4 Key Elements of Business Success
Business Vision
Business Viability Check
Key Strategic Indicators
Organizational Strategy
To have a successful business, there are 4 key elements that you need to have in place to ensure that your business becomes a vehicle to serve your life, not enslave you.
1. Business Vision
Writing your business vision is necessary in order to create shared expectations for those who work for you and inspire them to join your vision. The business vision is a 1-2 page description of how your business will be when it’s fully in place, exactly the way you imagine it. Building this vision, with some detail about the services and products your offer, your growth goals, the look and feel of the business, the way you treat your customers and employees, etc., creates the clarity for everyone to be on the same page. The business vision establishes the baseline for agreement that leads to accountability. It’s also a powerful recruitment tool that acts like a magnet to attract people to work for your company who are passionate about your vision. Without it, everyone is left to imagine where you’re headed and what’s important.
2. Business Viability Check
It’s important to understand what it takes to make your business profitable. Doing a business viability check is necessary to make sure that the business model you’ve chosen is workable. You have to understand your start-up costs as well as your operating costs to know the potential return on investment that your business can provide. Providing a needed product or service can be valuable and satisfying, but there has to be a return on your investment of some kind to make it all worthwhile. As a business owner, you have to make sure you receive some reward along with all the risk you take. An important part of this is understanding what’s in it for you. The business viability check takes a look at product and service offerings, breakeven and sales ramp to get started, operating costs and profitability. What does the business need to produce to make it profitable?
3. Key Strategic Indicators
Key Strategic Indicators are measures of your progress toward the fulfillment of your business vision. They help you stay on track, closing the gap between where your business is today and where it will be when your business vision is fully in place. The KSIs are determined by your vision. Some may be tangible like gross sales, cost of sales, fixed expenses, net profit, number of employees, etc. Others may be intangible like customer and employee satisfaction ratings. Without a way to measure your progress, you have no way to understand where you are in relation to your goal.
4. Organizational Strategy
The Organizational Strategy is a tool that helps you identify the separate functions you will need to fulfill your vision. This helps you build your business in an organized fashion and avoid overwhelm. It’s the roadmap for your business that defines the functions needed to fulfill your business vision. Your Organization Chart is the framework of your business “house”. Even if you are the only person in your business, there are many functions that make up your business operations that need to be taken into account as you build your business. A business owner typically wears many hats. Separating the business into functions like Marketing, Sales, Operations, Administration, etc. helps you determine who you will hire and when. It can also give you clarity as you move through your day about which hat you are wearing at any particular moment, thereby lessening paralyzing overwhelm that comes from too many things to think about and do at once. Creating an organizational strategy gives you the opportunity to decide which function(s) you’d like to turn over to someone else as the business grows, freeing you to work more strategically on your business as the business grows.
With these 4 elements in place, you will have a strong foundation to build on and a roadmap that will keep you on track toward the fulfillment of your Business Vision.
Call Janice at 408-884-8861 if you have questions about your business. I offer a free consultation that will give you the solutions to your frustrations at no charge.
