Planning for Growth
Most companies do not set out to grow - they're set up so that the owners can pursue a career that interests them.
If you have decided to go for growth you will have recognised that there are stages in a business that have to be gone through. You have to balance the people requirements with the technology to provide the platform you need to deliver your vision to the customers.
This means assembling a team if you want to grow past 10, getting the systems in place to allow you to trade formally with the larger organisations that will provide the baseload of your business and preparing for the scaleability you need once you've got proof of concept and are ready to take your niche to a new, global level.
Business Plans in practice.
You need to have a vision of the path that you will have to follow and advice on how to integrate people and technology. You may also need to raise additional finance.
Only about 1600 companies a year in the UK get past the 10 employee barrier. Part of the reason for this is the demand that relationship management makes on the business owner. Each new member of the business brings an additional layer of relationships in it's train. By the time you're up to 15 employees managing this is eating all your strategic planning time. The result is you get stuck. We can help you with this situation.
We know lots about motivating small teams and in installing lean but effective IT systems to help you grow. You need to be able to develop all parts of the business in synchrony. We can help.
What we can offer
We can provide you with planning tools and fact sheets, e-books, workshops and one to one consultancy. We use innovative, distance learning techniques to help you make the most of your time whether you are a one man band or a rapidly growing organisation. We offer a small company marketing course and a cd based Grow your business course that covers all the issues of finding partners, developing your market and building the infrastructure you need to be successful.
We can organise in house workshops, 1 to 1 consultancy or micro consultancy via videoconferencing links. .
Our current projects include research into different styles of networking. You can take part using this link. If you do you can opt to get a free e-book or a summary of the results.
Our next public workshop is Punch Above Your Weight on Friday 25th September at the Hub, EC2M 1RQ. You can book here. The price is £177 inc VAT
New e-book - 21 Business Stories. Takes all we've found out and presents it as 21 engaging slices of business life, covering marketing, monitoring, people, raising finance and above all tracking how you're doing. Only £9.40. You can buy it here.
Why we can help you
Unusually for a consultancy company we have a practical bias. We have 25 years experience of running growth businesses in IT, Business Training, Internet trading and horticulture. Currently we run a £0.5 Million internet trading company - Plants4Presents - and a 10 employee Organic Vegetable Business. These give us a real-life basis for our consultancy and training business that underpins our research into how companies actually use IT to promote themselves and improve performance as they grow.
Our founder, Dr Alan Rae is a chartered fellow of the Chartered Institute of Marketing, an associate of the Market Research Society and an accredited workwise adviser. You can look at his Ecademy Profile and Testimonials or follow his ideas on the How to do Business Blog
Contact - To discuss how we can help with your business growth or marketing ring 0845 094 0407
