On 28 August 2014 a group of twelve ambitious owner-managers of regionally-based Small to Medium-sized Enterprises (SMEs) came together to form a Business Improvement and Growth (BIG) Network for 2014/15. As well as forming the network, participants debated and agreed on the key challenges they were facing as they implement their strategic improvement and growth plans over the coming year.
First…a chance for personal reflection!
The process of identifying the key challenges started as far back as December 2013 when owner-managers, due to graduate from the BIG Journey executive development and growth programme and the previous year’s BIG Network, were asked to reflect on their personal and business development journey to date, and consider:
- what impacted you the most?
- what did you struggle with most?
- what unanswered questions do you have?
- what knowledge of skills would you like to develop?
- what are the challenges you expect to experience?
This exercise produced a list of functional topics to further work on, including: leadership skills & strategy; sales and marketing (e.g. product development, go to market); operations & value chain; human resources (e.g. managing employee performance, recruitment and selection, and culture); and finances (the finance function, financial management and strategic finances).
Second…a chance for prioritisation!
These functional topics were then played back to the individual owner-managers, who were invited to rank these topics in order of interest (1 being ‘not of interest’, to 5 being ‘of great interest’).
This provided an opportunity to analyse the common priorities amongst the group, a process that produced a list of six key challenges, and associated phraseology, facing owner-managers:
- team – ‘stepping up’, ownership, high performance, dynamics
- finance – growth, investment appraisal, financial analysis
- value proposition – mkt strategy, value chain thinking
- strategic alliances – managing, collaboration, IP
- innovation – culture, lean start-up, personality, delegation, turning ideas into a reality
- delivering a winning pitch – selling, pricing, public speaking
Third…understanding the top business challenge!
These themes were subsequently presented into the formation meeting of this year’s BIG Network on the 28 August 2014, and group goal setting process was used to explore, deepen and prioritise the above challenges. This led to the identification of the group’s top priority!
The top business challenge for the group related to a shared desire to revisit, renew and effectively communicate their Value Proposition.
This shared desire was broken down into components by the group of owner-managers into the following development areas, raising key questions:
- Market research
“What can we do to better understand our customers, our suppliers, and ourselves in the process?”
- Understanding our role in the Value Chain
“How do we connect our value proposition with where we sit in the value chain, and how does this inform our value proposition?”
- Developing a clear and concise Value Proposition
“I’d like to review and renew our value proposition”
- Sharing/communicating the value proposition
“How do we communicate our value proposition effectively within and outside of the organisation?”
“how much information can and should we share with our value chain?”
- Time to practice & examples
“what tips and tricks are there for the value chain?”
“how does the value chain differ between a product and service oriented organisation?”
The BIG Network looks forward to seeking answers to the above questions by working in partnership with the Centre for Value Chain Research, when it meets for its next event in November.
The BIG Network provides a space for ambitious owner-managers to explore, challenge and resolve issues that are central to the sustainable success of their organisations. The network is led by its members and is prefaced on openness and honesty, mutual respect and confidentiality.
For further information on the BIG Network contact Dr Simon Raby on 01227 824740 or S.O.Raby@kent.ac.uk