Is it time to Sharpen the Saw?

With 2020 rapidly drawing to a close, most of us are reflecting on the highs and lows of what has been an incredibly challenging year.

Whether your business has found opportunity in the midst of the impact of COVID-19 and grown, or sadly found itself lost in adversity and going backwards, one thing that is certain and unites us all is our business environments have changed profoundly.

So how do you get your business back on track, recover the lost growth planned for 2020 and build a successful 2021?

An annual exercise I do with my clients is taking time to 'Sharpen the Saw'. We all know having the right tools is essential to be able to do a great job. Gardeners know a sharp saw is much better than a blunt one - it always results in faster work and a better result.

So why do we continually try and grow our businesses, when critical parts are not as 'sharp' and fit for purpose as they need to be? We know we should make time to make these elements better, but we rarely 'slow down to speed up'!

So with the year coming to a close and businesses showing signs of resting a little for the Christmas break, it might be a good time for you to take stock of the great and not so great parts of your business.

So how do you get started?

Start simply. On a scale of -5 to +5 consider typical key elements of your business, like the following:

• Customers
• Products and Services
• Operations and Systems
• Sales Processes
• Customer Service

How good do you think these are? Are they good enough to support your business growth plans? ( feel free to expand the list and be realistic in your assessment).

An honest reflection on the quality of these parts of your business will focus you on the key elements that probably need your attention and could be better.

Once you've identified an area that you believe needs improving, you can dig and little deeper into what's missing, what needs to improve, etc, and build out something more valuable.

To help you establish where to focus your attention, our Growth and Profit Diagnostic tool could be useful.

I hope you find time to do this incredibly important exercise. It's always worth the time invested in it, if you act on what you find out.

Good luck and if I can help in any way, happy to connect and support your business growth!