Last month, I attended the North American Business Excellence Forum (ActionCOACH’s annual conference) in Houston, Texas. The conference took place over two days, where I met with other coaches around the country and listened to world-renown influential keynote speakers present on topics of business, management and leadership.
I wanted to share my top five takeaways to help you grow your business:
1. CEO’s have four jobs they cannot delegate.
As a CEO, you need to have clarity of the obstacles that are preventing your organization from being successful. While members of your organization can help you to identify these obstacles, it is up to you to develop/facilitate a plan or strategy to overcome it and build the business machine to get there.
The CEO is also responsible for prioritization. You must direct the allocation of resources (time, money, people) to achieve your goals.
The organization’s structure is also created by the CEO. You must decide who does what within your organization to fulfill the products or services you offer to your customer.
Lastly, the CEO fosters the culture within the organization. You set the tone of the environment of your company. People do what people see.
2. Create a dashboard in your business of activities or stats that will drive you to the desired results.
While the March Madness basketball tournament is currently going on, a good comparison to knowing your business’s stats is like knowing the current score of the game at half time, and understanding what must improve to win the game. In basketball, stats that factor into this include:
- Field goal percentage (the shots taken vs. shots made)
- Three-Point field goal percentage (shots taken vs. shots made)
- Rebounds vs. your opponents
- Fouls per player
- Time of possession
- Etc.
Similarly, in your business, you must identify the actions and activities needed to change to improve the final result you want to achieve. If you are unhappy with the “score” of your business, you must evaluate the components that make up your organization and find ways to improve.
Change in activity + Change in environment = Changed Results.
3. Management is about creating competent and productive people. Leadership is about creating passionate and focused people.
Every business must have both management and leadership. What is weaker in your business? If your team is lacking competence and productivity, your executives and key people must improve their management skills. To improve both management and leadership within your organization and achieve accountability, train and mentor your people with defined measurements of success.
4. There is a formula for success.
Here it is: Dreams x Goals x Learning x Plans x Action = success! Follow this formula to see your business grow. Sometimes all it takes is to dream a little bigger. Don’t let small goals limit your organization’s growth.
5. Focus on winning the game of business.
Keep your eye on the end game and stay focused on achieving your goals. Concentrate on playing the game of business well and expect yourself to make extraordinary plays. Play your hardest! The awards come after winning the game, so focus on success.