Page 22 - BUILDING BETTER BUSINESSES, FOR A BETTER ECONOMY -( David White - DRG )
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We will now look at each of the core Functional Areas in further detail, to better understand the
maturing process of the business at S-Curve 2. The business does develop beyond S-Curve 2.
In short S-Curve 3 includes the Functional foundations developed in S-Curve 1 and 2, but gains
a further maturity where staff are encouraged to take self-directed action for the business’s
further growth and sustainability. The Functional Areas seemingly become less defined, and
individuals and teams begin interacting with each other to support the business by identifying new
opportunities and ensuring better stakeholder engagement. Understanding the characteristics
and steps in preparing the S-Curve 3 foundation is not the intention of this booklet. This will be
explained in detail in a sequel booklet.
Functional Areas in S-Curve 2 focus on the points highlighted below.
Human Resource
Need to define activities staff will do in the business that help the organisation to meet its stakeholder
expectations – but in particular the measures of clients and shareholders. Client value and repeat
purchases being the ultimate measure, but shareholder value too is critical with its return on investment
hurdle rates of the business.
Draw up role profiles detailing activities, responsibilities and output requirements of individual people
and teams
Ensure staff have input to the process to ensure reliable and effective delivery methodologies are
developed
Clear and directing contracts of employment, policies and procedures, training processes, inductions
(and reinductions), and feedback circles
Fairness in pay
Effectiveness in recruitment selection and retention
Coaching and mentoring
Incentive and reward (sharing the harvest of the organisation)
Marketing
Ensuring a thorough understanding of customer wants, needs, and demands.
Knowing what it is that is keeping your customer up at night – and ensuring that your end to end
solution meets and exceeds their expectations
Drawing on market intelligence to continually improve services to customers
Ensuring customers have a voice, and that you and your organisation listen to and act on that voice
Doing health checks. Visiting your clients and asking them about their service experience, and asking
them how you could improve your service delivery
Communicating effectively. Remember that customers are important stakeholders in your business –
and as such need recognition and respect
Finance
Core to any business is the management of fund flows into and out of the business.
Companies are vastly different in application of financial resources, but there are benchmarks for
every industry, and careful consideration needs to be taken of these norms in defining your own
company’s financial resources and structure
Consider that a new client with extended credit terms can throttle the cashflow within the business,
and actually foreclose the organisation. Financial planning is thus critical for the organisations
success and sustainability
As companies move from S-Curve 1 to S-Curve 2 they tend to require a financial platform more
sophisticated than an invoice and a bank statement to support the financial process
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