What are the right ways for your business to grow? Before you know the answers, you have to figure out the questions.
Too often small business owners, independent professionals and solo entrepreneurs are stuck on the tactical questions of how to attract high-paying clients. Tactics are fine, if the strategy is right.
At least four times a year I recommend a business owner take a day to ponder the strategic questions of where he or she wants to go. Recently I did this on a visit to Lake Tahoe. Once I spent a weekend in a bargain hotel in Anaheim. For a team meeting, we had a four-hour lunch at a seaside hotel. It pays to get away and think. In other words, take a strategic retreat to ponder the important questions such as:
What critical market forces are at play in my industry? Are there forces that have the potential to impact my growth opportunities? What will it take to grow revenue and expand profitability?
“How does each of these areas impact the questions you should consider?” asks author Jill J. Johnson. “Structure your questions to challenge the critical issues impacting your ability to achieve these goals.”
Johnson is the president and founder of Johnson Consulting Services. She is an accomplished speaker, an award-winning management consultant, and author of the bestselling book Compounding Your Confidence.
According to Johnson, there are three primary categories of questions to evaluate when you are focusing on your strategic thinking. These include reviewing what is going on internally in your organization, exploring external market forces creating new challenges or opportunities, and a review of your organizational relationships.
Here are some samples of the types of questions Johnson says you can consider for each level of your scan:
Internal Scan. “Ask detailed questions about your customers and their evolving needs,” says Johnson. “What is the impact of your ownership, culture, stage of your business life cycle? Where are the sources of your profitability and capital resources? What are your leadership capabilities? How deep is the expertise of your team? Make sure you fully understand the key strategies of your organization and the opportunities you have to implement them.”
External Scan. “Consider the impact of various market forces on your target market and opportunities,” says Johnson. “What is happening demographically? How is your competition influencing your target market’s expectations on services, costs, and quality? What generational influences impact your ability to compete for your customers? What are the risks of remaining status quo?”
Relationship Scan. “Consider the status of the strategic relationships and partnerships you and your enterprise have developed,” says Johnson. “How do they impact your opportunities and create new challenges? Can you tap into other resources they offer or leverage them to achieve your goals? What are your internal relationships and how can you use them to impact success?”
Think like a journalist. Your questions should follow the format of who, what, where, when, why and how. Make the questions action-oriented. “As you answer them, they should provide clarity to your strategic direction and focus,” says Johnson. “This will provide guidance on areas needing more research.”
Johnson advises to make sure your questions are challenging enough so they cannot be answered without some research or reflection. If you can answer a question with a simple yes or no, it is not a strategic question.
For my company’s recent quarterly retreat with my four key employees, I brought in an outside advisor to help ask the tough questions, keep us on task and to provide outside insight.
“Thinking strategically is a skill set you must actively work at trying to improve,” says Johnson. “Find resources to help you learn and practice your critical thinking skills. Building your strategic mindset takes time, discipline and focus.”
