Why one growth strategy never fits all

Quote of the week: “Success is stumbling from failure to failure with no loss of enthusiasm.” Winston S. Churchill

Leading In Uncertain and Volatile Times

All businesses and business people will be in for a rough ride over the next 18-24 months or a lot less time if we are lucky. The winds of change are upon us and in this issue of The Business Brief I plan to highlight for you what you need to know and act on. It will be brief. There are four areas every executive and business need to address they are people, organization, strategy and performance. The right approach will be like indestructible alchemy. But what we know with certainty is that 50-60% of Canadians and Americans are living pay check to pay check, they will put off a lot of purchases, clothing, cars, appliances, home purchases etc. Trying to emerge out of this pandemic is a challenge. You can't stop the world and believe it will restart smoothly. The best we can do is begin to address a turbulent marketplace with the right actions.

People:

Talent is the cure to a lot of business issues and challenges. People and their intellectual capabilities are the catalyst that sets the course for change and adding to organizational competencies. Business leaders need to know their gaps within their organizations as they forecast the next two years relative to their vision of where they are and want to be, and how they plan to get there. Of course it all sounds too simple from where I come from. Because to be quite honest if you search for reasons why businesses fail you will find a number of issues that the organization was not prepared to deal with. All in good right. However, the truth is that all of this comes down to the capabilities and competencies of the organization. Guess who brings that? People! Talent. Talent for me is a competitive advantage, if executives and organizations don't recognize that as the catalyst for successful they will never have change materialize the way that they want to it.

Organizations - Five Types

Having the right talent is in itself good enough. The organization needs to be healthy. There are five types of organizations operating in business and yours could be any one of these and any time, because circumstances can change the fortunes and positioning of company very quickly in this very volatile and unpredictable world. In essence during 2019 we determined that organizations fell under one of five categories. Dysfunctional, Distracted, Reactive, Proactive or Defendable. The question for me was why are organizations unable to respond to changes in the marketplace? It had to be that they were or were not able to respond because they fell under these categories. Obviously organizations that were proactive or defendable are more likely to perform better in times of ambiguity. In many ways culture and talent had a lot to do with this. I called this the "Reliability Quotient" and the higher your score the more likely you would be in a position to compete and manage through change.

Strategy

Discovery, Development, Deployment, Delivery, Data. This is as simple as it gets to understanding the courses of action a business must take to ensure its longterm success. Strategies are key to success, and having the right ones tends to be a critical step. So far we identified People and Heathy Organizations being the foundation. The next 18-24 months of this current market we will experience turbulence from inflation, consumers cutting back, supply chains, this stubborn virus and an economic slow down and other challenges in a number of ways. The right strategies that have flexibility built within them can and will out perform those that don't. The following represents the path of building confidence in your strategies.

1. Discovery - Never stop pursuing opportunities to improve and deliver a higher level of services and products.

2. Development - Innovation is at the heart of strategic development. Anyone can create a service or product but who ever designs it and introduces it with the best experience has the potential for a competitive advantage.

3. Deployment - Plan, plan, plan. The details matter and going through every aspect of how you want consumers to experience your product or service and ensuring that the details are clear understandable and can be repeated are critical. However despite this businesses fail usually at the planning stage. In their desire to get out to market they have not established the expectations they have for these strategies. Someone on the team needs to own that and see through, every aspect of it within the organization.

4. Delivery - Execute flawlessly. Don't confuse deployment with delivery. Delivery is about creating the experience consumers are going to encounter. That level of delivery calls for a great deal of communication and training. And that training should involve everyone that has been a part of the strategy. The level and quality of front-line training is the measure by which your strategies will live and die in the real world. It is an investment that cannot not and should not be overlooked.

5. Data - Analyze, learn, adjust and reinvent. I've said that data and supply chains are king makers. And in this case when it comes to strategies, data on the performance and impact of your strategies will determine your effectiveness in this marketplace. Collect it, learn from it and act on it.

Performance

In 2008 with the housing bubble and financial crash it all led to the Great Recession. There were business failures and many people out of work. How do we prevent that outcome for businesses today? As hard as this may come across you need to rebuild your cost structures. That comes with a lot of hard decisions and investments in some cases. In every calamity most organizations have improved their productivity by changing the workplace. It is an outcome that I believe is flawed when the focus should be on growing revenue.

This week when you return to the office the discussion should be about business continuity and how will we achieve that objective? What is our risk mitigation plans and how will we restructure our financials to ensure business longevity. How do you restructure your financials? With a fine tooth comb and clarity on what you need to achieve, your objective and what you don't need. Hard decisions for hard times.

Personal Log: Why one growth strategy never fits all

Regardless of where we turn, businesses in most categories are uncertain of the future. The media has scared everyone and the anticipation of an assault on our country economics and consumer economy and business performance are all timidly expected. In fact, I do not recollect a time where so much information and speculation has fed consumer and business anxiety. However, there is a a great deal of truth to what we may face. The challenge is to be prepared. It is also easy to fall into the trap of following the frenzy when it comes to strategies and unfortunately fail miserably. In the 1920's everyone was following the frenzy of one presumed investment expert. He had the attention of the media and many expert investors. Many followed the frenzy right into the abyss. That's why I advocate home grown is so much better than chasing someone else's ideas. Nevertheless, I've seen it happen over and over again. The survivors in this game are the ones that stay focused on building their business from within with the resources available and when necessary turn to advisors who are reputable. By the way the name of the dubious investment expert was Charles Ponzi.

"Dismiss nothing, expect the unexpected, plan for the improbable." George Minakakis

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