Four Stages to Success

Business owners are passionate about their business and will have objectives for the growth and sustainability of their business. However, their experience when executing their business strategies are not always productive or on target and can be costly or ineffective.

Both small and big business owners share common problems and experiences when it comes to effective strategy implementation, which can be traced to four key underlying causes.

• The owner isn’t clear about what they want to achieve and why it is important to them.
• They don’t fully understand their situation and haven’t explored ways to improve it.
• They’re uncertain about the capability and capacity needed to implement actions.
• They don’t ask questions, nor learn from their mistakes quickly.

The following approach to planning with purpose steps through Four Stages to help business owners achieve their goals.

1. Clarity

A lack of clear direction and objectives at the strategic level can lead to disengagement with teams and execution of projects that don't contribute to overall business goals. Gaining clarity involves sharing with the team what motivates them to be involved in the business, why goals are important and coming to a collective agreement on the future direction.

2. Change

An understanding of the challenges and drivers of the current situation is needed in order to make decisions about what change is needed to address them. Gather business, industry and market information to make informed decisions that are realistic and provide a high level of confidence for delivering the agreed goals.

3. Capacity

Capacity is planning and leveraging the resources, time and capability needed to implement prioritised action plans and projects. Capability is having the knowledge, skills and behaviours to effect change. Implementing change often requires addressing the underlying attitudes before new practices can be adopted.

4. Confidence

Unintended results can occur when assumptions are made about actions taken. Monitoring and evaluation are often overlooked but offers a lot of value when considered at the start of a project. Prior planning identifies what information will demonstrate high confidence the project is on track for success.