Business Development: Stage-by-Stage Guide Gestation Stage Start-Up Stage Prototype Stage Roll Out Stage Rapid Growth Stage Expansion Stage Maturity Stage

Growth Stage

– the company is broadening production lines, focusing on the main product; management style transition from informal to formal

Organization: Centralized

Management:  Hybrid formal/informal

Technology: Developed, focused

Funding Stage: Second

Manage the Five Risks:

growth risk

technology & production risk

marketability & competing risk

financial risk

team & management risk

 

Problem

Solution

Action

Growth Risk

Your capabilities in maintaining perspective (reality vs. euphoria), balancing today's and tomorrow's needs, and coordinating resources are being tested

The original route to success works for some time, but then it stops working so well and hits diminishing returns. It is nor easy to keep a great new venture to grow at its original rate for more than 3 to 5 years. If you continue doing the same things that made you successful during the start-up stage you are almost certain to fail.

Growth Strategies

6Ws of Corporate Growth

Thinking about your second stage of growth before the first has happened. Reinventing your business model, experimenting extensively to find a successful new model and get to the second stage of growth

Besides creating a viable model, a critical factor in the ultimate success is how well and fast your company integrates

Development of a flexible and responsive company structure adaptable to changing internal and external conditions

Development of an effective and flexible production systems responsive to change

Building strategic alliances and synergistic partnerships

Embrace 10 characteristics of an emerging growth business

Take a helicopter view and work on your business

Understand what changes as company grow and most important tasks

Learn 9 secrets to boost your small business performance and follow the ten commandments for building a growing company

Develop sustainable growth strategies; use balanced business system approach

Reinvent your competitive and differentiation strategies; play entrepreneurial games, such as Innovation Football and Innovation Chess; use Kore 10 Innovative Thinking Tools

Master company integration and build a new organization that works

Maintain a purposeful and organized search for  new opportunities

Inject the relentless growth attitude into your company

Build a coaching organization

Keep flexiblespot what goes wrong and turn error to advantage

Identify people (values, skills, expertise) and resources needed

Develop a business plan for your company growth stage

Build  synergistic partnerships, strategic alliances and joint ventures

Create roadmaps (market opportunities; positioning; sales, distribution, operations; continuous innovation; people)

Develop innovative value chain management system

Develop effective reward system – people are reinventing the wheel

Problem

Solution

Action

Technology & Production Risk

Early success with a single application or product line does not translate into long-term viability in the face of well-capitalized, entrenched competitors with strong customer relationships

New technology and products development draws significant resources from the fast growing business operations

Identification of strategic market intervention areas

Development of the business and technology strategy to achieve this goal

Top management participation

Development of strategic technology development partnerships

Reinvent your intellectual property management system and develop IP strategy

Develop licensing strategy, protect your trade secrets

Identify competitive factors and critical technologies and formulate your technology strategy

Set strategic priorities and actions and develop your business strategy

Develop a synergistic diversification strategy and launch differentiated produce

Harness the power of innovation –  practice systemic approach to innovation; build an innovation portfolio; establish an effective innovation process

Establish a technology intelligence system

Search continuously for new opportunities

Develop flexible lean production systems responsive to change; establish continuous improvement mindset

Explore opportunities for a joint venture or a merger with a strategic partner to best exploit your short-term technologic advantage and realize the full potential of the company's entrepreneurial vision. Transfer technology and establish strategic alliances to stay technologically competitive. Winning is not necessary achieved without partners and parents.

Problem

Solution

Action

Marketability & Competing Risk

Poor market feedback

Poor strategic marketing plan

Growing backorders

Competitors "knockoffs"

Customer complaints; product returns or write-offs

While managing growing complexity, it essential to remain focused on how the business provides value to its customers

Fight fires

Research into the market and its trends

Reinvent market development strategy

Surprise To Win

5 Strategic Questions

Benefit from Your Competitors

Develop your competitive strategy - defend your markets from competitors, explore new markets to penetrate; create a new market niche

Reinvent your value innovation strategies

Revisit continuously the laws of marketing and virtuoso marketing approaches; reinvent your marketing strategy

Revise critically your marketing approach

Develop realistic marketing concept and customer value proposition

Reinvent your competitive strategy

Reinvent your marketing, advertising and selling strategy

Develop strategic marketing plan

Gain more loyal customers and repeated customers; retain customers ‒ unleash the power of your service-profit chain and engage customer

Partner with your customers to create a future for both parties that is better than either could have developed alone

Develop innovative product selling and customer relationship chain

Develop marketing partnerships

Problem

Solution

Action

Financial Risk

High leverage

Short-term financing

Inventory shortages or imbalances

Poor financial & tax strategy for generating cash

Excessive increases in overhead and personnel

 

Operating costs reduction through optimization of production systems

 Raising of working capital (second round) to support strategic growth plans

7 Routes To High Profits

Internet Revenue Models

Invent new revenue models

Creating Sustainable Profits: 9 Questions To Answer

Look at several measures of capital employment ‒ not just one

Work back to costs from what customers are prepared to pay

Select type of finance you require to implement your growth strategy and develop your fund raising strategy

Study investment opportunity selection criteria of different types of investors

Enhance shareholder value by adopting a leading-edge reporting model

Use a combination of long and short term loans

Problem

Solution

Action

Team & Management Risk

9 Signs of a Losing Organization

Start-up spirit starts to fade

Organizational boundaries are mounting; employee gradually lose perspective on each other's jobs

People lose the big picture: they can no longer see how the various tasks, activities and functions fit together to achieve the organization's overall purpose

Employees start to identify more with their own unit or work group than with the company as a whole

As boundaries become more rigid, the company loses its elasticity - it's ability to change in response to (or anticipation of) changes in the external environment

No strategic and contingency planning

Shifting priorities in response to opportunities

Resisting development of structure, processes and controls

Hiring people who are no smarter than you are

Key people leaving

Others don't share your urgency

Poor decision support systems

Overridden and inadequate internal systems, non-responsive to customers & employees  >>>

Conflict between formal and informal

Emergence of the "Peter Principle"

Difficult decisions about roles, authority & responsibility

Keeping pace with an increasingly complex business environment requires proper delegation, better communication, and cross-pollination of perspectives from outside advisers and peers

Managing a team

Addressing the problem of "good people" who can't keep up

Solving people problems

Establishment of management systems enabling better control, transparency, and customer relationships

Development of employee empowerment mechanisms

Development of formal professional management structures

Overcome Resistance to Change

Create the mindset of growth and establish the relentless growth attitude in your organization

Learn to do less and manage more; practice leadership-management synergy and the art of effective leadership, management, and coaching

Practice effective self-management

Lead the team; practice Results-based Leadership

Start with yourself, know your own values, strengths, weaknesses and use them effectively

To be a successful manager, learn how to innovate

Build an innovation-friendly organization

If you cannot afford top management, build your management team from within and develop their management skills

Change from reactive to proactive style

Do the feedback analysis as a matter of course to build on your strengths

Gain really effective control a comprehensive business audit

Develop plans for the future

Don't over-respond to opportunities to avoid fragmentation and burn-out (see 80/20 Principle)

Micro management de-motivates people - concentrate on the activities that bring the most value to the organization and delegate other responsibilities and tasks

Make sure you communicate clearly and often with colleagues, superiors, and subordinates; talk less and listen more and actively to associates, advisors, customers, suppliers, and vendors; cross-pollinate solutions and ideas with peers and advisers outside the business

Don't assume that everyone in the company thinks like you do; that you have all the answers; that things won't get done without you; and that your direct reports will automatically function as a team. Lead!

Play the role of the team builder, coach, strategic planner and communicator; communicate critical and actionable information

Require top managers to operate as a "team"

Help team manage the plan by group discussion of progress; measuring results with key metrics; communicating progress and results; and adjusting plans to market shifts

Manage organizational misfits, malcontents, and non-performers