4 ESSENTIAL STEPS FOR MANAGING BUSINESS GROWTH
Often as entrepreneurs we become so focused on bringing the product to market, advertising the product, and selling the same that we fail to grow all aspects of the business in unison.
As a result, while the business attains its ever-increasing benchmarks in sales it is growing upon an infrastructure that is not keeping pace with the growth of the business.
Flaws in management systems slowly begin to be revealed. Quality control is not in sync with the growth. Eventually a tipping point is reached in which these flaws, caused by the failure of the business to grow its infrastructure at the same rate as sales and advertising, cause the system to collapse.
You must grow your organizational structure in proportion to your business. Here’s how:
1. Create a Scalable Management Model
As your business grows you must develop scalable management and quality control systems. In the beginning management and quality control is easy. Perhaps your business begins only as a solo entrepreneurial endeavor or one among just a few people. Everyone has a defined role and everyone knows what everyone else’s role in the company is. Nonetheless, as your business grows and duties become more segmented among new employees, a management structure must be put in place to ensure accountability against established benchmarks as well as to make sure quality control of your goods and services remains constant.
In this regard, each position’s duties and responsibilities should be defined in writing. An organizational chart should be constructed and maintained which clearly defines who is responsible for what, who reports to whom, on what subjects, and how often. If properly segmented over time you will see your organizational structure begin to resemble a pyramid with the CEO on top and increasingly widening rows of persons with specific defined roles thereunder.
2. Define a Quality Control System
As your company grows you must make sure that the quality of your goods or services is maintained despite its increasing size. As such, you must determine what elements should exist in a quality control system and then assign the responsibility of maintaining that quality to someone within your management model.
3. Execute the Systems 100 Percent of the Time
Now that you have created a scalable management model with a defined quality control system it’s time to make sure it is executed to perfection.
Each person within the management and quality control team by now should know their respective duties and responsibilities. Even so, you must ensure that those systems and assignments are executed without deviation 100 percent of the time. To this end, especially for small and mid-sized businesses, we have found that it is very effective to use daily and weekly checklists to make sure individuals are performing their assigned tasks in a consistent manner.
4. Listen to the Numbers. Numbers Do Not Lie.
Lastly, even when you set up the systems and grow management and quality control systems in pace with your organization’s growth you must still always be mindful of the numbers. Numbers don’t lie. If used properly, they will tell you where additional oversight or changes are needed within your organization to increase efficiency, sales, and quality.
Returning to our opening discussion, let’s say sales are great. They are growing at an unbelievable pace. Yet your accounting department tells you something is amiss. Something is wrong. Your expenses are outpacing your revenue growth. The numbers don’t lie and they will tell you more about the health of your business than anything else.
So what do you do when the numbers tell a story you don’t like? Use them. Use them to determine what the problem is. Create a system to fix the problem and then assign it to someone to manage and create the internal systems to ensure those systems are run to perfection 100 percent of the time.