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Why Business Vision is Important

Article by: Sara Pantaleo

Do you have a crystal clear mental image of what you want to be like in five years’ time? This vision can stop you from heading off course.

The best way to come up with your vision, I’ve found, is by creating an image in my head that depicts what success looks like at this point or somewhere down the line when these goals are accomplished! However, we need to be able to formalise and communicate our vision; this is crucial for the success of any company.

A good way to formalise it, which also helps you communicate more effectively with co-workers or clients alike, would be through writing down what this entails in terms of how best your company can achieve their goals in making an impact within said industry/field goes.

Setting a vision is the first step to creating something great. It means we are passionate and have dreams for where we want to end up! Having this larger-than mini goal clarifies everything that needs doing right now so you can get on board with achieving them all at once instead of spreading yourself thin over many different tasks/projects, which ends up giving less impressive results because there isn’t enough time spent working towards your ultimate objective.

What is the Business Vision?  

It is often confused with a mission statement. The difference between a vision and a mission statement is that the former looks towards what you want to achieve in future, whereas the latter focuses on current activities. Vision provides a sense of purpose and direction for your business. “Your” vision will help you define short-term and long-term goals. It can also guide decisions that are made along the way. A company’s vision must align with its mission, strategic planning, culture, and core values. A vision statement is not necessarily set in stone; it can be returned to and changed as the business evolves over time.

Passion

How to Define Your Vision?     

Now that we’ve established what a vision statement is, here are some steps to use when defining yours:

  • Be specific. It needs to be detailed yet easily understood by everyone. It should clearly spell out the future direction.
  • Make it challenging. Your vision statement should create excitement and inspire. You want it to be ambitious and motivating.
Do Something Great

Why vision is crucial

A vision statement provides a focal point for goals, culture and everything else. Most importantly, a company’s clear vision can unify employees and create more profound meaning for their work. Not only does this bring people together, but it also helps them achieve success as they are all contributing towards achieving shared goals. And if tough times arise, it provides the motivation and drive to persevere through those challenges. A vision is designed to inspire and align.

We can help you articulate your business vision.

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Why is Business Strategy Important

Why is Business Strategy Important


Article by: Sara Pantaleo

Businesses tell me that they have no time to work on business strategy. The reality is that businesses can feel rudderless without a business strategy. A business strategy is a great way to help an organisation achieve goals, and define its methods and tactics. A business strategy needs to include the whole team and become what you do every day and not something that gets done occasionally.

Business Strategy

What is a business strategy?

A business strategy is a set of objectives that articulate the organisation’s business plans. A business strategy also defines what the organisation needs to do to achieve the goals and will guide the way. This helps for better decision-making and workforce planning, and resource allocation.   A business strategy guides all the organisation’s departments in a clear set of critical responsible areas (KRAs) and working together to achieve the organisation’s goals. 

It is essential to create a business strategy aligned to your organisation’s purpose, vision, mission and values to ensure that your strategic objectives align with your culture and meet your customers’ needs.

What are the key considerations for creating an effective business strategy?

When creating a business strategy, it is essential to have insight into your organisation, foresight into the environment around you, and opportunities for future planning. This will involve using tools such as SWOT to assess where your organisation is at a point in time and research your current and future sources of sustainable growth and innovations. Assess the external factors that may impact your organisation or industry, such as:

  1. Connected all the time – what does this mean to employee wellbeing and delivering to your customers
  2. The information age – are you aware of all the latest industry innovations
  3. Artificial Intelligence (AI) and robotics
  4. Codification of money
  5. Cybersecurity
  6. Life Sciences
  7. Climate change

Getting the whole team together early in the process will ensure that you consider all the essential factors such as the strengths and weaknesses, create or review the vision and identify your top big hairy audacious goals (BHAG). In addition, the process will help you determine where you are now, the external factors to consider, where you want to go, and how to get there. 

Elements of Business Strategy

Basic Business Strategy Planning Process

  1. Planning Awareness
  2. Formulating goals
  3. Analysing the external environment
  4. Analysing the internal environment
  5. Identifying strategic opportunities and threats
  6. Performing gap analysis – create a strategy that leverages your strengths and identifies any gaps that need to be addressed.
  7. Developing alternative strategies – is essential also to building contingencies.
  8. Implementing strategies – creating a business action plan, including all stakeholders, is crucial to executing your strategy.
  9. Measuring and controlling the progress

Planning and awareness – A business strategy helps you identify the key steps to reach your business goals. Setting big goals is essential to stay focused on achieving your objectives.

Efficiency – A business strategy allows you to allocate resources effectively for your business activities, automatically making you more efficient. It also helps you plan for deadlines, assign job roles and stay on track for your project goals.

Control – Creating a business strategy gives you more control over choosing the activities that will directly help you reach your goals and allows you to quickly assess whether your actions are getting you close to your goals.

Competitive advantage – By identifying a clear plan for how you will reach your goals, you can focus on capitalising on your strengths, using them as a competitive advantage that makes your company unique in the marketplace.

Other Key Components of Creating Business Strategy

Vision

A business strategy is intended to help you reach your business objectives. With a vision for the direction of the business and clarity of purpose, you can create clear instructions in the business strategy for what needs to be done and who is responsible for completing each step.

Core values

A business strategy guides top-level executives and departments about what should and should not be done according to the organisation’s core values. It helps everyone stay on the same page and with the same goals.

SWOT

Stands for strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. This process helps an organisation assess where you are, identify and evaluate your organisation’s strengths and weaknesses, and identify untapped opportunities and threats that you need to mitigate. 

Tactics

Many business strategies articulate the operational details of how the work should be done to maximise efficiency. As a result, people responsible for tactics understand what needs to be done, saving time and effort.

Resource allocation plan

A business strategy includes where you will find the required resources to complete the plan, how the resources will be allocated and who is responsible for doing so. In this regard, you will see where you need to add more resources to complete your projects.

Measurement

The business strategy also includes tracking the organisation’s output and evaluating how it is performing about the targets set before the strategy’s launch. This helps you stay on track with deadlines, goals, and budgetary concerns. This will ensure that you can do more of what is working and stop doing what is not working.

Business Strategy Plan

Pitfalls of Creating Business Strategy

  1. Not executing – strategy is a choice; execution is imperative
  2. Do-it-all – Failing to make choices and making everything a priority
    • What can you execute now with the resources available
  3. Not customer-focused – what’s suitable for customers is good for business
  4. Not agile – Need to adapt and change to market conditions or customer needs and feedback and stay relevant
  5. Something-for-everyone – Attempting to capture all consumer or category segments simultaneously. Be clear and serve one market well

Simple examples of Strategic Goals

Cross-sell more products

Increasing the amount of product sold per customer can increase your average spend. However, even a slight increase can significantly impact profitability without spending money to acquire new customers.

Improve Customer Service

Having customers top of mind in your business can help to deliver quality customer service by building a solid reputation of having exceptional customer service with help more referrals and more sales. If you have a problem in a specific area of servicing your customers, having a goal focused on improving customer service will have objectives that centre around the customer.

Sustainability

You could launch an entire business strategy to increase your business’s sustainability. For example, focus on reducing energy costs, decreasing your organisation’s carbon footprint or becoming more circular. This may also include how you will be more community focus.

Start Creating your Business Strategy

Organisations may feel overwhelmed, time-poor, and unable to work on creating a business strategy. What are the consequences if you do not set a plan? So, start small. Get your whole team together, review your business honestly and assess where you are and where you want to go. Then set clear goals and actions aligned to your vision, purpose and values, including being customer-centric. Ensure you assign accountability for each activity. Make each goal realistic and part of what you do day-to-day and measure, review and act. Stop doing what is not working!

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Franchisee Recruitment

Franchisee Recruitment

Article by: Sara Pantaleo

Creating and building a profitable and successful franchise brand involves a lot of factors; having a great product or service, clear vision and strategy, a profitable business model, success for franchisees, franchisor and customers, effective leadership, an organisation with purpose, a great team of staff and good franchisees with solid alignment to brand and a great relationship with the franchisor.

Where the franchisor sets the vision and strategic objectives for the organisation, it is the franchisee that executes the vision with the customer.  It is, therefore, important that the franchisee is clear on the vision and run it well.  Franchisees aligned to your brand and able to deliver at ground level as was intended.

So, what are the essential ingredients in franchisee recruitment to have the most excellent chance to succeed in your franchise?

Firstly, you need to know what it takes to be successful in your organisation and the attributes that make a franchisee successful in your brand.  This might be their work ethic, how they interact with customers, lead their team or specific attributes required for your industry.  It will also help understand and identify their characteristics and assess when they apply to be a franchisee.  As a franchisor who has been in business, you will be able to train in the practical skills, but you must determine what they are at the recruitment stage to create a development plan before they start in their franchise.  You will also need to ensure that they have the financial capital to succeed.
In some cases, it can take over twelve months to reach profitability. Therefore, the franchisor needs to understand that the prospective franchisees have enough working capital until profitability is achieved.  This will vary for different industries.  Finally, you will need to train and prepare them to run their own business under your brand.  This may include business acumen and industry skills, brand culture and onsite practical training.  

Prospective Franchisee Candidates

It would be best to determine what makes a successful franchisee in your brand.  These may be personal or professional attributes.  Profile and criteria that contribute to their success.

  1. Some candidates are cooperative, decisive, impulsive, egotistical and often afraid and sceptical. Determine what works for your brand’s success.
  2. Are they able to communicate with your customer and future employees?  For example:
    • Need to be able to communicate with individuals ages between 30 and 50
  3. What is the profile of your prospective franchisee?
    Gender, age, industry experience, profile. Are they:
    • husband and wife teams
    • out-placed executives
    • partners
    • existing entrepreneurs
    • immigrants
  4. Are they able to transition entering into a new world of self-employment?
  5. Do they have support?

It is essential to identify an individual’s decision making, overall attitude, dedication, work ethic, eagerness to engage in a long-term relationship and follow a business operating system. Additionally, an individual’s net worth and education do not correlate to utilising their financial resources and working capital during their start-up phase and a first full year in business. Personality, life circumstances (family, health, marriage, personal interests), local and national economics, employee availability, and customer response must also be factored in; local and national economics, employee availability, and customer response all play into the franchisees’ high, medium and low business results.

While measurable evaluative criteria are essential, controllable and uncontrollable factors (seen and unforeseen) influence the outcome of the business, such as family disruption, illness or divorce.  Franchisees may possess all of the measurables of a great franchisee. However, there is no guarantee of their success or failure. High quality and thorough franchisee “interviewing and approval” process will help identify the intangible factors that will lead to success. Even then, there are still no guarantees; however, if you formulate a set of behavioural questions which will objectively evaluate and assist in better understanding the candidates. 

When I was recruiting for a restaurant franchise, I used the Nathan Profiler’s recruitment tool to assist in this process.

Once you have determined the attributes and formulated a set of interview questions and a schedule, you will need to advertise to attract prospective franchisees.  You may hold discovery days for groups or individuals (these may be in a metro or regional area).  The most effective way is to have a robust website with lots of information to enable prospects to understand your brand. 

Leverage your website

Before their initial contact with the franchisor, franchisee applicants are armed with much more information today than they used to be.  They can compare available opportunities online and typically make a preliminary assumption about whether the opportunity is right for them and, equally as importantly, on the business’s professionalism before they first get in touch.  During this initial search, you must make a good impression by attracting prospective franchisees to your website and engaging them to interact and seek more information.

How much is real estate on your website dedicated to franchisee enquiries?  Do you regularly update content on your website?  Online tools such as Google Analytics allow you to measure who is visiting your website, where they came from, what they are doing and when they leave.  Keeping your website regularly updated with fresh, relevant content will allow you to appear higher in organic search results.  The higher you appear, the more clicks and franchise enquiries are likely to flow onto your website.

If you do not feature prominently in organic search results, it may be worthwhile investigating a Google Adwords campaign, so you can appear when specific terms are searched.  The beauty of this is you can measure how effective every dollar you are spending is at the click of a button.  Would you like to be appearing each time someone searches for “Buy a franchise”?  Maybe you would prefer to focus on more specific terms such as “Buying a food franchise” or “Buying a beauty franchise”?  Like when selling to your customers, it is essential to understand what your target market is looking for and how best to attract them.

Attracting Prospective Franchisees and managing the enquiries

The fundamentals of building trust and awarding franchises to qualified candidates remain highly personal, consultative and relationship-oriented.  Do not fall into the trap that website automation and technology are the “be all and end all”. 

These shortcuts and impersonal approaches are the root cause of declining contact rates, contributing to failure.  It would help if you considered how you communicate via live telephone calls, messaging, and emails, including professionally printed and electronic collateral material, videos on your website and testimonials.

There are varying degrees of etiquette and courtesy on when to contact candidates (hours) and how to respect the value of time.  When a candidate is serviced professionally during this partnering process, they will be much more receptive to your field support representatives throughout the life of your working relationship.

Types of franchise inquiries.

  • Live telephone inquiries
  • Internet portals
  • Consultant referrals
  • Tradeshows
  • Corporate website
  • Customer referrals

Qualifying Leads

It is crucial to ensure your franchise opportunities page encourages people to search for information (essentially pre-qualifying themselves).  By the time they contact the franchisor, they already understand the business and the offer.  You only need to look as far as Ben & Jerry’s to see an inviting franchisee enquiry page.  Videos are intuitively interactive and provide a great tool to promote the opportunity.  If prospects are comparing options, they will seek to see clear points of difference.  You should already have defined your franchise offer, so communicating the benefits should be relatively straightforward.

Lead Management:

One of the essential things about pre-qualifying leads online is being as transparent as possible and explaining the process.  This indicates the business’s professionalism and sets a good benchmark for the rest of the process.  It is worthwhile to outline the recruitment process carefully so the applicant knows what to expect.  Dominos has a straightforward application process outlined on their website, so the prospect is already informed of what lies ahead for them.

Items to consider to process and manage prospective leads:

  1. Each inquiry is a human being with dreams and aspirations.
  2. Each individual should be treated as a customer, not a lead, regardless of their financial or educational pre-qualifications to own your franchise.
  3. Each prospect deserves an equal opportunity to be considered.
  4. We are courting individuals more than qualifying leads.
  5. Regardless of the lead source, each inquiry should be processed fairly and equally.

Franchise Approval/Accreditation Process

Detail the process, so candidates know what to expect.  For Example:

  1. Initial enquiry
  2. Telephone calls (1, 2 or more)
  3. Franchise application submission and confidentiality
  4. Interviews (individual and/or panel)
  5. Accreditation
  6. Induction and Training – culture, marketing and support.

Include information along the way on the positives and detail any obstacles and challenges they will encounter throughout the journey.  Include details on training such as industry or non-industry professional experience they require or will receive from the franchisor (restaurant, retail, etc.).

Franchisee Funding:

It is essential to request an in-depth financial analysis of their completed franchise application (unique net worth composition).

Ensure their net worth has been pre-qualified to complete your discovery process.

Provide funding strategies and consult with your franchisee candidate on various methods of funding their business.

Disclosure and Validation:

Franchisors must not give prospective franchisees misleading or deceptive information and follow the Franchise Code of Conduct. As part of the legal compliance steps, franchisors must provide information to prospective franchisees.  For instance, you must provide your candidates with a Franchisor Information Statement.  This will assist the candidates in understanding your business and its purpose.

Individuals who want to learn more about franchising and determine if franchising is the right investment choice should consider completing the ACCC free online course.  You will know how franchising compares to independent small business ownership, what you are likely to find in a typical franchise agreement, why it’s essential to do due diligence and some of the common issues you can face.  Franchisors should consider recommending the course to ensure that prospective franchisees understand what it takes to be part of a franchise system.

Manage the Franchisee Recruitment Process

It is one thing to generate good leads, but appropriately managing the recruitment process and selecting the best franchisees is equally essential.  Many disputes in franchise networks are caused by something that occurred during the recruitment process.  So, please do not assume that prospective franchisees’ advisors cover essential information. Include clear and simple information that is easy to understand and provides ample opportunity for the applicants to ask questions and make informed decisions.

Final comments

The common saying in franchising is:

You get the franchisees that you deserve!

So, ensure that you understand the factors that help franchisees succeed in your brand, set up a profile, and then build a recruitment process that helps you identify these factors in prospective franchisee applicants.  Additionally, it is necessary not to take any shortcuts when recruiting because this could have devastating consequences in building a successful relationship with franchisees.   It is essential to use the recruitment process to identify applicant skill gaps that you need to address before starting their business, creating a robust induction and training program to prepare them for success.  Recruiting the ideal franchisee is not simple but will lead to mutual success for the franchisor and franchisee when done well.

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People Culture

People Culture

Article by: Sara Pantaleo

Do you have a people culture in your workplace?

Fostering a people culture helps organisations succeed.

What does people culture mean?

As Peter Drucker put it, ‘Culture eats strategy for breakfast’.  He did not mean that strategy is unimportant, rather that a powerful and empowering culture is a surer route to organisational success.

People culture means that employees perform from a value-based lens.  They feel valued and empowered and have a sense of belonging.   Employees seek workplaces where they can intertwine their beliefs with those of the organisation and work together on a shared vision of purpose and success.  

Leaders successful in building people culture unite the team around a common cause.  Help align to the vision, purpose and goals of the organisation.

How do you create a people culture in your organisation?

In today’s workplace environment, people would rather forego a fancy title and higher salary and not work in a bad workplace environment.  Employees care about whether companies foster environments where they can be themselves and positively impact society.  Today’s workforce wants to know that they’re making a difference within their companies.

Leaders can take action by listening and allowing employees to speak up when they don’t agree with an organisation’s activities or work on projects they are passionate about.  Let the team lead in their expertise and empower them with the ability to make decisions.

Create opportunities for employees to strengthen relationships and team building by having social gathering spots around the office.  Encourage recognition and feedback at all levels and build trust with open communication.

People working together

Encourage employees to examine or reconsider how their role ties back to the greater organisational purpose. 

Being authentic and transparent is also essential to enable communication in the workplace and ensure that everyone participates.

Creating a people culture involves selecting a series of values that define the organisation’s products and services represented.  Then, as a leader, you need to encourage those values in your employees’ everyday behaviours.

Have regular conversations which help people know where they can improve and what actions are most important to the businesses’ overarching mission and goals.

Feedback sessions help all parties clarify whether employees are content with what they’re doing and align with the organisation’s values.

Recognition and praise are essential parts of fostering a positive work environment and showing people they are valued.  Therefore, it’s crucial to give detailed feedback and be genuinely grateful for the employee’s strengths and accomplishments. 

Flexible working environment

More and more people today enjoy flexible work schedules and working from home.

Some ways you can encourage balance at the workplace include:

  • Onsite daycare
  • Paid time off
  • Lunchtime yoga classes
  • Gym discounts
  • Formal work-from-home arrangements

Anything you can do to help employees make their day-to-day schedules less stressful will message that you value and appreciate them as people.  The result should be happier, more productive staff.

So, creating a people culture takes alignment of all stakeholders, owners, management, and employees.  Ensure employee voices are heard, recognise employees, have genuine one-on-one meetings, align employees to company purpose and success, provide honest real-time feedback.  Finally, the organisation’s leaders embody a culture that values its people and employees and walks the talk.

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Ways to Improve Productivity in the Workplace

The article was written by Sara Pantaleo.

Boosting productivity in your organisation means you will be able to increase profits.  Small businesses have twenty employees or fewer.  Therefore, it is essential to have strategies to make your business more productive and efficient.

Some of the ways to increase productivity in your small business include tools, systems and processes, and some are about how you build and nurture your employee relationships.  If one team member is not performing in a small business, the whole organisation feels the consequences; therefore, it is crucial for small business leaders to also focus on people.

Here are some of the ways to improve productivity in the workplace.

1.    Have a purpose, plan and clear goals for the business

Without direction in an organisation and a clear plan, your employees may not be working on tasks that improve or benefit the business.  Having clear strategic goals means that each department and employee has a compass on what needs to be achieved and prioritise their tasks to align with the business goals.  It is also essential to set and commit to deadlines.  Regularly meeting deadlines demonstrates reliability and the ability to stay focused.  Customers can be lost if an organisation does not ensure goals are completed on schedule.

2.    People Culture and excellent workplace conditions

Develop your employees, offer them support and practice positive reinforcement.  Create a culture where employees feel included and that they belong.  Employees that believe in the business purpose and vision are more likely to be happy working for you and performing at their peak.

It is also vital to create a well-organised and decorated office, a pleasant workplace to see every day and physically and visually enjoyable.  The more comfortable employees feel at the office, the less stressed they will be.  One way to maintain a healthy work environment is to create an upbeat atmosphere that makes everyone feel appreciated and motivated.

Every employee doesn’t need to be busy every minute of the entire workday.  Keeping your staff too busy can create fatigue and cause burnout.  That’s why one of the steps to improve productivity is to take occasional breaks.  Taking 10 to 15-minute breaks allows your team to recharge and feel refreshed when they approach the work again.

Try using 90-minute cycles divided by breaks.  It’s a practical tip that can lead to higher output.  During the 90 minutes, each employee should put as much effort as possible into achieving a task.  This is followed by a break to recharge.  Creating a flow of 90-minute sessions followed by short breaks is enough time to establish a rhythm and complete tasks without getting burned out.

3.    Reduce Distractions

It’s essential to stay focused while working; therefore, remove as many distractions as possible.  Remote employees have this advantage, whereas office employees must deal with background noises made by devices and co-workers.  Your team in the office should try using soundproof headphones and turning off their personal mobiles unless they are a necessary part of the job.

Avoid booking unproductive meetings that do not have a purpose and do not accomplish much.  Like staff meetings.  Some topics can be communicated via phone or a quick email.

4.    Be Efficient – Track and measure

Most businesses track their financial performance but forget to track and analyse how their team uses their time.  Studying the data reveals which employees are productive and which employees need more training.  The technology can assist you with communication and performance.

5.    Have the right tools, equipment and technology

Technology is an integral part of the modern workplace, and any business without some level of technical savvy will likely fail.  Assess that you have the right technology, system, and tools fit for your purpose.  There are many cloud-based solutions to achieve different outcomes you may consider.  Some of the technology to consider (This list is an indication only):

  • An accounting package such as Xero allows you to track your business metrics and performance accurately, keep inventory, make and record sales, manage and pay bills and handle payroll.
  • A Client Relationship Manager (CRM) such as Hubspot or Zoho allow you to keep accurate customer data and track your customer’s journey. A CRM will keep you efficient and give you the ability to nurture customers efficiently and without leaving it to chance.
  • Software packages that can assist in meeting your employer compliance and facilitate all the templates to help recruit, onboard and train employees, such as Employment Hero.
  • Industry-relevant – regardless of your industry, technology makes what you do easier. For example, if you work in health care, countless technologies save lives, protect patient privacy rights, and make sure providers get paid through insurance.  On the other hand, if you are a farmer, engineering and robotics will help you maintain crops and improve yield.
  • Communications tools such as Slack will allow instant message co-worker communication.
  • Social Media – Use Facebook, Instagram and Twitter to communicate directly with your customers. Create and promote your brand and get your message directly to the customer.
  • Stay informed with the latest technology and adapt. New and upcoming technologies such as Blockchain[1], AI[2], and IoT[3] are revolutionising business.   Stay informed and aware

Being proactive and going beyond what is needed to limit, reduce or eliminate future vulnerabilities is a great strategy.  Businesses that don’t take time to proactively prevent future disasters may find themselves in a difficult situation when the disaster occurs.  For example, computer networking businesses would take a proactive approach by building a solid defence against cybercriminals.

Consistently assessing how your team works and areas of improvement will help increase overall workplace productivity.  While there are various tools out there that aim to streamline workflow, ultimately, as a leader in your organisation, you must be there to support your team.

Forget perfection.  It is unrealistic to be perfect in every aspect of your business.  Your business can only be as good as your technology and resources.

Footnotes
[1] A blockchain is a distributed database that is shared among the nodes of a computer network. As a database, a blockchain stores information electronically in digital format. Blockchains are best known for their crucial role in cryptocurrency systems, such as Bitcoin, for maintaining a secure and decentralized record of transactions.

[2] Artificial intelligence (AI) is the capability of a computer system to mimic human cognitive functions such as learning and problem-solving.  New level of AI is machine learning, which is the process of using mathematical models of date to help a computer learn without direct instruction.  This enables a computer system to continue learning and improving on its own and can solve problems based on experience.

[3] The Internet of Things (IoT) describes the network of physical objects—“things”—that are embedded with sensors, software, and other technologies for the purpose of connecting and exchanging data with other devices and systems over the internet.

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Triple Bottom Line Blog Affari SP

What is Triple Bottom Line

The article was written by Sara Pantaleo.

What Is the Triple Bottom Line?

The Triple Bottom Line (TBL) is a way of measuring an organisation’s impact on its social and environmental effects in addition to financial performance.

Purpose-led organisations find that using triple bottom line to monitor more than just the financial performance helps them improve how they treat people both within and outside the organisation and reduce their adverse impact on the environment.

John Elkington first explained the triple bottom line in his 1999 book, “Cannibals With Forks: The Triple Bottom Line of 21st Century Business.” It’s a bottom line that continues to measure profits, but also measures the organisation’s impact on people and the planet”.

The triple bottom line expresses an organisation’s impact and sustainability on both a local and a global scale.

The concept behind the triple bottom line is that organisations are responsible first and foremost to all their stakeholders, including everyone involved with the organisation, whether directly or indirectly, and the planet we’re all living on.

The standard bottom-line infrastructure is based on profitability. However, the triple bottom line includes social, environmental and economic impacts that might affect an organisation instead of using profit and economics as the driving force.

The shareholders are part of the stakeholder group, but not the only factor.

So, some critical trends support the need for organisations to be more socially aware and responsible:

  • Organisation’s imperative for success in hiring, motivating and retaining good people. At the extreme, think of leading sports teams or media organisations, in which the people earning big money are the stars, not the shareholders. These organisations need to be focused on their people.
  • Good people are in short supply. Baby Boomers are moving out of the workplace into retirement, and there are fewer people in the following generations.  The impact of COVID19 border restrictions has escalated this problem further.  Organisations that don’t look after their workforces will quickly find they can’t attract and retain the right people they need.
  • While earlier generations may have tolerated impoverished conditions at work, people in the new generations are likely to be looking for more meaning. Unless they find this meaning, they’ll move on.
  • Consumers and potential recruits have many more choices than they had in the past and are more aware of large companies’ ethical and environmental stance—some base their purchase and career decisions on these things.

Triple bottom line is also expressed as “People, Planet, Profit.”

People, Planet, Profit

The Three Ps of the Triple Bottom Line

People, Planet and Profit

People

Organisations fostering the triple bottom line way of doing business think about their actions on all the people involved. This can include everybody from farmers supplying raw materials, customers, employees and up to the CEO of the business. Every one’s well-being is taken into consideration. The organisation offers a flexible working environment, reasonable working hours, foster diversity and inclusion, a healthy, safe workplace, and opportunities for advancement and education. It does not exploit their labour force (using child labour or offering sweatshop wages).

In some cases, the “people” bottom line can also include the company’s community.

While the people’s bottom line concept is undoubtedly attractive, the difficulty comes in deciding how far you go. Do you apply it to employees? Their families? Suppliers?

Planet

Triple bottom line organisations focus on reducing or eliminating their ecological footprint. They strive for sustainability, recognising that “going green” may be more profitable in the long run. But it’s not just about the money.

Triple bottom line organisations look at the entire life cycle of their actions and determine the actual cost of what they’re doing regarding the environment. As a result, they ensure they reduce their energy usage, dispose of any toxic waste safely, use renewable energy sources, and don’t produce unsafe or unhealthy products for people and the planet.

Profit

The financial bottom line is the one that all organisations share, whether they’re using the triple bottom line or not. When looking at profit from a triple bottom line standpoint, the idea is that profits will help empower and sustain the community as a whole and not just flow to shareholders.

People – How an organisation engages and develops its employees and its impact on people.

  • For example, how do the mines in Western Australia affect the surrounding communities and the benefit the organisation offers employees.

Planet is related to the environmental footprint of the organisation.

  • Such as energy use or waste footprint.

Profit is the standard method of measuring profit and loss in accounting principles.

The Triple Bottom Line in Practice

While you may or may not consider the Triple Bottom Line appropriate for your business, it makes sense to recognise how the workplace is changing and consider whether you need to adapt your approach to business to reflect this.

If you decide to explore the concept further, start by researching what other companies are doing to change the way they do business positively. Looking at the steps they’ve taken will save you time brainstorming on ways to improve your own business. Some examples from different industries include:

  • An international shipment and packaging company has reduced its ecological footprint by having 30 per cent of its stores use renewable energy.
  • A food business sets goals to reduce its carbon dioxide emissions by 10 per cent over the next few years. Investigate using more environmentally friendly ways to package products and set targets to reduce waste.
  • A coffee company only buys its beans from farmers who grow coffee environmentally friendly and ensures that all its workers are treated fairly and receive a living wage for their skills.
  • A computer company focuses a lot of its community efforts on training and education programs. It helps underprivileged kids by giving them access to technology and has goals to recycle a percentage of its annual waste.

By taking the time to start using the triple bottom line approach, you might be surprised at just how positive the reaction will be from your colleagues and your customers.

Triple Bottom Line

What can you do for your business to work towards a TBL model?

The Triple Bottom Line is essentially a reporting system. But, in itself, it doesn’t improve the company’s impact on people or the environment any more than the action of producing a set of management accounts would affect profits.

However, it can drive improvements in how an organisation impacts people and the environment by helping leaders focus on what they need to do to improve all of the bottom lines and keeping this work high on their agendas.

The B-Corp certification is an excellent way for a larger organisation to ensure you’re incorporating people, plane, profit into your business.  The impact assessment and getting certified hold you to a standard of TBL verified by the B-Corp framework.

If you are a small business, don’t try to do it all at once. Instead, pick one or two initiatives, execute them well, and create a TBL mindset from leadership to all stakeholders.  For instance, try to reduce waste and introduce environmental measures like saving energy or offsetting carbon emissions if you are a trucking business.

Some tangible initiatives you can implement:

PEOPLE

 

  • Diversity and inclusion policies
  • Flexible working environment
  • Employee surveys
  • Employee reward and recognition programs
  • Employee personal development plans
  • Employee Assistance Program (EAP)
PLANET

 

PROFIT

 

Your Organisation’s Community Impact

Your profits shouldn’t come at the expense of people and the planet.

Imagine working every day for an organisation you are genuinely excited about and proud to be a part of.

Sure, the pay is decent, and there’s childcare, but those aren’t the only reasons why you love working there.

You’re proud to be a part of this organisation because they’re honourable.

They stand out from the typical “cut-throat” business world by the way they treat suppliers, the community, their commitment to environmental sustainability, their ethical investments, and their desire to empower and promote their team members instead of dragging them down.

There is a constant air of excitement and possibility, and you love coming to work each day.

Triple Bottom Line (TBL) is not at profit’s expense, but more to incorporate other measures into an organisational health profile.  Businesses must be financially healthy and prosperous for People and Planet to thrive.

All three must work in unison to fulfil its Triple Bottom Line goal.

What is Triple Bottom Line Read More »

why small business fail

Why Small Businesses Fail


Studies have shown a high percentage of small businesses fail in their first year and up to 50% by year five.  70% of small businesses don’t make it past ten years.

Some Reasons why small businesses fail

1) Lack of leadership – No vision and purpose

Setting a clear vision and purpose gives you a guiding light and clear road from who you are and where you want to go.

When you don’t have a clear vision, creating the path to success is challenging, like not having a rudder.

2) Market research and niche –  do not know who the ideal client is

Not knowing who your ideal client means that you will try to attract and serve everyone.  This is like using a fishing rod to catch a shark, and you will not catch anything.  The clearer you are about your ideal client, the higher the chance of reaching the people you want to serve.

3) Poor management and planning

Setting clear strategic goals and business plans aligned with your vision will ensure you can develop precise financial forecasts around your ideal client.

Your plan sets out where you are, where you want to go and how to get there.  Ensure your goal is realistic and executable with the resources you have.

small business failure

4) Marketing

You need a clear marketing plan identifying how you are going to attract your prospective client. You should also have a marketing budget and track the return on investment for each channel to know what is working and what is not.

5) Lack of making decisions or no action

You have to get things done. But, don’t get so caught up in the process and become unable to make decisions.

Anything that prevents you from executing will lead to failure. At some point, you have to decide and move on. It’s better to make a decision and not get it perfect than not acting.

6) No commitment to innovation and continuous development

Successful business owners are constantly looking for new and better ways to serve clients and develop new opportunities.

They research and become aware of the latest trends. As a result, they are continuously innovating and finding new ways to be more efficient and increase productivity and stay abreast of changing consumer behaviour in their industry.

7) Knowing how to sell and follow-up

Lack of follow-up is a definite way to lose clients and not get referred to new ones.

Have a clear process on how you will be attracting new clients and the following up—making phone calls, responding to e-mails, or delivering a product or service.

Make sure that you track that you are delivering on time. Creating long-term customer relationships and building trust comes with knowing when to follow up.

 

why mall business fail

8) Poor governance and consistency

Setting up structure, systems and processes, areas of accountability are critical to achieving your strategic goals.  Some of the governance in business is to comply with laws in your industry, but small businesses in a partnership should consider strong shareholders agreements. If in a family business, a family business charter.  Other considerations are separation of duties and authority to mitigate risks and being prepared—good crisis planning to anticipate the impact of external factors, such as regulations or global trends.

Consistency is also essential. Many years ago, I learned that giving an excellent experience sometimes and a poor one sometimes creates doubt in the customers’ minds.  So, it is better to provide a great experience all the time and commit to consistency.

It takes time to attract and nurture customers to build your business. So, it is best if you were committed to tracking and acting consistently to deliver the experience that will make and keep customers.

9) Do not understand or track financial performance

Setting budgets, cashflow forecasts and financial metrics and measuring your performance is vital to know where you are so that you can make solid and informed business decisions

A small business must set sales targets and understand the reasons when you do not achieve them.

As well as revenue and profit, you should know what is happening to cash flow and forecast according to peaks and trough cycles and understand the gap between paying suppliers and receiving funds from your customers.

Other critical financial metrics are the cost of goods, employee costs, operational expenses, debtor payment days and creditor payment days.

You must work with your accountant to set these up correctly and be consistent on how and when you measure so that you can see trends developing and you can act quickly.

small business success

How can small businesses succeed

So, success in small business is not by accident, but it is by planning and design. If you are starting, ensure that you do your research, plan, set your financial and non-financial goals and what success looks like if you achieve them.  Start with good governance from the beginning.

So, if you are a successful small business, make sure you celebrate your successes and review your strategy, vision and purpose regularly to check that it resonates with the right here and now and into the future.

At the moment, one of the most significant focuses in society is climate change.  Will your small business be ready?  What research and analysis have you made in your business to ensure that you are planning for the future changes that deal with the impact of climate?

Showing leadership, setting a clear vision and strategy, strong governance and tracking performance, taking action and executing leads to small business success.  The key is not to stand still and continuously evolve in line with your business growth to meet your customer’s needs of the day.

Why Small Businesses Fail Read More »

How do I find my Purpose?

How do I find my Purpose?

How do I find my purpose in life?

Part of finding your purpose is by knowing what role you can play in changing the world.

Some of it may be the fundamentals of your belief system, some of your journey in life.   What you believe and what you want to manifest in the world.

It is essential to be realistic and set priorities, and ask yourself what you want people to say about you as they look back on your life.

One exercise is to write your eulogy and highlight your virtues.

Then determine which values are important and what is not negotiable.

How to find purpose in business?

Finding the purpose in business is very similar.

People want to engage with brands and people that are aligned to their purpose.

Defining a robust and shared purpose for your organisation is vital for business success, and it needs to be more than just building profit.

Business leaders need to have a clear vision for the future and inspire others.

Create a reason for being and to exist, a clear purpose.

Having a strong sense of purpose can define the culture you want in your organisation and guide your decisions.

Purpose sets your compass, a guiding light that gives employees a clear sense of how they should do things every day.

The purpose will make the work more meaningful and fulfil the human need to contribute to something bigger than self.

Some of the questions to ask while determining your business purpose are:

  • Why did you create your organisation?
  • What inspired your business idea?
  • What problem is your organisation trying to solve?

Simon Sinek, in his 2009 TEDx Talk, talks about the three layers to your business story, ‘The Golden Circle:

  1. The What
  2. The How, and
  3. In the centre – The Why

AffariSP Purpose Golden Circle
Golden Circle

All organisations know what they do in the products they sell or the services they offer. This is also articulated as the organisation’s Mission statement.

Only some organisations have a clear way of how they do it.  The values set them apart from their competition, but few organisations know why they do what they do.

This is because setting a purpose is not about making money. It’s about a belief and the reason why the organisation exists.

He talks about human behaviour and suggests that we talk to the part of the brain that controls feelings and behaviours by communicating from the inside out.

This creates loyalty and sells to people that believe what you believe.  The same goes for your employees. They will excel if they believe what you believe.

Having the best minds and most technical people who communicate from the outside in, you will have all the statistics and facts but not the emotion.

People do not buy what you do; they buy why you do it…. Simon Sinek

Organisations must have a clear picture of where they want to head and a future position when they succeed.  This can be articulated as the organisation’s Vision.

If everyone in the organisation is aligned to the purpose, it acts as a guiding light and the filter for setting business strategy.

You define your purpose by determining what is important to you and the organisation, and you must make it about the people you want to serve.  This cannot be about money.

Then determine the values on how you want to do it.

What are some of the factors to finding your purpose in business?

  1. Involve your team
  • It is vital that if you are working on your purpose after the business has already been established to involve your team and organise a planning meeting to ask the key questions about your business:
  1. Why do we exist?
  2. What do we do?
  3. What are we great at?
  4. Why do we stand out?
  5. What do people say about us?
  • Make sure that you are not closed-minded, listen to all the perspectives, and be realistic about your organisation. Sometimes the most valuable insight comes from the people in the front line serving your customers.
  1. Get some external perspectives – this will bring a fresh outlook and objective feedback. Organisations find it helpful to use a consultant to help facilitate the day
  2. Make sure the message is in line and resonates with your customers. Make it customer-centric.
  3. Be inspirational and aspirational. These words will become your compass and will guide your decisions in the organisation
  4. Bring people on the journey. Roll out the message to the entire organisation and public to bring it to life.  Align it to everything you do by:
    • Once you find it make it stick
    • An organisation’s true purpose is much more than a statement on a wall or website
    • Your internal behaviour and actions need to be aligned
    • Your brand and image must be aligned
    • People need to feel it, touch it and be part of it

What happens once you have found your purpose in business?

Once you have articulated your purpose, it’s time to make it a reality.  Build trust and make sure all your team is truly committed and aligned.

Culture eats strategy for breakfast…Peter Drucker

Peter Drucker says that culture is the secret sauce that keeps employees motivated and clients happy.  A clear purpose should help create clarity, and executing realistic strategies will boost productivity, performance, and bottom-line success will follow.

So, in my opinion, get your purpose right, determine your value system and set the future aspiration for success, but you must develop some realistic strategies and execute them; otherwise, it’s all a waste of time.

It all matters, Purpose, Vision, Mission, Values, strategy and execution. It’s just a matter of ensuring you set the culture first, then the priorities and then act.

So, the key is to take action and never standstill. Business success is about being able to service the customer of today. This keeps evolving, so it’s crucial that you also set a date to review and assess regularly.

Affarisp Purpose Vision Mission Values Strategy and Action Plan
Purpose, Vision, Mission, Values and Strategy Pyramid

How do I find my Purpose? Read More »

The powerful, inspiring women leading family businesses

When I first joined the family business, I found it very difficult to break through the sexism and invisibility of being a woman in a male-dominated industry.   Even though I was developing and improving the business, I was seldom acknowledged in the early days and treated like a little sister.  Not just from my family members but also others who were working in the business.

It took many years to get recognition, and I had to work a lot harder, build trust and prove myself at every stage.  All this while creating my family and all that came with that.

How women are seen in the family business

So, I found it interesting when I read a KPMG article in 2020, following a survey of family businesses that talks about women in the family business as having hidden roles and being designated as the ‘chief emotional officer’ in some situations. However, women took more of a support role in keeping the family together instead of leading the family business.

I am happy to say that there are a growing number of women leading their family businesses and not in any way invisible.

I had the privilege to have a close look at some of these inspirational women leaders in the family business as part of a project I have been involved in this year.

These women are not in the background, but they have broken through the stereotype of the traditional male-dominated head of the family business.  They have founded the company, or they have taken over in the succession of their family business.

They have successfully broken down the barriers and are redefining leadership in the family business.

Challenges for women in the family business

Most of them cite their primary challenge as the male family members putting barriers and not trusting that they can do the role in male-dominated environments.

The consistent trend I read in their submissions is that they have transformed their family business into achieving high financial performance and innovation. In addition, they implemented a transformational leadership style to create an inclusive and diverse workplace.

They have in common that they succeeded despite the barriers while having families and building inclusive teams with a sense of belonging.

These women showed immense resilience and grit to succeed. Yet, they had to fight for their place.

Embracing and supporting women in the family business

In the future, we need to be aware and cautious that all women are given the same opportunities as their male counterparts and not miss out on women’s contributions because they do not think the fight is worth it.

I know in my own experience, I sometimes questioned if it was worth it.

The risk of not embracing women in family businesses may mean the end for the company.

Celebrating women leaders in the family business

So, I want to give tribute to all the female leaders in family businesses and encourage all organisations to embrace all they have to provide and support them to succeed and remove any barriers in their way.

I want to share some of the quotes from the inspirational women I had the privilege to review.

A woman as a business leader

My strength and courage to fight for change, to show those who came before me that there is nothing to fear from this new approach, have driven growth and secured the business for future generations

A woman overcoming challenges in the family business

I’ve fought constant resistance and been required to prove my worth time and time again.  Courage has been essential to my success both as a leader and a woman in the business

Supporting women in your family business

I have ensured that flexible working hours and days are core to the business. It doesn’t just make good moral sense, but it makes good business sense

I have coached and built the women in leadership in my business by providing a leadership pathway and funding the furthering of their learning and experiences

The powerful, inspiring women leading family businesses Read More »

Crisis Management Planning

It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to lose it..Warren Buffett

 

What is a crisis?

A time of intense difficulty or danger?

So, in business, a crisis is related more to a significant adverse event with possible reputational damage.

An out-of-the-ordinary event, disclosure or set of circumstances, real or perceived, which seriously threatens safety, disrupts the activity or negatively impacts the reputation of a business or customer patronage.

It will not matter whether it is real or perceived.

Types of crises

Most importantly, are you aware of all the different types of incidents that could threaten your business and reputation?

A crisis, which can last from a few hours to several days or longer, needs decisions to be made quickly to limit damage to an organisation.

Types of crises can include natural disasters, accidental or intentional human-caused events, and technology issues such as cyberattacks.

Why have a crisis management plan

A crisis management plan will detail all the organisation’s risk areas and respond in a critical situation that negatively affects your organisation.

A crisis management plan allows an organisation to act quickly should an incident occur, with well-documented responses to potentially critical situations.

An effective crisis management plan will include:

  • criteria used to determine if a crisis has occurred
  • monitoring systems to detect early warning signals,
  • contingency actions
  • list of emergency contacts
  • specify who will be the spokesperson in the event of a crisis
  • strategies for everyone to know their role during and after a crisis

Having a plan will not avoid an incident but will minimise the impact of adverse reputation outcomes and guide how to manage and recover from incidents.

Right, now is a great time to prepare a crisis management plan and be ready for the recovery of COVID19 and have contingencies to deal with the employee well being and any matters arising from bringing the team back to the office.

Recovery is more clear with a crisis management plan.

As a result, after a significant adverse event, a crisis management plan could be the difference between your organisation being left vulnerable by highlighting the organisation’s and systems weaknesses or coming out more resilient.

Thus, leading to enhance the organisation’s capacity to retain its state and function despite external disruptions and adapt and transform from these events and be better equipped to undergo future changes.

 

 

Download – Steps to create a crisis management plan

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