Would you work for you?

August 14, 2012 1 Comment

When we were researched and wrote up our own learning, and the learning of others,  for what drives long-term success for ambitious business owners there was one theme that dominated the answers to the question – if you had your time again, what would you do differently?

I wish that I had taken on people more talented than me much earlier on

These comments are reflected in an earlier theme entrepreneur as leader and they beg a further question – how does an ambitious and growing SME attract and retain talent?

In our observation, the businesses who struggle say things like:

  • who would want to come and work for a small business in a rural town like Boringville
  • we can’t offer the same attractive salaries or career progression of a large corporate
  • we have to make do with what we have got

In comparison, the businesses who seem to make more progress say things like:

  • people join us because of our culture
  • it is a real challenge focusing the energy and ideas that come with ambitious people – but what a challenge to have
  • I’ve had to find and adapt to a new role, at the same time establishing where I can really add value

We are sure that this is much to do with great leadership AND great management – something that many business owners struggle to achieve balance with. But what does seem clear is the need for a compelling story that engages potential and current employees in the purpose and values of the business; informs them about what they need to focus on to be successful; and inspires them with what might be achieved together.

But these are our thoughts and our experience with our clients … in your opinion what helps ambitious business owners to attract and retain talent? What works? What doesn’t?

The topic will be explored in further depth at our next compass meeting.

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Growing your business with other people involved

June 21, 2012 Leave a comment

Through our Compass Meeting on 14 June 2012, (Agenda for Compass Meeting #7) and various online discussions, we’ve spent the last two weeks exploring and developing the theme “Two from the top please Carol”. It has been an enlightening and interesting exploration of essentially what is required at the top of a growing SME to make it successful in the long-term.  What seems to have emerged from the discussion are two choices and some tricky middle ground:

  • The original theme highlights one of these – partnership and the ever evolving fusion of two distinctly different but connected parts.
  • The debate put forward the second choice – strong leadership backed up by an employed but committed and empowered management team.
  • And, the conversations unearthed the middle ground – a strong individual trapped between a desire to delegate and a fear to let go.

Partnership in its truest sense

By partnership, we essentially mean two (maybe three) people who provide the ying and yang described in “two from the top please Carol”. Amongst this population we hear some common phrases:

  • “we are not the most natural fit with each other – on paper it shouldn’t work”
  • “I wasn’t sure if I could trust him to begin with but I began to realise that he delivered on what he said he would do and the trust built from there”
  • “sometimes it feels like the staff treat us a bit like mum and dad – going from one to the other until they get what they want – but we’ve learnt to adopt a united front in public and ensure  our strongest debates happen in private”
  • “we are really clear on the goals and the direction – the constructive debate comes in how we get there”
  • “it really is a partnership of equals in every sense – when he says something I know there must be something in it, even if I can’t see it straightaway”
  • “we are very lucky to have found each other”

For this approach: perhaps the greatest strength is someone who is there to bounce ideas off, share the burden and reap the rewards together? And the greatest weakness is the lack of ease with which you can bring others into this dynamic duo environment?

Reflecting on the feel of the partnership, it seems to have an informal and organic nature – a relationship that has developed over time with firm roots that allows it to sway in the breeze.

Strong leadership supported by strong management team

In this scenario the same ying and yang is achieved through different means. There is a clear and strong leader and a loyal serving management team. The leader owns the direction and the vision, management the implementation and resource. The collective of the management team challenges the leader on the direction and vision, whilst the leader holds the management team to account.

Whilst we did not explore this in depth during the conversation, we have previously heard comments like:

  • “it is my business and whilst I am willing to share in the success I am clear that is my business”
  • “we are really clear about roles – the management team know what decisions they are empowered to make and when they need to involve me”
  • “we spend two weeks of the year out of the business developing, agreeing and monitoring our plans to achieve the vision”

For this approach, perhaps the strength is a sense of security and knowing where you stand? And, the weakness that you never fully empower people to take the lead?

Reflecting on the feel of the relationship, there seems to be a stronger sense of formality – structured planning processes, a clear delineation of role descriptions and a team process that works.

Consistent in both worlds

In reality, these two worlds have a subtle difference and essentially achieve the same result. The success of each appears dependent upon some common elements:

  1. Sounding board for leadership – inside or outside the business
  2. Absolute clarity on the future direction and needs of the business
  3. Self-awareness in leadership’s strengths or weaknesses
  4. Willingness to work with people who are better than you
  5. Time to explore and have the debate
  6. Evolving a sense of trust – delivery on promises
  7. Two-way street – the interdependent ability to unlock and work with diverse points of view

Avoiding the trap

During the rewriting of this theme, we were reminded of Katzenbach and Smith’s work on the Wisdom of Teams and their exploration of working group or team.

Perhaps the dangerous middle ground is reflected by an ambitious business owner struggling with the transition of holding individuals accountable for their roles and wanting the team to work together?

As ever with these themes, we often seem to rediscover learning through the ages and apply it to a specific context – after all, two heads are better than one and too many cooks spoil the broth! And, elements of this certainly appear to be reinforced by others.

So, if you are an ambitious business owner looking to grow your business and achieve enduring success, some important questions worth asking are:

  • To what extent do you have ying and yang represented in your business?
  • What are you doing to contribute to (or hinder) a sense of partnership or team?
  • How will you create a strong sense of common purpose, values and vision with the people that are critical to the long-term success of your business?
  • How can you make more of the difference that resides within your partnership or team?
  • Who is your unbiased sounding board?

If this theme, or others have interested you and you would value exploring it further, please do not hesitate to contact us adamcampbell@telospartners.com. For more information, click here.

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Simply better – hits the nail on the head

March 21, 2012 2 Comments

The post ‘what is unique about being unique?’ was born from our observations of ambitious business owners who create and grow businesses that stand out from the crowd, punch above their weight with larger organisations and grow faster than their peers. On 13 March 2012, our sixth compass meeting for ambitious business owners built upon this theme and explored what you need to do to create such an outstanding business. The conclusion was remarkably simple – be better by:

  1. doing the hard yards by working out what customers really value and are willing to pay for
  2. being passionate about why you want to, and how you can, deliver that value
  3. being focused [obsessed] on delivering that value time and time again
  4. ensuring your marketing and communications clearly and concisely demonstrate all of the above so that you can deliver more of this value to more these types of customers

If you want to create your own outstanding business then the Simon Sinek TED video ‘how great leaders inspire’ seems to be a good place to start and the questions below appear to be important ones to develop answers for.

Enough said, we are off to help more ambitious business owners (as one of our clients said) ‘to chart and to navigate their way to long-term business success’. If you want to find out more about how we can help you to achieve this please contact adamcampbell@telospartners.com.

inside OUT

  1. What problem is your business here to solve?
  2. Why do you want to solve it?
  3. What do you passionately believe in?
  4. What difference do you want to make?

OUT side in

  1. Who are you targeting as your ideal customer?
  2. What problem are you really trying to solve in their eyes?
  3. What do they really value?
  4. What does ‘world class’ delivery of this value look like?
  5. How will they judge success?
  6. How well do you deliver this value?
  7. How could you deliver this more?
  8. How can you do this more consistently?

stand OUT

  1. Who are your real competitors?
  2. How do you stack up against them?
  3. How will you win beat them?
  4. How can you demonstrate that you are better?
  5. What work would you never take on? Why?

OUT standing

In a sentence, describe why your customers will want you and your competitors will fear you

And finally, what can you do for your existing and potential ideal customers to allow them to experience your outstanding business?

For more information please see the attached file for a summary of the conversation.Compass meetings #6 – summary of outputs.

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Getting beyond the point of no return

March 6, 2012 1 Comment

This theme is aimed at those people who are thinking of setting up their own businesses. It begins to explore the things that need to be considered for sustainable success even before the business exists.

I have lost count of the number people I have spoken to who, early on in the conversation, say ‘I’ve been thinking of going into business myself’ or ‘I’ve just started a business with a friend’ or ‘I’d like to start my own business’. For the majority that I meet, I get an overwhelming sense that it is never going to happen. It might be in their tone of voice, the look in their eye or the way they ramble on about the business idea, but, I just can’t help but think it is never going to happen. And, for those people that I have kept in touch with, I can’t think of any of them who have gone on to really do it. They might start a business, they might even do some business, but, eventually the thought, idea or dream slips away “well at least I gave it a go!”

On rare occasions, I meet someone who I really believe. Somehow, you just know it is going to happen. And sure enough – it does! I have often wondered what lies within this difference and in my occasional moments of reflection, three phrases spring to mind: moments of commitment; opening up options; and, getting beyond the point of no return.

When setting up a business, you will face many moments of commitment – consider them hurdles. These hurdles vary in height and difficulty. They might include a lack of full (or perceived) support from your partner/spouse, through to, obtaining funds to take your idea to market. Those business owners who go on to great things, seem to find ways to use these hurdles to fuel their business idea and ambition “each time I heard the word ‘no’ it made me more determined to make it happen”. Whilst, those whose ideas and business that fell by the way side saw these hurdles as an ever increasing size ‘I’ve worked out that I now need to raise £5m to get this off the ground’.

In addition to this, there seems to be something important in the way that successful business owners go about this exploratory phase. Let me give you a very simple example. It comes from how two close friends (both now running successful businesses in their own right) went about choosing a name for each of their businesses. Both of them were able to describe what they wanted the business to stand for. Both of them knew the gap they wanted to fill in the market place. Both of them used people outside of the business to come up with a name. Both of them tested these names with lots of people. Both of them ended up with a very clear favourite that they felt described what they wanted the business to truly stand for.

Successful business owners seem to open up options. They have a core idea that they want to test and evolve. They know what it is but they can’t really describe it. They take this idea and throw it open to other people. They are willing to gather other people’s ideas/thoughts and explore all possible options – before closing things down and focusing back on their core goals. It is a process that they adopt for many aspects of the business before it even starts. From the business structure, through financing and even taking on employees, they invite people into their challenge.

Compare this to the others who don’t make it (including myself on a couple of occasions!). They have an idea, think of a name, start a business to register the name, and start saying ‘I’ve got my own XXX business’ or ‘I am opening up a XXX’. They close down options and almost become protective of their original idea. They lack the confidence to take on board alternative points of view. Consequently, they don’t find alternative routes over, through or around the hurdles.

Perhaps these initial two aspects of this theme are about people dipping a toe in the inviting, but freezing, crystal blue waters of a swimming pool on a baking hot day. However, if you want to go swimming, at some point you have to commit fully, you have to immerse yourself in those icy wateres and have your breath taken away.

It is your final moment of commitment – it is the point at which you have to get beyond the point of no return. ‘I’ve told so many people what I am doing, I’ve got so many people interested in the results, that I really have no choice but to make it work – I will feel a failure if I don’t do it’.

Below are some phrases or thoughts that I might expect to hear from someone who is truly ready to start their own business. They are indicative rather than exhaustive or exclusive. I am sure many business owners have started businesses without doing this, but I am convinced that those that went onto greater things got to this point (or an equivalent) first.

I feel that I have no other choice but to do this myself

  • I have tested my business idea with lots of people, taken on board their critical feedback and it has heightened my belief that I have to do this now
  • I have a written this down in a plan for the business and have set out some financial targets
  • I have thought deeply about the business name, I have tested lots of different names and chosen a name that truly highlights the nature and ethos of the business
  • I have thought deeply about the business structure and governance and I am sure that this will allow me to explore future avenues for growth
  • I have enough money in place to fund the first 12 months of the business
  • I know that it might take longer than I want and that it will be harder than I think but I feel ready to take on the challenge
  • I have a clear action plan for the first 6 months of the business
  • I have sufficient access to the right advice and support

To summarise, I’d like to use the analogy of a magnetic attraction. The more that a successful business owner gets into the detail, the greater is the level of attraction. Eventually, the attraction becomes so strong that the two entities (business owner and business) can’t help but stick together. Whilst with the others, the experience is much more like magnetic repulsion. The more you pushed them towards their idea the greater the desire they had to move away from it!

So if you are thinking of setting up your own business, what are you doing to increase your sense of attraction to your business idea? Some additional questions worth considering:

  • What are my possible routes for exit?
  • How does the ownership structure of my business enable or inhibit these routes?
  • If you are considering working in partnership with someone, what difficult conversations have you not yet had?
  • What stepping stones can I create to eliminate some of the risks or accelerate my progress?
  • What skills, capabilities or people do I need in order to give my business the greatest possible chances of success?
  • What will attract them to the business?
  • What are you willing to give up in return for their contribution?
  • How will you create a business that stands out in your market place? (click here for more information)

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What is unique about being unique?

February 10, 2012 1 Comment

Recently, I was privileged enough to be invited to form part of a panel of ‘so called experts’. It is not my preferred way of engaging with business owners, large-scale talks tend to have a limited long-term impact, but I was honoured to have been asked.

We were speaking to expectant business owners at a Fitness Industry convention, the dawn of the ‘budget club’ had well and truly arrived. Having spent years competing with national operators, the 150, or so, people in the audience now faced a real challenge ‘if I can’t compete on facilities and I can’t compete on price, what can I do?!’

Each esteemed and, might I say, carefully selected expert had been asked to prepare a 3-minute introduction to kick-off the discussion. I spent hours preparing mine, well, most of the two hour train journey to the NEC. Imparting my ‘distilled wisdom and simple truths’ I found myself telling the audience ‘you have a fantastic opportunity to compete and carve out your niche in your market place’ – I made a strong emphasis on your to infer that they were in charge of their own destiny. I went to summarise my key lessons as ‘be unique, target your customers and make it easy for them to buy’ And, using their own language, so did pretty much every other panellist. In fact, three of us had made reference to the parallels of going fishing… not much uniqueness in that!

Perhaps the consistency of the message is important – there are no silver bullets – but it got me thinking. What is unique about unique? What do we mean by real difference? What are the implications for the long-term (as well as the short-term) success of your business?

Many business owners start a business because: they intuitively feel there is a gap in the market ‘I couldn’t get what I wanted, so I started a business myself’; or they believe ‘I could do a better job and make more money, if I left this company and did it myself’. The driving force to do it is emotive and strong, often a massive sense of dissatisfaction with the status quo. In their heads they can see it and define it, but articulating it and communicating it is a real challenge. Over a period of time, they develop smart and complicated answers to a question that they often get asked ‘what do you do?’ But ‘people never quite get it’ and the more that this happens the more they take on whatever work they can get for whatever the price – bang goes their uniqueness.

Instead of trying to be unique, perhaps the question ambitious business owners should be asking themselves is how to create an outstanding business? Creating a business that stands out from the outside in and the inside out. It is the obsessive pursuit for the alignment of business purpose and values and the delivery of the customer experience that successful business owners appear to focus on.

What seems to be required are some different questions:

From the inside OUT

  • What problem are you really trying to solve?
  • Why are you trying to solve it?
  • What do you really believe in?
  • What difference do you want to make?
  • What capability, knowledge, relationships or experience do you have that no-one else can replicate?
To being OUT standing
  • Who are you targeting as your ideal customer?
  • What do they really value? What problem are you really trying to solve in their eyes?
  • How will they judge success? What does ‘world class’ of delivery of this value look like?
  • How well do you deliver this value? How could you deliver this more?
To standing OUT
  • Who are your real competitors?
  • How do you stack up against them? How will you win?
  • How can you demonstrate that you are better?
  • What work would you never take on? Why?
Back to OUT side in
  • In a sentence describe why your customers will want you and your competitors will fear you
  • What can you do for your existing and potential ideal customers to allow them to experience your outstanding business?

If you want a different take on the same subject please look at this video.

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