Tag Archives: planning

Continuous Improvement

The past few years have proven challenging for many small business owners as they adjusted, pivoted, modified and realigned to meet the changes they faced.

Some businesses were not prepared for what 2020/2021 brought and sadly closed their doors. However, others positioned themselves to take advantage of the opportunity to rethink and reimagine their business to meet the needs of their customers.

While it may take facing a disaster for some business owners to examine and explore opportunities to improve their business, continuous improvement is a critical component to success in any business – regardless of size or sector.

Continuous improvement is an ongoing process that focuses on:

Identifying opportunity for improvement and planning for change.
Implementing small-scale change and analyze the results.
Applying the successful change on a wider scale.
Assessing continuously and beginning the cycle over.

I have seen several business owners work on continuous improvement even while going through challenging times. One woman closed her business in one location and found an opportunity to reopen successfully in another location by collaborating with an existing business owner. Another family business had just launched as the pandemic began spreading and they worked creatively for almost eighteen months to stay in business before they could safely open to the public.

These examples of determination and resolve to succeed were accomplished by people working together to achieve a goal. To some degree we could say that they were reacting to changes brought about by a disaster rather than by creating an action plan for change, but they made it work. All businesses could benefit by continually looking for opportunities to improve and analyzing the data to make sure changes bring about results regardless of what is happening in the world.

Businesses that have continuous improvement as part of their strategic plan are better positioned to withstand natural disasters, limited resources, or whatever comes their way. Even solopreneurs can work together with support teams – virtual or otherwise – to creatively look for ways to stay ahead of the business curve. Just think how much better businesses that already have teams in place are positioned to use their collective expertise to keep the business primed for success.

Does your business have a continuous improvement plan? This could be another tool to add to your toolbox. Let me know if you need support in putting together your continuous improvement plan.

Why a Butterfly?

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Someone recently asked me why I chose a butterfly as the logo for Wise Women Leadership, and I thought that might be a good blog post for this month. For me, butterflies are the essence of change and transformation, and as the focus of my business is about changing or improving performance, I feel the two have a lot in common.

Like butterflies, many of our businesses don’t just happen overnight, and they go through some significant changes to get to the end result. My idea around creating a supportive network for entrepreneurs and leaders to grow and change began as a seed many years ago.

Like the caterpillar that eats its way through leaves to gain energy for the transformation, I spent time and gathered knowledge and experience about leadership. I have applied what I have learned about leadership with various business sectors and have found that there are underlying topics that cross business types and industry levels. For example:

Leadership is not about a title as much as it is about a skills, values, and communication.

Planning is something that takes resources in the present to preserve resources in the future.

Self-care is as valuable a part of leadership as any knowledge or experience.

Each leader brings to the organization his or her own unique experience. For me, my unique self is adapting to change. For as long as I can remember I have had to adapt to circumstances and cultures, and this has given me a distinctive advantage when working with clients. I call it my magic sauce!

I was also asked why I chose the color purple. Purple signifies wisdom, creativity, and would you believe – magic! I believe that wisdom comes from life-long learning combined with experience. We are never too young or too old to learn something new every day, and when we keep connecting with people and places, our experience continues to grow.

To me, creativity is essential for enjoying life. I am at my best when I am learning something new, meeting new people, making new connections, or creating new offerings. When I am at my creative best time flies by quickly, my passion is in full bloom, and my energy is high. Even my hobbies allow me to explore my creative side; I love to garden and watch how plants grow, and I love to make quilts out of different colors and textures of fabric. I know I am at my lowest when I am not creative and things are tedious or too routine and this is when I look for ways to bring creativity back into my daily work and life.

What makes your creative energy flow? What excites you about your work or your life? Drop me a note and let me know mailto:jillian@wisewomenleadership.com .

Managing a Sustainable Business

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Earlier this month, I presented a webinar on Managing a Sustainable Business. As you look to grow your business and ensure your company’s longevity, it’s important to remember regardless of size, businesses exist for two main reasons:

Provide a product or service that meets an unmet need

Generate an acceptable return on invested resources.

If your product or service isn’t meeting a need, then the business most likely will not be able to generate an adequate customer base, and in turn not be able to generate a return on invested resources. The four factors important for a business to be sustainable include:

Market Positioning – A business needs to be in a market that is large enough to support growth regardless of the percentage of market share your company serves. There are two methods you can use to grow market share:

generate new customers for your existing products or services

generate new products and services for your existing customers

Sometimes a business is not ready for the market due to limiting factors, or the market is not mature enough to purchase the products and services being offered. Having a clear understanding of the market is key to managing a sustainable business.

Leadership – A business needs to promote learning for everyone involved in the process of operating the organization. This includes:

learning about how the business functions

learning about the products and services the business offers

learning how to collaborate

learning how to be customer focused.

Mentoring and coaching employees for succession and growth can have a significant impact on organizational culture. Keep in mind that open and authentic communication should also be part of the culture.

Operations – Having systems in place so that the business can operate effectively and efficiently are also important. One of the most important factors in operations is to make sure that internal resources are aligned with external demands. If you own a seasonal business, there may be times where inventories are lower than others, as well as staffing needs and resources. Addressing the ups and downs of the business cycle should include a review of how work is being considered, and make sure that the right tasks are being incentivized.

Planning – While many businesses don’t work from both a strategic plan and an operating plan, a sustainable business knows the value of both. It’s important to understand the difference between a strategic plan and an operating plan:

A strategic plan maps the way

An operating plan works the day

Planning creates a map of how the business will address short and long-term goals, and should be structured enough to provide stability to the business and flexible enough to allow for contingencies.

I hope these highlights have been valuable, and please check out my upcoming webinars. If you have any questions or would like help managing a sustainable business please email me at jillian@wisewomenleadership.com.