As a business coaching firm, the business owners we work with tend to have similar problems. Their issues tend to relate to time, team and money which are all interrelated. If you want to get your time back, you need to build a team to help you run the business. If you want to grow your revenue and profits, you first have to grow your team. In this article, we explore the three fundamental pillars crucial for successful team management: strategic direction, clear execution processes, and a values-driven culture. By understanding and implementing these pillars, business owners can create a robust framework that promotes efficiency, productivity, and creativity in their teams.
Zig Ziglar put it this way: “You don’t build a business. You build people. Then people build the business.”
Team management is about getting the right people doing the right things in order to accomplish a shared vision. A cohesive and motivated team can transform visionary ideas into reality, drive innovation, and sustain long-term growth.
1. Strategic Direction
Strategic Direction is the cornerstone of any successful business. It involves defining the company’s vision, purpose, competitive differentiation and goals, which collectively guide the organisation’s trajectory.
Vision & Purpose: This is about creating organisational clarity – and you need clarity to achieve alignment. In fact, it is about creating so much clarity that there is very little room for confusion in your organisation. And out of the process, you must set a clear, succinct strategy for how you intend to succeed. Discovering your core, your guiding principles and creating your long-term vision for your business.
Market Strategy: Creating clear strategic advantage for how you intend to succeed and differentiate from your competitors. Which is really a set of intentional decisions to give your company the best chance to thrive and differentiate from your competitors. That includes knowing who the target customer is, understanding what these target customers want and delivering against their expectations (your brand promise).
Plan: With a clear long-term vision in place, you’re ready to establish the short-to-medium-term priorities (the planning piece) that contribute to you achieving the vision. A strategic plan serves as a roadmap, ensuring that all team efforts are aligned with the broader organisational objectives.
2. Clear Execution Processes
Embedding the communication tools, processes and routines required to create clarity and align everyone in the organisation (onto the same page and the same direction) is the key to consistently driving execution and results. Here are a few of the key ones:
Action Plans: These are detailed plans that break down the strategic goals into actionable steps. They assign tasks, set deadlines, and allocate resources, ensuring that everyone knows what needs to be done and by when.
Organisational Plan: An effective organisational chart clarifies roles, responsibilities, and reporting lines, ensuring a smooth flow of communication and accountability. Organisational structures don’t have to be rigid command and control versions. Today, effective organisational structures are those that are suitable for the environment and are efficient.
Performance Development Plans (PDPs): A PDP process to align individual goals and contributions to the business strategy and goals. PDPs allow individuals to receive critical feedback and support, which helps them understand how they’re doing and what they need to do to improve. Remuneration should be performance-based, at least in part, to encourage individuals to focus on achieving their objectives. The key is to make sure that incentives align with the organisation’s goals and values.
Team Meeting Rhythm: The Team Meeting Rhythm is your organisation’s heartbeat. To move faster, you need to pulse faster – by embedding a rhythm of daily, weekly, monthly, and quarterly meetings. These meetings bring focus and alignment, provide an opportunity to solve problems more quickly, and ultimately save time.
Key Performance Indicators (KPIs): KPIs are a way to track progress and determine if the right things are being done to achieve the organisation’s goals. Every business has seven levers, which are key components that make up the organization’s success. These levers include leads, conversion rate, average dollar sale, number of transactions, retention rate, gross margin, and net profit. By tracking and understanding these KPIs, leaders can identify areas where improvements need to be made and make data-driven decisions.
Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs): SOPs are documented processes that ensure consistency and quality in operations. They serve as a reference for employees, helping to maintain standards and streamline workflows. By having SOPs in place, businesses can maintain consistency and ensure quality outcomes, regardless of who is performing the task. These SOPs can be used to build a business dashboard to track progress and ensure that the organization is on the right trajectory towards success
3. Values-Driven Culture
Culture is about designing an environment of performance and growth using the organisation’s core values—a systematic discipline, not something that is left to chance.
If you create a sound strategy and execute against it but don’t create an environment where people can do their best work, the likelihood of the strategy failing is high. A high-performance environment where people feel valued, the leaders lead by example, values are used to make decisions and people are not afraid to take risks.
Having a few rules, repeating yourself a lot, and acting in ways that are consistent with the rules—these are the three keys, whether you’re a parent providing your children with a good moral foundation or providing a company with a strong cultural foundation. A strong culture leads to superior performance, higher employee retention, and a better-aligned organisation. Equally important, a strong culture driven by a handful of rules (core values) makes leading people much easier, reduces the need for stacks of policies and procedures, gives everyone a foundation from which to make tough decisions, and generally brings simplicity and clarity to many of these people systems within a business.
Above a certain point – fair pay, good benefits & a safe place to work – people want to feel part of something bigger, a company with a great culture of connection, recognition and communication. If a business owner isn’t deliberately creating that culture, they’re bound to fail.
Conclusion
Building a successful team is an ongoing process of strategic planning, aligned execution and systematically living core values that shape a performance culture. By embracing the three pillars of strategic direction, execution processes and core values, business owners can create an environment where your team can thrive. Remember, the success of your business is intrinsically linked to the strength and cohesion of your team. Invest in these pillars, and you will pave the way for sustainable growth and success.
By understanding and implementing these pillars, you are not just building a successful team; you are building a legacy of excellence and innovation. Take the next step today and transform your business with a winning team.
If you want support in developing or implementing these pillars, I can help! Book a 15-minute call with me here: www.TimeWithShane.com
