GooseiQ

 Planning for the future starts with asking questions, creating insight and working to a structure.

Below are some of the questions to ask when establishing the basis for any strategic plan;

• Do you know the market, and importantly where the market will be in 1, 5 and 10 years?

• Do you know your competitive advantage (and know your competitors customers)?

• Do you know your current capacity and your potential capacity (and what it would take to get there)?

 

While the questions themselves are not difficult, I have seen amazing results by simply taking an organisations leadership team through the process of answering questions like this together. The collective processing, brainstorming and sharing creates insight rather than just answers.

 

Having established where you want to be, there are three essential elements that need to be worked into any sustainable growth plan for it to succeed;

1. Operations – the ability to increase capability

2. Systems – the ability to manage increased capability

3. Leadership – the ability to drive increased capacity

Any one of these on their own will potentially result in immediate/short term growth, but for growth to be sustainable it needs to have all three.

​

Businesses can fall into the trap of focusing solely on leadership and driving growth, without first establishing if they can produce and or manage the growth demands that result. Others spend all their time (and capital) on establishing state of the art systems and processes only to have no production and no demand. Yet others have both product AND demand, but struggle logistically to match these - resulting in issues such as long wait times, failed delivery, wrong products shipped, high inventory costs, slow paying accounts, stock losses, and low customer engagement to name but a few.

 

If any of this resonates with your business, contact me to discuss what approach might suit your business in addressing some of the questions and in establishing a sustainable strategic growth plan.