Date: 3-1-2011

Providing clear direction means ensuring that clear and consistent messages are communicated in relation to the direction of the organization and what’s expected of people in order to maximize their contribution within their specific roles in order to help the organization achieve its objectives and fulfill its vision.

I don’t want to get hung up with the “management speak” or academic interpretation. Think of vision as equating to a “tagline” for what the organization is all about and what it is seeking to achieve. Probably one of the best taglines that I’ve come across in recent years has been the following:

Mahera Dental Practice “the reason to smile”.

That works on so many levels! It conveys a clear message about what this small, regional dental practice is all about, what it hopes to achieve in respect of its customers and the atmosphere that it strives to promote for both its customers and for its employees.

If you are an aspiring leader, even if you don’t necessarily head up an organization, think about what you’re hoping to achieve within your particular area. What are you responsible for? If you’re responsible for the reception area of your organization what’s your vision for your particular area? What do you want to exemplify?

Effective leaders lead by example so make sure if you develop a vision/tagline for your organization or your area make sure that you demonstrate consistently your commitment to ensuring that your vision or tagline is meaningful and is not just empty rhetoric.

Engage and involve people in order to encourage ownership and “buy-in” to your vision. One example of this that springs readily to mind is the approach taken by (another dental practice) Dental 32 where the business partners Robert and Claire engaged and involved their staff in a meaningful series of discussions that led to a clear and consistent understanding as to what the practice was all about and how everyone, within their specific roles, should contribute to achieving the overall vision for the practice.

By engaging and involving people in defining the vision or “tagline” for the business (or at least ensuring that they understand what this means for both the business and them) the leader within the organization is sending out a clear message;

“This is what we’re all about and this is what we expect you to live up to and demonstrate on a day to day basis”.

Find out how Zappos has applied this and has grown to be the largest online shoe store. Sales in 1999 were 'almost nothing' and last year was over a BILLION!

Take 2 minutes to register your details and get immediateFREE access to the Zappos story and many like it.

ADOPT A ZERO-BASED BUDGETING APPROACH

Many of the organisations that have not only survived but actually thrived during the current challenging economic times have adopted a zero-based budgeting approach.

This means that they have seriously reflected upon costs of running the business and have introduced austerity measures and negotiated with suppliers to obtain the best deals and “cut back” where necessary to minimise their cost-base.

By reducing costs and focusing upon how to best serve the needs of their existing and potential client base these organisations have maximised profitability. Quite a number of the businesses we work with have reported increased profitability despite a general squeeze in the marketplace because of the approaches that they have adopted.

It’s important to mention a couple of things that have traditionally been cut from the bottom-line of organisations during a recession that have not featured significantly this time round. For example, traditionally the two areas of cost-spend reduction that were immediately removed from the budget were marketing and training. The organisations that have truly thrived during these challenging times have certainly evaluated the return on investment of both marketing and training and have sought to become more cost-effective in relation to these areas.

DON’T GET LEFT BEHIND – INVEST IN MARKETING AND TRAINING

The organisations that have distinguished themselves have, in some cases, increased their marketing budgets but have reapportioned their spend to reflect a maximum return on investment and areas of increased spend have primarily focused upon enhancing information and communication technology (ICT) and web 2.0 strategies to improve brand awareness and their capability to communicate with existing and potential clients. They have evaluated effectiveness in terms of attracting new customers and increasing spend from existing clients.

Our team have found that the organisations that have thrived have not necessarily reduced their training budget. Let us qualify this. The word “training” seems to have disappeared from the mindset of those organisations that have been particularly successful.

Instead of focusing upon “training for training’s sake” they now focus upon the alignment of learning and development specifically with the achievement of business objectives. Ergo “training for training’s sake” has been eradicated in favour of a focus on maximising the knowledge, skills and behaviours that people across all levels of the business need in order for them to directly contribute to business growth and development.

Even organisations that are particularly cost conscious have spent time, effort and resources developing the capabilities of their people in order to directly influence the bottom-line.

Here are some examples of what they’ve done:

Incurring external costs only when absolutely necessary to bring in experts to enhance internal knowledge and capability.
Coaching at all levels is encouraged with more experienced members of the workforce sharing their knowledge with less experienced colleagues and continually building capability.
Mentoring is evident; taking a long-term view and developing the capabilities of key people to meet the future anticipated needs of the business.
Delegation is managed with a view to supporting the workforce to expand the scope of their capabilities and widen their roles.
Experiential learning (or learning by doing) is recognized as a particularly powerful and cost-effective method of developing the capabilities of individuals across all levels.
Those organisations that have demonstrated particular effectiveness have clear systems and processes of evaluating the return on investment of all learning and development. They maximise the use of line managers to evaluate what’s working particularly well and what needs to be improved, refined and developed to move to the next stage of organisational growth and development.
The organisations that have really achieved control of their finances have worked with their suppliers and customers to maximise cash flow. They have engaged their staff in “improvement projects” designed to introduce austerity measures and reduce costs across all areas of the business.

INCREASED TURNOVER + REDUCED COSTS = PROFIT MAXIMIZATION

What suggestions do you have to help a business to grow profitabiltiy despite the recession?