Every business school, business writer, and coaching organization (including us), expounds the need for good business planning, and yet sometimes in the course of our work we encounter very successful companies that do not have a formal, well communicated vision or strategy for the organization. How do they defy the odds if they don’t follow the rules?
Business strategy is just one of the elements that influence success. Leadership competency, sales execution, employee hiring and retention, staff engagement, and transition planning are among the other critical variables. Businesses without well-developed and broadly communicated business plans often overachieve in one or more of these other areas.
- Leadership: The company hires and develops exceptional leaders who inspire their teams beyond normal performance.
- Sales execution: Clients seek out the company’s product and/or the sales team does a really good job communicating the value proposition.
- Employee hiring, retention and engagement: The organization and its leadership have found the secret sauce that drives the right performance. As a result both staff and culture are exceptional.
- Transition planning: The organization has a well laid out plan for succession. Leaders and employees feel secure about and more committed to their future in the company.
So why then do they often engage firms like us? First and foremost, high performing organizations are more likely to invest to enhance and improve their results.
Second, sometimes although the organization enjoys success, the leaders feel like hamsters on a wheel; but, the wheel, not the hamster is setting the pace. They feel like they’re hitting their limits. Or put another way, they are overwhelmed by the stress of plugging the dike in so many places in order to meet performance expectations.
Those leaders who come to us recognize that they can increase capacity through better planning and communication. It’s much easier to stay zen when you have a plan.