Strategic Planning Session for Your Company

It is both valuable and necessary for companies to hold a half or full day strategic planning session at least once a year! Companies get so busy that many times they do not take time to plan for the future and make sure the right things are getting done in their business.

There are many benefits of doing planning sessions, including:

• Team building and getting everyone on the same page
• Clarifying your company vision, priorities and clarity of focus/expectations
• Showing that the owner is interested in listening to key employees

Who Should Attend?

• Those who report directly to the owner
• Members of the management team
• Accountant or other key advisor
• All employees (if possible, but does depend on the size of your company)

Good facilitation is essential at your planning sessions, especially when the value is frequently misunderstood. It is best if the owner does not facilitate the planning session and instead has someone else that knows the business owner and understands the issues and challenges the company is facing.

Roles of the facilitator during a planning session:

• Keep the group on task and on time
• Encourage everybody to contribute, participate and think “outside the box”
• Handle any conflicts that may arise
• Lead the exercises, for example, brainstorming
• Do an evaluation of the session
• Debrief with the owner after the session

It is not necessary for the facilitator to be an expert in the industry being discussed. The owner cannot dominate this meeting or become defensive, but instead needs to listen actively to the ideas and concerns of the team and appropriately provide input.

A sample agenda could look something like this:

• “Setting the stage”—why are we here and brief overview of “state of the company” (owner)
• Introduction of the facilitator (owner)
• Review the agenda (facilitator)
• Discuss the role of the facilitator (facilitator)
• Discuss ground rules for the session (facilitator)
• Self introductions (what is my job within the company)
• Company SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats) via brainstorming process (facilitator)
• Identify next two years of strategic initiatives via brainstorming (facilitator)
• Narrow down the list via multi-voting technique (facilitator)
• Wrap up, evaluation of day and closing comments (facilitator/owner)

You can hold this during the normal working day, or if you have them in the evening or on a weekend, make sure the employees are compensated and thanked in some fashion.

Adjusting Your Collections Policy

We've discussed a few financial strategies to implement now. Sometimes an easy way to improve your cash flow is to adjust your collection policies. Here's more detail to get you started today!


From TAB-Scottsdale's Business Owner Blog:


"Good times or bad, in order to run a good business, you have to be diligent about collecting your money. The collection process starts the first day the customer decides not to pay on time. I have been on both sides having run healthy companies and having turned around a Chapter 11 company. The ruder the people were the further down the pay list they went. However, if someone was willing to work with me, I would try my best to get them at least some money. Some general collection policies are important in these difficult times."

1. "Have a 30 day, 60 day, 90 day reminder letters prepared, and send them out religiously.
2. As an owner of the company or decision maker do not make the first calls. Otherwise, you are immediately on the spot to start negotiations and have no room to strategize what the next step should be."

Read more....

Growing Your Sales in a Tough Economy

SALES. It regularly ranks as the number one concern for small businesses. Without sales, our revenues suffer and the effects trickle down to other areas of the business. In today's economy, it can be tempting to let fear overtake our will to seize the opportunities before us. But, our small business coaches agree, it doesn't have to be that way.

One of our coaches gives you some great steps to begin to get your sales back on track.

From the CEO Success Blog:

"As daily stories of economic doom and gloom continue to dominate headlines, most companies have their own version of the current economy and its affect on them. Some of your salespeople may be returning from calls with objections like:

• “there’s a spending freeze…”
• “it’s no longer a priority…"
• “they’re going out of business…”
• “they’re laying people off…”
• “they’re postponing the initiative…”
• “they’re only going to do half of what we spoke about…”
• “they’re too busy putting out fires…”
  

There are many more that we don’t need to list here.

If the doom-sayers are correct, excuse making, chronic mediocrity, under achievement, complacency and a selling skill set adequate only for wonderful times may collide head-on with a recession or possible depression. What could be worse? Lots could be worse. You cannot control the global economy, but you do control the strength of your sales force. Tremendous opportunity exists in today’s economy. "

Read more....

Tough Times Don't Last--Tough People Do

The title of this article is attributed to Gregory Peck, but applies well to business owners. I remember many years ago when I was in sales and sales management, fighting against the urge to use a soft economy as an excuse for not producing results. I now see my TAB members fighting that same urge. Forget the excuses and make the following three commitments. If you do, you can actually improve your position during the slowdown.

Maintain Excellence. Customer expectations don’t decline with a slow economy. Be certain your organization promptly returns phone calls to all customers and prospects. Make sure your sales people remain busy with informative follow-up calls, cards and e-mail messages. Absolutely do not let the quality of your product or service slip.

Stand Out. Everybody claims to offer the best service. If you haven’t heard “The Story of the Rose”, ask your TAB facilitator to tell you. You need not only to be excellent, but also to be remembered. I read recently about a retail flooring store (do you think they have many competitors?) that delivered a homemade apple pie with each installation. When they sent a follow-up questionnaire after the job was completed, they included a high quality measuring spoon and asked the question, “How do we measure up?” I know a roofing company that takes photographs of the homes of their customers and publishes them in their newsletter announcing that this customer has been named their “customer of the month (or quarter or year)”. In addition, the customer receives a gift certificate for dinner at an exclusive restaurant.
Expand Your Offering. Offer as much product or service to your existing customers as you can competently deliver. A fabricator observes a customer who buys a fabricated part and then paints it prior to using it. The fabricator has a paint operation and offers to paint the part and save the customer money in the process. A manufacturer’s representative expands her product line to offer more of what her current customers are buying. A fire system inspection and maintenance company adds kitchen hood cleaning to their service card.

If you find yourself “sharing the pain” more frequently these days with your TAB board, get back in balance. Spend more time reviewing the opportunities available to you, and then move forward. Remember: tough times don’t last; tough people do.

Spouses Working Together in a Family Business

There have been a few occasions when I have heard business consultants make the comment, “Just because spouses own and work together in a business doesn’t qualify it as a ‘family business’”. I couldn’t disagree more. After all, part of what makes up the definition of family is a group of people who live together and are related by birth, marriage, adoption, etc. Moreover, the number of spouses working together in a family business is very large. According to the National Federation of Independent Businesses, there are an estimated 1.2 million husband and wife teams running American family businesses.

Spouses working together can, and often do, create family dynamics that are more awkward than other family business relationships. The challenges relating to spouses being family partners are particularly difficult and can cause great strain, in part because the couple not only works together, they also live together. When spouses work together, problems can be as mild as running out of conversation to full-out discord in which the couple stops speaking to each other altogether.

When spouses are running a business together, they have to reach a consensus regarding what they desire for the long-term future of the business. It becomes much easier when couples discuss and come to consensus regarding their respective personal vision statements.

In addition, they need to outline their common dream for the future of the family business in their company vision statement. One way to bring differences in long-term desires out in the open is for the spouses to work together to develop a written, clearly stated company vision statement. Going through the process of creating and refining a company vision statement helps illuminate areas that need mutual agreement and areas in which they do not agree on the future of the business. Mutually agreeing to the major elements in the company vision statement will, at a minimum, reduce the intensity of disputes between them relating to the future of the business, or, at least, bring disputes to a head which will help to reduce the undercurrents between the spouses.

Recapture Your Creativity to Successfully Take on Challenges

At some point, every company faces major challenges. Today, many are feeling the effects of the economy. Upon being confronted with these challenges, some companies retreat, others outright fail and then there are the companies that prosper and grow.

Great Entrepreneurial Managers (GEMs) meet challenges head on. It is often the challenge itself that inspires GEMs to new and better ideas—ideas that lead to company growth. Theirs are the companies that prosper and grow. What is their secret, you ask?

GEMs are open to creative and original thinking. They do not simply fall back on doing what they always have done. Due to their creative thinking, they are able to perceive challenges in a fresh light.

Once GEMs zero in on a problem, they enact innovative solutions that eradicate the challenge. More importantly, they often find ways to turn challenges into opportunities that lead their companies to the next level of growth.

If you think of yourself as being a non-creative type, don’t despair. You can recapture your creativity. As a child, just like nearly every child, you likely possessed curiosity, which is the beginning of creativity. Those who were lucky had parents that nurtured and encouraged this curiosity. The rest, who were not so lucky, may have unconsciously suppressed their curiosity, in part, due to environmental factors. This can happen due to parents or teachers who impatiently tell children to “stop asking so many questions.”

Another environmental factor that could have created an impediment to your creative development was being bombarded with the idea that you should accept what is without questioning why. An example of this is children who are told to simply accept certain religious views “on faith” without being given any facts. Over time, these kinds of vague responses, especially from people we respect, subconsciously work to undo our natural curiosity.

Curiosity is a skill that can be nurtured. Find something that catches your interest and ask questions. Follow your curiosity; it will likely lead to creativity.

GEMs achieve success because they access their creativity. They grow their businesses in spite of major threatening factors or challenges, and so can you.

Changing Course: Making Positive Change

Watching the news of stocks plummeting has prompted many business owners to step back and take a closer look at their company. Treat the current economic crisis as an opportunity to analyze your company more deeply and embark on a course change that will be best for the company’s future success. Here is an effective way to start the process once you have envisioned your course change.

Set new expectations with your executive team or key employees.

Communicate your vision and initial plans with your executive team or key employees first to gain buy-in or resolve any challenges. What are the infrastructure changes that must occur in order to support your course change? For example, if you invest in sales to drive that growth engine with more human resources, be prepared with the company support to deliver on all those new sales. How might you separate duties, create focus and pave the way for scalability to support growth?

Stage a company meeting event to communicate your expectations to all employees.

Do something inspirational to rally the troops! Share your vision, your course change, projected results and how it translates into more opportunities for all employees in the way of professional growth, advancement and compensation. Have fun things in the room—make it a celebration focused on the future, when the financial storm has passed.

Survey employees after your company meeting to assess your communication effectiveness.

You can survey employees with a simple 10-question evaluation of key points you hoped to impart to them during your company meeting. Be sure it is completely confidential and provide an option for open comments, concerns or suggestions that you, as the owner, commit to reading.

It’s your company, your vision, your goals—and your responsibility to be clear not only in your communications, but also in your actions. Successful change takes place only if you’re leading it effectively. If you have been getting involved in too many daily details—whether due to interest, passion or need—you’ll want to refocus on the big picture ideas and activities that create greater impact on results. Then, watch your company surge to the next level.

Common Employer Mistakes Leading to Employee Lawsuits

Being sued is a company’s worst nightmare. Review the most common errors below so you can avoid a potential lawsuit in your organization.

• Lack of Employee Handbook:
  This is the simplest problem to “fix” but many employers still do not have any Handbook or Manual containing the policies and procedures of the Company. Most important is an “at-will” disclaimer properly stating that the employment is not governed by any contractual agreement.
• Lack of Adequate Anti-Discrimination Policies:
  Each state has its own anti-discrimination statute, some more liberal than others. Without anti-discrimination policies that adequately address ALL of the provisions of the law in a particular state, employers leave themselves wide open for a lawsuit.
• Insufficient or Inaccurate Performance Evaluations:
  From probationary assessments to yearly reviews, honest and accurate evaluations must be completed to accomplish three major purposes: (1) legal compliance and documentation; (2) administrative uses; and (3) developmental uses.
• Insufficient or Erroneous Documentation of Personnel Decisions:
  “If it is not documented, it did not happen.” Employers have repeatedly stated, once the lawsuit was filed, that the employee was warned over and over again about their behavior/attitude/performance; however, not one document existed to support their defense.
• Lack of Adequate Investigation Procedures:
  This is a HUGE issue in litigation. Courts throughout the nation have repeatedly admonished Companies for not conducting an objective investigation of a complaint of discrimination, harassment or retaliation in terms of who should conduct the investigation, when it should be conducted, and how it should be conducted.
• Failure to Apply Company Policies/Procedures in Uniform Manner:
  Many disgruntled employees file charges with the EEOC simply because they feel they have been treated differently than their co-worker in terms of enforcement of policies and procedures. As a result, Companies are forced to spend money defending a charge that could easily have been avoided.
• Inadequate Response to Initial Claim:
  In many cases, handling an initial claim properly and timely can eliminate the risk of any future lawsuit. When the response is not appropriate, increased damages in a subsequent lawsuit are likely.
• Lack of Management/Employee Training:
  Perhaps the most talked about topic by judges in the last five years. Anti-harassment training must be mandatory for supervisors and managers and must be available to all employees of the organization concerning how to recognize and eradicate unlawful harassment.