Well here they are the golden 6 metrics that will drive any business forward. These of course must align with the goals as set out in the Business Plan
Sales
Key Performance Indicator No 1 for a very good reason. Your sales and marketing plan will identify a stretching but achievable sales target for the coming year
Quality/Complaints/Returns/Rework
Ignore this at your peril. Even if you think it's unjustified, thoroughly look into it and get fast feedback to the customer/client.
Set a reasonable target for non conformance and drive it through daily. All the workforce must engage in Quality Control even if you have dedicated QC officers.
The rework area should be empty. I've seen several manufacturing businesses brought to their knees on this one. If you are a retailer or in services, Quality Control is just as important, change any suppliers/staff members who don't shape up. Remember, there is no winning from any quality issues. Even if you have replaced, refunded, repaired, your reputation and future sales will be irrevocably damaged.
Payroll.
Your Business Plan will again show this one. If it's out of line % wise with sales, then you have an either inefficiency problem or a Sales & Marketing issue to sort.
Cost of materials
You know where to find out what this should be, yes the Business Plan. Have you got some waste or shrinkage going on or have your suppliers upped their prices. Either way, this KPI will quickly show you where action is needed.
Overheads
These days I'm particularly obsessed with Electricity, Gas & Water. Although the buck stops with the senior executive, the whole team needs to be aware of the first 5 of the Big 6.
Cash
It's no good driving growth if your cash goes into a bottle neck. "Great news, our customers owe us £1m. Bad news we cant pay next weeks wages and we are on credit hold with our suppliers"
All The Big 6 need to be in perfect alignment and the right Strategic Pathway will ensure that they are.
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There are a number of elements that make up The Complete Business Tool Kit. These will be listed below with explanations regarding some of what the individual modules contain
Pricing can be found in the About Us tab.
The Tool Kit is best utilised in conjunction with The Big 6 KPI's and also as the full unit. However, if you're just starting out then maybe purchasing 1 or 2 modules will be enough to get you going. I've already given you The Big 6, monitor those daily and that will show your strategic priorities.
Business Fundraiser Plan
This Plan is an essential tool for raising Bank Loans, Overdrafts, getting Investors on board etc etc. However you intend to secure funds, using either Debt, Equity of even Grants you will need a professional document to support your application.
Integrating the standard Business Plan with the Financial & Marketing Plans will demonstrate that your Business is thoroughly thought through and well capable of repayment and/or producing dividends for Investors.
Business Plan
This is simply a must even if you're not seeking to raise funds. It will increase your understanding of your business and help to inform outside parties like Board members, Lenders, Investors, Grantors etc.
The plan also contains a business and cyber protection check list. Useful for start ups and established businesses alike.
The Financial Planner
This is usually used in conjunction with the Business Plan. It sets out your Financial Projections for an appropriate period of time, I suggest a minimum of 1 year with a maximum of 5 years. The figures set out here will be used to monitor The Big 6, so if real life shows your plan to be over ambitious, then change it
There's no point whatsoever in kidding yourself (and/or your Lenders/Investors) . Use the right modules to bring your numbers to match and if that proves not to be possible, boost your corrective actions or downscale your expectations.
The Sales & Marketing Plan
First of The Big 6 for a very good reason. Miss your sales targets by a significant margin and you're in real trouble. Thankfully, the modern world sees more and more traction being gained on Social Media and most of that is free of charge. The module itself is based on the classic 4 P's proposition (P. Kotler) but has a modern twist to take in LinkedIn, TikTok et al. It's all there: Marketing, Lead Generation, Funnelling, Sales, Go to X 10 in 12 months!
The Leadership Development Plan
If you want to grow the business in a sustainable way then you have to be a Leader as well as a Manager.
Micro managing will simply demotivate the staff and cause you to crash and burn. Learn how to get the best out of everyone and then delegate. There's a section on Emotional Intelligence included here and when you get into that, you will be amazed at the affect it can have on your people.
The truth is that you may well be able to set up the business in accordance with the Business Plan but if you are to grow in a sustainable way you simply can't do that on your own. Running a business from a hospital bed is not a good idea. Healthy back pressure is one thing, extreme stress bordering on duress is quite another. Train, develop, empower your people and they will deliver reducing your work and stress load dramatically.
The Manager/Operator Development Plan
Need to see productivity and efficiency improvements? Invest in your people. This plan shows you how to develop them first and then lead them to the end goal. That's a big win, win situation as this plan looks at the situation from both sides. This is about your people and the main focus is rightly on them. The resultant business improvement is a welcome by-product.
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So now you have started to grow your business and the people in it. It's highly unlikely that left to it's own devices it will continue to run along a smooth path.
There is a real need to look at all your people and systems, evaluate, improve and start over. This needs to be a repetitive programme of corrective actions.
Identify, Isolate, Analyse, these are the key elements in your Continuous Business Improvement Programme. Its therefore, important, that you set up your systems with the three tenets above well in mind.
Take sales & marketing. The old cliché of "only half my advertising is working but I don't know which half" is anathema to me. Make sure that you know which message in which medium works. It's a simple matter to add a promotional code and then run one advert against another. Please remember that a large part of business is experimental. Having conducted your experiments, keep and analyse the data.
When it comes to advertising and promotions nobody can tell you what will work for certain. Therefore, its really important that you test the water in an incremental way. Don't burn through all of your contacts or money without conducting these patch test with a follow up series of improvements.
Look at the Operator Development Plans and you will see how much the individual performance is contributing and if that has improved. If you can't change some of the people then change those people. You can't take everyone on your journey, some will be left on the platform
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