How do you know when to grow your business?
As business coaches, we get asked many different questions, and our role is to guide, stimulate, challenge, and nurture the right response for the client. Yet sometimes there is a question that needs a direct reply, one that is not just why is this important? What can you do first to make this happen? How can you change one thing right now? Or what if you did do this? What would happen?
A great question we get asked is
“How do I know when to grow my business?”
We will share what we discuss and help our clients answer this question and what it entails in consideration, intention, and how you can apply it in your business, along with other elements that need to be considered.
Firstly, let us explore why is this even a relevant question? Surely everyone sets up a business to grow it, don’t they? We have experienced that most people who set up, run (or take over) a business have the want and desire to be successful, yet usually, they have not even considered how it would grow; there is an expectancy that growth would just happen!
Sadly, growth is not like that. This assumptive mindset creates failure early in business life and is one of the common reasons a business fails. The very fact that a business could fail[1] does not cross our minds initially as we assume it will succeed. Operating in assumptions usually leads to problems.
Did you know that there are paradigms and myths that we believe about business, and one of them is that 90% of all businesses fail in year one- this is not true; it is just clickbait.
The reality of business success or failure is up to 20% of businesses fail in year one, 30% in year two, and up to 5 years over, 50% of businesses, leaving between 15-25% of businesses surviving longer than 15 years. The numbers are still high, though and what this does highlight is that as time goes on, when a business is expected to be growing, and it is not, it could be growth has stalled or got stuck in a cycle of doing the same things.
Let us also make sure we note that 80% of first-year businesses are successful, and still 50% remain that way 5 years plus. RLC Global is now in its 14th year and has been growing since its formation, so we believe we can share the reasons and things to consider for your business.
One way to overcome this is using our core product at RLC, The Business Framework- the Framework has a structured way of building your business, having a clear and realistic future view (agile growth) with flexibility and agility to deal with even a global pandemic[i]. In this blog, we share some elements that you can apply in your business today[2]
The power of language
The first is language- yep might seem irrelevant, yet it’s a fundamental power shift for engagement, action, strategy, and getting results. Let’s explore the simplicity of this change.
What do you say about your business?
How do you share your story?
What is the plan, and how do you know your teams know it? Do you share your story and direction?
Do people understand it?
What do you add to benefit your business?
What do you say to your customers or clients, and what differs to your teams?
How do you stay consistent and share?
How do you share your focus and plans?
Some examples are of language that seeps through a business, impacting growth; check if you ever say anything similar and consider the impact YOU are having:
We always do it this way
I know. I’ve been doing it for years
We are short staffed
We don’t get results
Just the way it is
Hopefully, it will work
We are trying to make it work
The team just don’t get it
I’ve explained so many times to my team it’s them, their a probem
Why don’t they have the passion or motivation like me
Let’s dangle a carrot
Change is hard
Customers are so rubbish they make our life harder
This customer is useless
Really consider your language whenever you talk about your business, people, product, or service. Even when it is hard, it is not about avoiding the challenges or hiding behind a toxic positive attitude or approach. Successful businesses that grow and are ready to grow are built from how you express what good, bad, challenging, and opportunity is.
Top tip- Language
Reflect and review. What do you say?
What are customers/clients and your team hearing?
Do they match?
Do focus groups, listen first, and respond later.
Find out what the story really is and work on any gaps first.
Without a great consistent story, clear, simple language, and apparent reasons for ‘your business why’, you will feel like you are stuck in a perpetual cycle of it just not going right.
Keep asking questions; listen first.
Listen. Listen. Listen
Stop assuming you know the right answer.
Stop assuming you know your team.
Use good transparent non-complex language.
Ensure that direction and understanding are in every role
Check-in each role is their full understanding of its contribution to your business and the plan – if not, share it, define it, and repeat it positively often.
Your language matters.
Being on track
This may seem as simple as the language you use, yet we do experience a lack of structure and unclear communication on performance when we work with businesses. Each of these simple ways boosts and builds a flexible, agile plan that lets everyone know they are on track. Being aware means action can be taken.
Being on track is also about having and DOING your plan.
To be ready to grow, you need to be very aware, clear, and understand what that track is, why you are on it or not, and what you must do to get more sales, revenue, and customers- be specific and how everyone’s role contributes to it- the structure, your process, support and how does growth affect the whole business- are you prepared? More sales mean more costs- easily forgotten when growing. More people need a robust and flexible recruitment process. Good training and onboarding are all necessities, and you cannot wing these things, or you could become a 20% statistic.
All this may seem simple, yet it is commonly ignored or not done and needs reviewing in every business.
Next, looking more into structure and performance is the issue of lack of focus and financials supporting your business.
Let’s talk business fog.
When we talk about clarity in business plans and growth, we can get lost in the fog as we overcomplicate it with our own internal noise, issues, or assumptions of others or even dismiss our impact on others affects our business directly. Understanding what creates fog is important, and we see it as a few things, check if any of these are relevant to your business.
Cash flow awareness
What is your current 90-day cash flow? 180 days (about 6 months)? 24 months (about 2 years)? It may seem obvious, yet unpaid client revenue, lack / missed revenue, lack of visibility of finances, prohibitive costs, poor planning, and poor processes all contribute to a lack of cash flow awareness and stop you from growing, even pushing that failure closer and faster. Never assume.
Have an (operational) plan and complete it. Plans are not made in stone or to be ignored. Create one and do it. We use a 24-month plan in our Framework, making it flexible and reflecting on the desired outcomes you and your business require. Review the plan and manage it.
Balance of reactive & proactive.
Businesses can get stuck being in their business and not stepping out to look in. Reacting to the immediate need is a skill required and complimented by the focus on seeing a wider perspective.
Being able to react and be proactive
The oxymoron of reactive and proactive is about skill and competency. If you can focus on facts, have a process that is followed – consistently_ not when it suits, follow and review, do, act, and act, you will be able to step back regularly (weekly)and look at where you are. Review how simple are your metric systems of assessment. They must be uncomplicated; we see many over-complex OKRs or KPIs in business which people spend more time manipulating than working towards!
Consider these two (project) ways to measure that can be applied to ANY business, project, action, group, or team. Each stimulating, enjoyable conversation enables help and support to boost cash flow, revenue, and awareness. See two perspectives, both now reactive AND proactive, working in harmony.
RAG- Red Amber Green. This simple metric view is what is red needs instant reactive help, what is amber can be supported or observed, and what is green gains recognition and assesses the learnings of what is working (proactive). This is so simple, our favourite at RLC, as everyone seems to get it. The short, mid, and long terms actions can move through the RAG scale as they get worked on- every role in the business has a clear view of what needs extra support or what is working.
Scrum views- To Do, Doing, Done, Stuck
Simply another way of doing RAG. High visibility, clarity of what is being worked on, what is waiting, what has been achieved and what’s stuck needs help. Again, the focus is on reactive and proactive.
Add a layer (s) to ease complexity.
Short, mid, long.
Small, medium, large.
If you run a business with many layers, adding a simple layer to your RAG or Scrum view (or add both!) will keep it simple and not overcomplicate it.
You could have a Red Midterm project (action) that is small – less reactive.
Or
You could have a Stuck Short-term project (action) that is large that needs immediate support.
Or
You could have a long Amber term project creating less risk yet could affect many elements of your business, so you become more proactive.
We use this in meetings or reviews as so:
You create the best definitions for your business and its language and culture.
Make sure you have definItions to share with your teams so everyone clearly understands when you talk about the terms of action.
PEOPLE, PEOPLE PEOPLE
At RLC, we work with one person at a time. This may seem a trivial point, yet to influence and have an impact on many, it starts with a singular one. Many programs force their theories and programs on many and wonder why it does not create the results they expected. Focus on one at a time, and your people are your everything from team delivering, people thinking, your strategists, your people doing and making the wheels of the business turn, people who are in front of your customer and the people creating and making behind the scenes.
At RLC, we love questioning business models and practices to stimulate thoughts and actions. Creating and working within a flat structure and the power of empowered individuals and teams makes growth. The positive results come from a team that knows the plan, does it, and can challenge it, query, and make decisions. It is also the hardest to do and needs special leaders to influence it who are willing to be open, continuous learners, great listeners, and willing to fail and change.
Invest in you AND your team
Investing in yourself, your personal growth, adding skill investment and developing your team and people into your plan is essential. Growth comes from a growth team, and that needs nurturing. The right people – the backbone of a growth business. Retain, recruit, and reinvest in your people- and yourself, the right people. The simplest route to this is to focus on competency and, skill, willingness to learn action. Focus on facts, not likeability.
Poor language, lack of structure, no performance transparency, a limiting mindset, and bad attitude add to a lack of growth, and it is found in a lot of businesses in many guises, and sometimes the owner/leader/managers are working with the best intention, yet the language they choose to it impacts the business and people in the opposite outcome.
Look at yourself first always.
What shadow do you cast?
Do you lack flexibility, or inability to deal with real-life challenges? How you do gives permission to others to behave and respond the same.
Our final growth tip is looking to the future.
Fast Forward
When talking about your business, think in the past tense first. This NLP technique is about reframing and resetting how we can achieve growth with the foundations we have shared in place first.
Back to language and looking at using
Can, Shall, Do.
If you want to review the growth in your business or want to know more about having an RLC Framework in your business- get in touch.
Notes
[1] https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/361350, https://www.ictsd.org/how-many-businesses-fail-each-year-in-the-uk/
2. The RLC Business Framework (go here for more about the framework)
[i] www.rlc-global.com/framework
