Early stage business leaders have to make decisions with limited resources, incomplete information and little room for wasted effort.
A founding team can be exceptional at building a product, service, solution or experience but still finding their feet as a leadership team.
When businesses are growing fast and a leadership team is under real pressure for the first time, symptoms show up that deserve our attention.
Strategic thinking may crowd out operational grounding, or the other way around. Communication can be thorough but not holistic, or visa versa. Great product creators aren’t necessarily either natural or evolved executive leaders.
Building a successful business demands commercial, financial, people and leadership acumen that needs to be consciously quickly developed rather than slowly, piecemeal, and potentially incompletely, acquired.
Here are some thoughts.
The six areas below are a practical high level lens for thinking about the business you are running and the environment you are creating.
'When we're looking to improve our B2B business, I think a good place to start is to consider and, where necessary, take action in these six areas:
-- Firstly, the clarity and appropriateness of our offer in the context of the markets we serve and the resources, both operational and financial, available to us. We don't want to be stretched too thin or applying our efforts in areas that don't suit us or our configuration well.
-- Secondly, the quality of our customer base, paying particular attention to their ability and willingness to pay for what it is we have to offer. The better the quality of our customer base the stronger our business.
-- Thirdly, the environment we have designed, consciously or otherwise, for our people. A good question to ask and to listen carefully and take positive steps in response to is "are we as a team, are we as an individual, easy to work with and easy to work for?"
-- Fourthly, the business and people acumen of each member of our management team. The more adept our leaders are in these areas the likelier they'll set a positive, collaborative and commercial tone for their respective teams and make good decisions.
-- Fifthly, the confidence, consciousness and capability of our sales professionals to engage on a business level with business leaders and other budget holders. The more of an asset our people are to our customers the likelier we succeed.
-- Sixthly, the confidence, consciousness and capability of our non-sales customer facing professionals in building strong productive relationships both externally and internally. The closer we collaborate the stronger our bonds.'
- Rob Evans, Founder Of Outperformance Highway, Based On 35+ Years Working Inside 150+ Businesses Worldwide
Consciously or otherwise, we're always making choices.
And not all choices are equal.
We never have endless reserves of cash, time, energy and attention.
We have many ways to allocate the assets we do have.
Some steps hardly move us forward.
Perfection burns resource.
Bad choices destroy progress.
Sometimes we catch sight of a good outcome with reasonable certainty and modest cost.
We need to really go for it when we do.
How proactive and deliberate are we in finding those big leaps forward for modest investments and risk?
Are we actually drowning in too much volume or choosing to have no breathing room because we haven't found a more strategic way forward?
Is getting each task done, each report out, each fire extinguished and each request attended to really a way of rationalising our distance from a state that we feel we ought to be at but which we haven't yet figured out how to reach?
The big picture is so easily lost in a sea of operational volume.
It takes determination to shift our state, and it begins with the reality of where we are today.
Are we clear headed enough about where we are, or are we too deep in the operational to see it?
The answers to human questions matter as much as strategic ones.
Feelings drive behaviours.
What would they say?
About us.
Are we as an individual, are we as a team, are we as an organisation, both energising to work with and energising to work for?
If all the answers are yes, we're in a great place.
If any of the answers are no, why and what are we going to do about it?
Curriculum For Your Short Free Programme
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Introduction
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The First Question
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What Is Good Leadership?
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Ways To Improve Performance
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A Short Session On PPMCLeadership™️
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The Final Word
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About this course
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All of the above is drawn from 35+ years working inside 150+ businesses worldwide including 50+ acquisitions. It's not theory, it's what I discovered and observed working and where I saw people come unstuck.
'Luck may play a part but outperformance is never a fluke.'
- Rob Evans, Founder, Outperformance Highway