For Those Who Love Strategy As Much As We Do
Rolling out your plan can range anywhere from a big, high-profile campaign to a low-key announcement. Whatever you decide to do, make sure to inform everyone in your organization. You may choose to give complete copies of the plan, including background material in the appendixes, to certain groups of stakeholders, whereas you may [...]
Failing your way to success is not the most common thing you hear these days in business strategy, but being innovative and creative is what makes companies stand apart from the rest. Doug Rauch, the former president of Trader Joe’s grocery store explains how trying and failing made their grocery store different from the others.
Organizations that are strategy-focused are more effective with their resources, have higher employee retention, and make more money because they serve their markets better than their counterparts. And they stay in business longer because they proactively respond to the environment around them. Want to create a culture that’s strategy-focused? Here’s a hit list of ideas [...]
Completing, or just even creating a strategic plan is on your to-do list, right? But is it slipping lower and lower down the list? I know that feeling. And don’t worry, you’re not alone! Completing your strategic plan and maintaining momentum with implementing it is arguably one of the most important things you have to [...]
Whether you are a seasoned strategy expert or just getting started in the process, helpful articles, blogs and tips are always good to breeze through every once in awhile for your strategy development. Over the week I have browsed through a few great articles that I would like to share with you to get your [...]
The difference between having an idea and actually executing it are two totally different things. This is what separates the dreamers from the doers. In strategic planning there is a huge gap between writing goals and really tracking and implementing those goals. It makes no sense to write a goal that you have no intention [...]
In the early 1990s, the Balanced Scorecard (BSC) was introduced by Robert Kaplan, a Harvard Business School professor, and David Norton, the founder and president of Balanced Scorecard Collaborative, Inc., as a new way to work with business strategy. Today, more than half of the Fortune 1,000 companies in North America use the BSC, which [...]
Many organizations do customer research, but struggle with what they need to do with it next. Seeing your business through your customer’s eyes is one of the best ways to uncover the strengths and weaknesses of your organization. With this information, you can make strategic decisions that raise your worth in the eyes of those [...]
The purpose of writing a positioning statement is to ensure that all you marketing activities for a customer group are consistent and clear. (And having a positioning statement saves you tons of time in the long run.) Initially, focus on writing a positioning statement that’s used only internally. In the future, you may end up [...]
In the early stages of your business strategy development, and throughout the lifetime of your business, understand and learning from your customers is key to being successful. Business strategy and development hinges on your customers knowing and loving what you do. Many businesspeople have heard about the 80/20 rule, which states that about 80% of company [...]
Spending tons of money and months collecting customer feedback can be too overwhelming and cost prohibitive for many companies. But still, obtaining feedback is crucial for the ongoing success and sustainability of your company. You can easily retrieve information during the normal course of your business day. Here’s a list of areas you can easily obtain [...]
On our recent client engagement with a gas company in Abu Dhabi, I was struck again (as I was the last time I worked in the region) that implementing all the “best practice” management tools in the world does not a great company make. The prosperity of Middle Eastern companies enables management to implement everything [...]
When you are at the point in the strategic planning process where you are doing your environmental analysis and customer analysis, consider these tips to help assess your customers and their needs. Uncovering why your customers buy products from your company or use your services is essential to be successful. Ultimately, the value you provide is [...]
Reconstructing your value creation The business model consists of eight key building blocks that deliver your value proposition.
On the right-hand side of the model, you identify your target customer segments, how you develop relationships with those customers and the channels by which you reach them, supported by the revenue streams generated from that interaction. On the left-hand [...]
Throughout the strategic planning process you should be working through a series of exercises and exploration that generate a long list of issues you need to address or solve during your planning process, including the following:
Past history–lessons learned Current products and services attractiveness and profitability Financial performance to assess the health of your organization Industry structure to uncover [...]
We came across this article on NPR and had to share it with all of you as a little inspiration to the New Year and business strategy! We’ve all been there. Trapped in line at the DMV. Or stuck on hold while trying to call a city agency. It’s easy to complain about government bureaucracy. But [...]
It is not uncommon that the term strategic plan and business plan get confused in the business world. Before beginning your strategy implementation, take a look at the difference between the two terms to ensure you are on the path to success. While a strategic plan is a type of business plan, there are several [...]
Strategic Planning is the Most Popular Management Tool – Find Out Why Companies committed to executing strategy are equipped with advantages over their competitors. Because managing strategically matters to the life of your business, our guide on the Benefits of Strategic Planning (on the right) will show you what you can gain from strategic planning and [...]
The 11 Step Business Action Plan I came across this article on the American Express Open Forum and had to share it with our followers and clients. Murray Smith gives a quick 11-step list for creating a business action plan in this article. In our system, MyStrategicPlan, we use Action Plan Reports to show a person [...]
We’re delighted to unveil our Second edition, the Strategic Planning Kit For Dummies. We wrote this book from our experience helping fortune 500 companies, non-profits and churches create and execute their strategy, and we’re happy to share our insight with you. This business climate has dramatically increased the use of strategic planning, and it has become [...]
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