Three tips for your business growth
Firstly, in this weeks blog we’re giving you Three tips for your business growth. More specifically we are going talking about MCP.
Secondly, whatever your outlook for your business future, you cannot afford to stand still and be swept away by not doing anything.
Consequently, the MCP approach is great for driving forward and growing your business. MCP is also needed if you don’t want your business to stand still.
MCP is not some new medication or drug, MCP is shorthand for
- Mindset
- Capacity
- Performance
MCP Meaning
In other words they mean nothing, or different things to different people. To clarify, let me give you a flavour of each:
Mindset: It affects how we tackle anything, and spoiler alert, we need a combo
Capacity: Capability is another way to describe this, and no one business has it all.
Performance: Be less dog, do not chase your tail. Check & manage your progress
As a result, looking at three tips for your business growth, mindset is the first one we look at.
Mindset
So, mindset is about what you think about the world, your attitudes, your behaviour, your assumptions. Moreover, you shouldn’t ignore mindset because it really influences how you handle situations in your business, and your life.
That is to say, your mindset plays a big part in your success, or what you trip up on. One of the biggest battles you will face is the space between your ears.
Mindsets that most people refer to are
- Fixed mindset
- Growth mindset
Fixed mindset
With a fixed mindset you carry on with the status quo. You’re risk averse, you’re a bit reluctant to try new things, to try new techniques, different ways of working, and you can end up working in your business as opposed to on your business.
So, in some situations, a fixed mindset may be needed. However, with other situations a growth mindset is what is needed.
Growth mindset
So, you look at things differently, and do things differently. For example
- Accepting the status quo is not an option
- Step outside your comfort zone
- Your risk appetite dial moves away from risk averseness
- Selling to new customers
- A different way of engaging with clients
- Creative way of working
- Recognising the importance of numbers
Growth mindsets are seen as the sexy kid on the block. But do not dismiss fixed mindsets, they have their place too.
Fixed mindsets and set backs
Certain business disciplines should not be abandoned and fixed mindset rules. For example, due diligence, compliance, systems, and procedures for credit control, keeping an eye on the cash, financial controls.
However, even with the right mix of mindsets, things can go wrong. You will make mistakes, and will continue to do so, I’ve been there are got the tee shirt. Anybody who runs a business and says they don’t make mistakes is either deluding themselves lying, or they’re extremely fortunate.
Setbacks are an inevitable part of a business life. In a strange way setbacks can be a good thing. Experiencing that pain, that discomfort, gives us valuable lessons, all part of the refinement and learning process.
Certainly, you don’t want to continue making the same mistakes and not learning from this. Thomas Edison went through this when he invented the light bulb. If it is good enough for Edison is good enough for us
Capability
Capability and capacity are meshed and overlap. There’s the conventional meaning of capacity, which according to the Cambridge Dictionary is the total amount that can be contained or produced
For instance, this could be production capacity, enough staff, and workers to do what is needed , seats in a restaurant to cope with demand, hours in the day to deliver workshops, you get the picture.
If you don’t, that’s not the end of things here. You could always look at ways of increasing the capacity with efficiency and productivity, building your team and outsourcing.
Skills and abilities
Do you believe you have all the necessary skills and abilities to deliver and execute your plan? I’ve mentioned plan because whatever you’re doing you need a plan.
You need a plan, road map to reach your destination points. Your leadership, how you run your business as an owner sets the tone. You are the one who sets the direction, sets the dial for where you want your business to go.
Clarity and focus on where you want to go to and how you’re going to get there is vital.
Information
One area often neglected and ignored by business owners is information.
Information is all around you. Rather, there’s loads of existing and valuable data that can be mined and tapped into and turn into nuggets of information gold.
Finding your business data
Every piece of your business activity, internally and externally creates business data. For example, website traffic, financial transactions, social media engagement. All that data means truly little unless you convert that into information.
With your social media platforms, you have got interactions, there are people visiting your n virtual space, they may not comment, but they leave footprints.
Many of us do not drill down and explore that data. To delve deeper is insightful. You can see who your customers are, who our potentials are, whether they are expressing an interest in us.
Your financial transactions tell you what you are spending money on, what’s coming in and form where. You need to know what you’re spending, how much money you’re making, which of your customers are profitable, and which ones are a drain on your resources.
Look under the bonnet of your website and you get an insight into what is going on. See who your visitors are, when they drop by, what pages they’re look at – and which ones they don’t.
Management information
Those insights are valuable. Mining and using that data does not require big budgets. It does require know how, connecting to your plan, and having a joined up system that converts that data and gives us something useful.
A splatter gun approach to anybody out there is going to be inappropriate, it’s not going to be a good use of your time and energy and talking to everybody means you end up talking to nobody.
Build and use a management information system. Information is business gold. It helps us chasing our backside. Data is like raw food ingredients. Data needs to be turned into information, as ingredients need to be transformed into a meal.
We have looked at Two out of the Three Tips for your business growth. Finally, tip number three.
Performance
You manage what you measure. Sounds obvious but often overlooked. If you do not measure what’s important in your business then how on earth do you know what your progress is, whether you are achieving what you set out to do.
Making money, making profit is a key objective. If you don’t quantify, put a number to it then you may never be satisfied, and will not know if you have made it.
If you don’t measure it what’s important, then
- You have no accountability
- Your progress can’t be seen
- It gets tough to keep yourself motivated.
- You need clues and milestones to know how your business journey is progressing and if you’re getting anywhere.
Milestones
Lots of business owners feel they’re not actually making any progress things and overwhelm can set in. That feeling of working hard, investing effort and not seeing success is more common that it should be.
Deflation is added to the roller coaster of emotions business owner go through. That legal dopamine rush of making a sale, getting paid becomes a fading memory.
Your need to kick that overwhelm feeling, of not getting anywhere into touch. One way to do that is setting yourself mini milestones.
Imagine learning to ride a bike, you have stabilisers on in the beginning, at some point, those stabilizers will be removed. Set yourself mini milestones, daily, weekly, or monthly as markers to get yourself to your end destination.
For example, setting what needs to be done If , this is what I’ve got to accomplish at the end of week one, you do it, you tick that box, it reinforces that positive feeling that you have, and you’re able to continue.
But if you don’t measure, if you don’t come up with suitable measures, then there’s no way of knowing if you’re on the right path.
Conclusion
To clarify . Three Tips for your business growth are mindset, capability and performance. These are the ingredients that you need to have in your business, part of the business success DNA.
Think of MCP as ingredients in your delicious business cake of your plan. Blend them well, use good quality ingredients, and don’t over get the proportions , it’s about blending them correctly and keeping an eye on that baking process.
Your plan doesn’t have to be a detailed and heavy tome. It can summarised into a few pages, with your end destination in mind and action plan..
Get in touch with us to find out more about sustaining and growing your business. For more business and finance , news, advice and tips, don’t forget to watch our weekly broadcasts, listen to our weekly podcast I Hate Numbers.
Pro Active Resolutions
The Numbers Crew – Here to help you!