales is all about moving an opportunity through a process that takes it from the first contact through to sale and beyond.  Two things are implied:  Firstly, you have to have a process (that is a repeatable series of steps from first contact through to close – a pipeline) and secondly, you have to do something to move an opportunity through the pipeline – the follow-up.

The follow-up is therefore a defined and repeatable action that kicks-in whenever an opportunity needs to be moved through the pipeline.  For instance, when you meet someone at a networking event your follow-up might be a) send an email saying how much you enjoyed your conversation about topic x and b) add them to your database for future newsletters.

If someone subscribes on your website your follow-up might be an automatic email with latest offers.

If you finish a job for a client your follow-up might be a phone call three months later to discuss any other requirements.

An effective follow-up will be:

-          Consistent and controlled rather than left to chance or whim
-          Persistent (without being irritating)
-          Personalised, even if automated
-          Related to the prospect’s needs, not your product’s features
-          Designed to move the opportunity on in a specific way.  For a suspect, say, to establish whether they do in fact have a need for your service.  For a prospect, to establish whether they have the money – and so forth
-          A call to action
-          Intriguing and original
-          Via an appropriate medium, or mixture of media
-          Recorded, analysed and the results fed back into the design of the process

A CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system will help you define and control this process – but you can do it quite simply without one.  What you can’t do without is a documented sales process and a bit of organisation.

Get more great business tips at http://www.nickbettes.co.uk.

Frustrated that your staff can't do things as well as you do - or don't care enough to?
Are you resigned to your business staying the same size because you have no more hours to give and you just can't find anyone to take on some of your workload?

Maybe you need to learn about motivating staff...

- Motivated staff are more productive
- Motivated staff are more positive and helpful to customers
- Motivated staff are easier to lead and will take responsibility for things that otherwise you will have to do.

This seminar "The Owners' Trap" will give you techniques to motivate your staff - as well as the other steps you need to take to take your business on to the next level..

Learn how to raise your game by visiting my website.

What do your customers really want?

Customers take different things into consideration when they think about buying what you sell.  Some factors will be more important than others – this will vary by customer or by customer category.  You and your competitors will be, or will have the reputation of being, better at delivering some of these factors than others.

If you know how important the different benefits are to different customer groups you can tailor your proposition to each group.  If you know how well you deliver on that benefit then you can work on improving this where necessary.

How do you carry out customer benefit analysis?  Identify your different customer categories. list out all the different benefits each category is looking for (this could be low price, reliability, speed and so forth).  Weight them in order of importance for the customer category and assess how well you deliver the benefit.
 
If you'd like to know more about the power of customer benefit analysis then this event is for you.
 
Get more great business tips on our website.

Organisational structures for SMEs

Why is structure important in a small business?

- Employees need to know where they and others fit in an organisation. Lack of clarity can be confusing and de-motivating
- Growing and changing the business will be simpler if you already have a disciplined and open approach to reporting lines and responsibilities
- The process of formalising an appropriate structure will force you to address inconsistencies, gaps and duplications – and to consider how effective your people and processes really are

How do you decide on an appropriate structure?

- There are some basic principles that you need to embody in your structure

    o Single reporting line – every employee should report to one and only supervisor. (Do not confuse reporting lines with providing a shared service; for instance an administrator can support several managers but should only report to one person for pay and rations issues). Avoid dotted-line reporting lines
    o Division of labour or specialisation – group similar activities and skills together in departments or sections
    o Each post should have clear responsibility for outputs or results which is matched with appropriate authority over the resources necessary to achieve this
    o Span of control – no more than eight direct reports to each position
    o Lean organisation – keep the total number of levels including the leader and the front line to a minimum – in most SMEs this will be between two and four

- Start at the second level with three main responsibilities

    o Winning business
    o Delivering the product or service
    o Getting paid and admin tasks

- There should be one position responsible for each of these roles (but this may not be three separate people in a small business)
- Almost all small businesses should use this functional structure. Larger business may adopt a divisional or matrix structure
- Do not design a structure to cope with or work around individual inadequacies or historical accidents – deal with them
- Generally, but not always, a superior should be better rewarded than their employees. It is worth questioning why if this is not the case

Implementing the structure

- As with all HR-related activities, the process is as important as the result
- It is an opportunity to communicate with (ie listen to) your employees. Effective consultation will achieve a better result and more buy-in
- It should be done in conjunction with job descriptions and, if relevant, the incentivisation scheme
- The structure should be published as an organisation chart and kept up-to-date

My workshop programme covers this and every other key part of running a business, from strategy through to invoicing. For more details of this comprehensive and affordable course visit my business advice website.

If you'd like a free white paper on boosting the value of your company then complete this simple business value calculator

Is your business direction clear?

Clear direction - a vision, mission and strategic objectives - is essential for any successful business.  Business owners ned to know:


· The importance of a motivating and guiding vision for any business and how to construct one
· Ways to turn your Vision into a compelling Mission for your staff and customers
· How to identify and set concrete Objectives that will keep you on track towards your goal whatever happens
· Why growth is not optional - and why unplanned growth will damage your business – and why growth itself brings challenges
· What successful business owners spend their time doing – and not doing

If you'd like to learn how to do this then this seminar is a must:  The Road To Growth

More information on my website:  http://www.nickbettes.co.uk/

Thinking about selling your business?

Preparing in the right way could get you 2-3 times as much for your business.

Getting your company fit for sale could mean the difference between getting nothing and getting a great multiple.

It's not about numbers.  It's about strategic positioning and generating competition between the right buyers.
It's what you as a business owner should spend your time doing.

Make a start.  Come to this business advice seminar.

More information on our business advice website

Feeling the management strain?

As your business grows it doesn't just get bigger.  It gets more complicated.  More staff,  Bigger, more demanding customers.  More rules.  Trying to manage through other people.  Delegation.

You'd go mad trying to run it the way you used to run a small business - or give yourself a heart-attack.  And you'd fail, and go back to being small.

There is an alternative.  Learn how to manage a big business at this business advice seminar.

Or take a look at our business advice website.

Looking for business investment?

Are you looking for a bank loan or business angel to fund your business growth plans?

Do you understand the kind of things they look for in a company before they will invest?

Do you know what government finance is (still) available and how you qualify?

These are big issues.  Succeed or fail issues.  Don't leave it to chance - talk to us.

As a first step, get yourself on this business advice seminar or take a look at our business advice website.

Selling your business in the next two years?

Preparing in the right way could get you 2-3 times as much for your business.

Getting your company fit for sale could mean the difference between getting nothing and getting a great multiple.

It's what you as a business owner should spend your time doing.

Make a start.  Come to this business advice seminar.

More information on our business advice website

Business owner - need to raise your game?

· Reached the point where you are no longer confident about the way to to drive your business forward?
· Need money from an investor or bank to fund your growth plans but unsure how to go about it?
· Started to wonder if you or your management team need to understand more about business to achieve your goals?
· Worried about how you will achieve the best price when you sell your business?

Even successful and ambitious business owners sometimes find it hard to remember why they started their business. Dealing with day-to-day issues can swamp the big picture, leaving you struggling to keep on track and unsure about when and how you will realise the rewards for all the hard work you put in.

We can help you raise yoru game to overcome these barriers - and we're running this great seminar to explain how.
 
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How resilient is your turnover?

Not all revenue is equally certain. A business which relies on winning a small number of large contracts each year may well earn the same revenue and profit as a business that gets its income from a large volume of contracted subscriptions and a third company that gets all its income from ad-hoc repair and maintenance across a moderate number of existing customers

o In theory, the riskier nature of the project business should result in higher profit margins (returns to the shareholders) and the stable nature of the subscription business, lower - but this is not always the case in practice
o Don’t confuse spreading payments for a project with spreading both the cost and the income by using a different business model. The first impacts cash flow and actually increases risk – so should require an even higher return.

All other things being equal, businesses should strive for as much locked-in recurring revenue as possible

How can you translate one-off into recurring revenue? Some examples of spreading payments are

o A photocopier which is paid for by charging a small amount for every copy made
o Mobile phones, where the phone is given free in return for a fixed term monthly contract

Each of these relies on a higher total income over the life of the contract to cover the cash flow hit and the risk of default. It is also necessary to build in a compelling proposition to renew the contract before it expires in order to build revenue resilience

Some examples of additional recurring revenue are

o Software license maintenance
o Membership of a user group
o Subscription services
o Service and maintenance contracts

An alternative way of looking at this is separating future income from resource or asset limitations

o Translate a single consultant’s time into a course to be sold online in perpetuity

What is the proposition for the customer? Possible benefits that would induce a customer to sign up for a long-term contract are

o Access to a continuous stream of new content
o Access to special offers and discounts
o A known fixed charge covering all repairs (a form of insurance)
o The right to free future upgrades
o Continuous tuning & maintenance of the original product

One final source of revenue risk is over-reliance on a single or a few customers (high customer concentration) – avoid this.

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Why systemised businesses are worth more

The value of a business depends on its growth prospects, profitability, cash conversion and the degree to which that future cash flow is at risk

o One of the main risks for small businesses is their reliance upon key personnel, particularly the owner, who know and do things that no-one else knows or can do

o This risk is present even if you have no plans to sell the business. If you the owner or one of your key staff are unable to work for an extended period what happens to your business?

o Systemisation is the process by which the processes of the business are documented and standardised and reliance on any one individual is removed

o This process also makes a business scalable; the processes can be replicated, additional staff can be selected and trained and the business can grow beyond the constraints of any one person

How can a business be systemised?

- Document all your processes. Start by asking all your staff (including you) what they spend their time doing and build up a diagram of the different flows of work from the start (say a customer enquiry) to the end (say an invoice paid)

o Post-it notes are a good way to do this. Use different colours for different people or departments and put a different task on each note. Record key dimensions on each task – how many times, how often, how long it takes. Record problems or issues with the task. Organise the notes into sequences of tasks (processes)

o Turn the hierarchy and sequence of notes into your draft written operating manual

- Identify where only one person has the skills to carry out a particular task and examine ways to enable more people to do this

o Delegation and recruitment

o Training

o Cross-skilling, so that people can turn their hand to multiple roles

o Altering the task so that it becomes less specialised

- Look for opportunities to improve processes

o Complexity that has arisen for no good reason over time

o Bottlenecks

o Different ways of carrying out what is essentially the same task

o Specialised resources being used for mundane tasks

- Automate where this is practical

o Streamline and speed processes up using computers and the internet

o Look for opportunities to provide self-service – this reduces cost and improves customer service

- Finalise and issue the operating manual

o Institute regular audits to ensure the manual and the reality match

- Starting with you, the owner, develop a succession plan

o Named individuals selected or recruited to replace the people above them

o The appropriate development plans in place for these individuals

See how my services could help your business.

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Improving productivity

What is meant by “productivity”?

- Productivity is a measure of output for some measure of input

• Maintenance visits per hour of direct labour
• Cakes sold per hour of shop assistant labour
• Boxes produced per square metre of steel
• Helpdesk calls closed per man-month

- It can apply to a person, a department, a company, an industry or even a country

• For your business you can choose whatever measures are most useful

Why is productivity important?

- Productivity has huge impact on profitability as shown in the table

• The company has 8,000 hours per year of productive labour. The budget is based on these hours producing 100 items which results in a 10% profit.

 

 

• A 10% improvement in productivity (each person on average producing 10% more in a given period) results in a doubling of profit
• A 10% deterioration in productivity results in no profit being made at all

- The same model would apply if the cost were raw material (the efficiency in this case being yield or, conversely, wastage) or machine time (utilisation)
- This approach applies to services as well as products

How can productivity be improved?

- Decide what it is you produce (the output) – this may not be obvious in a service business
- Identify the main costs or resources utilised in production (the inputs)
- Define your productivity measure(s) – in the above table it is labour hours/item
- Monitor productivity over time and between different employees or resources
- If the main productivity factor is labour then improvements can be made in training, supervision, communication, standardisation, documentation, tools, systems or support
- For non-labour measures examine product or process design

 

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Market triggers

What are market triggers?
- Most products and services have some kind of event that triggers the customer need
- These triggers may be seasonal (school uniform, umbrellas), calendar-driven (payroll, VAT returns) or ad-hoc (marriage, moving house)
Why should you understand your market triggers?
- Understanding your market triggers will help you to position your product or service where it is most likely to catch the customer at the right time or place
o If you run a carpet cleaning company then demand for your services might be triggered by someone moving into a new home – so post leaflets through the doors of houses with “sold” signs
o If you print business cards and stationary then demand for your services might be triggered by someone setting up a new company – so subscribe to a company registration data service and send start-ups a brochure
- Understanding the customer motivation will help you best meet their needs and so improve sales conversion rate
o Make it part of scripts and qualification to ask why the prospect is looking for your product or service
- It will help you cross-sell or up-sell other services related to the trigger
o Someone who gets divorced may well need a new will
o Someone who hires a lot of new staff may well need employment policies
- It will suggest related complementary services and so which strategic alliances would be beneficial to you
o Solicitors will form alliances with estate agents to get access to conveyancing work

See how my services could help your business.

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A big sales technique for small businesses

- Consultative selling, or solutions selling , is a technique used by big companies for complex sales. However, it can be used by SMEs for business-to-business (B2B) or even business-to-consumer (B2C) selling. The essence is to go beyond the stated requirement to understand your prospects’ needs and explain how your product or service meets those needs better than anyone else’s.

Preparation:

- Research on the customer (for B2B - turnover, growth, products, stated aims, stated strategies, culture and strengths. For B2C – the benefits your various customer types are looking for);

- Research on the market (emerging trends, main players, size, growing/shrinking, macro-economic factors eg is the market driven by the housing market or unemployment);

Set the scene:

- For planned meetings send an agenda/have a pre-meeting telephone call that sets the expectation that you are interested in how your product or service can help the prospect achieve their aims – you are not turning up to talk about features or technology

- For unplanned (eg in a shop) make sure you have a script that engages the prospect in a discussion about their needs

The discussion:

- For B2B, set out to understand the following things:

o What the company produces

o How many/how much they produce

o What is important to their customers

o What is their USP?

o How do they get the best from their staff?

o What are the top three challenges they are facing?

- For B2C, set out to understand the experience they are seeking

o In a shoe shop, don’t ask “Can I help you?” ask “Are you looking for shoes with a special event in mind?”

o If someone rings about a new carpet ask them “What does the room feel like?” or “What atmosphere are you trying to create?”

- Explore with open questions (that require a descriptive answer) and confirm your understanding with closed questions (that can be answered Yes or No)

- Listen, listen, listen

- Explain to them how your product or service helps them achieve this

o Point by point match benefit to need

o Use their own language

o Don’t assume they will recognise all the benefits you are offering without you telling them

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