Are you working ON the business?

We continue to test our 40 Strategy assessment with current clients and prospects. We recognize it provides different value to different people.

The 40 Strategy assessment can be an eye-opener.

We went through the assessment with Adam Ghiglia CEO, and accounting manager Austin Cracraft, of Valley Pacific Construction company.?

This is a third generation company that has been generating business for decades.

If you’re a veteran of the industry, you recognize that there are often a lot of ups and downs with factors, sometimes out of your control.

My goal, regardless of economic conditions, is to help each company feel that they are in control of where the outcomes can be.

And sure enough, the assessment results were an eye-opener. It was also a little bit humbling to see the facts. However, I have learned that this management team is not afraid to tackle difficult problems. Going through the strategic focus areas, they were curious, “What do we have to work on now, because we’re obviously not excellent at many of these different areas?”?

In this particular case, I made it clear, first we have to focus on our “in the business” activities. We have to make sure that we are focused on creating a recurring, consistent pipeline of sales. It is important to make sure we’re effectively delivering our jobs on time to delight our customers. Making sure that we’re managing our operating expenses so we generate solid profit. Good news, all of these areas, are tracking in the right direction.

According to Forbes, it’s not an either/or situation, “working in” and “working on” your business. By having systems and processes in place, you can step away from the day-to-day details and focus on the long-term. For example, this could include delegating tasks, outsourcing, or using software solutions that automate low-level tasks that reduce the operating risk of your company.

After completing those respective activities, we got them focused on the most important “on the business” activities, which were highlighted.

Just because we are doing an assessment, it doesn’t mean we need to move forward with solving all the world’s problems, or in this particular case, 40 of their problems, right now. In the future, we’re going to tackle these gaps to increase the value of their business based on which strategies will have the largest return on investment.

Adam said, “It’s a pretty cool tool. It makes you rethink things. That really made me pause in a few different areas and think about things that we need to focus on and areas that we’re really not well covered in. And the ones in which we’ve been doing a good job. It’s helpful to see that there are values attached to them, showing you what they do for your business.”

Austin said, “It gives you a good sense of the larger picture when we’re kind of in the day-to-day trying to figure stuff out. It will be cool to do this another year and a half, once we’re in a different place, to compare it over time.”