coaching for small business

Simple and Effective Small Business Planning – Coaching for Small Business

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Rich Grof Proven Coaching for Small Business Tips for Success

Planning in for success and growth in your small business is important.  Just like any business you will want to plan in advance and review your progress regularly to see what changes you will need to make along the way.  Without adjusting your actions for the current conditions and new information your plan will be useless. That is why I encourage my small business coaching members to look at this simple system to plan for their success.  The simpler your plan is the more likely it is that you will follow it.  And remember, most people will over estimate what they can do in their business in one year and underestimate what they can achieve in 3-5 years.

What You Need to Look at to Grow

Your small business growth plan will need to look at a number of components to be successful.  Here is a list of the steps that I recommend that you place in your planning and development for your business:

  1. The business review of your current years statistics:  This includes your small business sales, where they came from and the strength of the sales channel.
  2. The review of your S.W.O.T. strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats:  It’s important to know how you are doing and even more important to know where you can improve.  With this in mind you may be able to hire someone that can effectively do something you are not strong in.
  3. Setting your goals for sales and lifestyle:  Your goals for your business need to be aligned with your lifestyle goals.  Why? Well, as a small business owner your efforts greatly affect the function of the company.  Without you, in most cases the business will grind to a halt.
  4. Reviewing your sales marketing plan and deciding on your new plan in advance:  In our coaching for small business programs we help entrepreneurs and small business owners understand that sales don’t happen by mistake.  Although you can have some business trickle in from various sources, the strength of the business lies in how defined their sales and marketing plans are.  Without a well thought out sales development program which may include sales outsourcing, sales management outsourcing or specialized marketing firms most businesses will struggle with erratic sales.
  5. Reviewing areas for Technical Growth and Ability:  Setting up your Implementation Plan will identify quickly were your small business can benefit from a technical upgrade to your systems or benefit from educating your employees with training they need.  Make sure to see if there is an government funding that you and se to help you grow in this area.
  6. Setting up your Business Growth Tracking and Monitoring system:  Implementing new ideas is the first step to your business growth.  The big gains in performance came as you begin to work with the system over time.  By tracking and monitoring results any small business can continue to find growth from their efforts as the year progresses.

Timing your Review

The best time to do your planning and review is after the first week in December.  By that time most of your clients and prospects will become busy with the holidays and contacting them may be tough.  If you find yourself busy in December reschedule your planning for a quite time in January.  We always have times where things slow down somewhat in our small businesses and that is a perfect time to plan.

I personally like to plan a trip away to do planning.  Even if it is a short day trip, a change of scenery will help you look at your business and the possibilities that are available for you in the coming year in a different way.  Regardless of how you plan, you need to plan for success.  So take the time and schedule in your business review now, you will be taking your first step to a great future!

 

 

 

 

The Sure-Fired, Super Successful Business Plan

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Getting What You Want Starts with a Business Plan

A new year, a new quarter, and even a new season can set people into all kinds of emotional turmoil.  Some of us are excited about the thoughts of great success and opportunities in our businesses, others are tired and worn out about having to do it all again, while others are not sure where to start.  Some will take the time to fill in a detailed business plan but then have it sit on the shelf for the rest of the year.  So why is it that after we have spent so much time deciding what we want to build, what actions need to happen and even planned out a timeline, that we close the cover never to make it happen?  That’s right…Business Plans don’t work!  Actually it’s not the plan that is not working, it’s us.  But even though we know what to do, we still can’t seem to get it done! Read more →

Business Coaching Canada: How to Deal with Difficult Clients – Leadership Training for Business Owners and Salespeople

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Business Coaching Canada:  Adversarial clients drain energy

If you have been in business or sales long enough to do a few sales, you know that some clients are a pleasure to work with all the way through your interaction, while others seem to be a challenge right from the very first time you spoke to them.  They seem to have an interaction style that is adversarial and it grinds against every forward movement that you make.  These clients seem to suck up all of your time and energy.  You might even find yourself unable to sleep at night as you think over all the days’ struggles. As a business, leadership and sales coach business coaching in Canada, I have helped many of my members’ fine tune their client leadership process and increase their business success.

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sales training calgary

6 Steps to Get More Done in Business and Sales | Sales Training Calgary

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Sales Training Calgary:  6 Powerful Steps to Get More Done in Business and Sales

Being a business owner in Calgary and beyond has its challenges. Some of these challenges seem to pop up after we’ve made the jump from working for someone to being our own boss. We now find ourselves alone. This isolation, coupled with the lack of accountability and a flexible schedule tend to lead to problems in getting things accomplished. As a business coach and performance sales coach I have helped many business owners, managers and sale people get more done in business and sales. Here are some simple yet powerful steps to help get more done. Read more →

Building a Performance Sales Team – Sales Manager Training

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The art of building a performance sales team has long been referred to as a gift more than a science. Sometimes what makes a great sales person cannot be measured by data nor can it be assessed in an interview.  Being successful in sales requires one to be gifted in soft skills (ie. interpersonal skills). Because these skills are difficult to determine from a resume or a 10- 20 minute interview many successful candidates end up not being “suited” for the job. Most business owners, managers or sales manager rely on a “sink or swim” philosophy when hiring a salesperson. They hire the ones that seem to be the best candidates.  When they don’t meet the sales quota they are shown the front door. It seems that if you don’t have the “gift” for making sales you’re out. But this approach to hiring and training can lead to a revolving door of sales people. Few make it, most don’t.  

So here is the good news: inspiring great sales performance can be accomplished with the right skills. Sales managers will need to invest time to not only understand each salespersons motivational style, but also how they implement actionable tasks to get things done.  If you’re a sales manager or in charge of sales you may need to adjust, tweak or adopt a new leadership style in order to hold your sales people accountable and to keep them focused. Read more →