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Follow These Rules of the Road As You Ramp Up For Growth

You are stranded on a desert island and you only have 30 seconds left on your cell phone battery -- could your second-in-command back at your office tell you in those 30 seconds how well your company was running?

If you had your company focused on your key indicators, you would know immediately. Yet so many business owners fail to really hone in on the key indicators that spell success for their company.

Obvious ones are sales, profit margins, expenses. Not so obvious are number of leads generated, number of leads turned into prospects, number of proposals out the door, number of proposals closed, number of projects in-house, number of projects completed, outstanding receivables past 30 days, number of invoices billed -- you get the idea.

As you add more and more employees, you move from one stage of growth to another. The transition that happens between Stage 1 (1 -- 10 employees) and Stage 2 (11 -- 19 employees) is called a Flood Zone. A Flood Zone indicates an increased level of activity -- you have more clients, more work, more processes, more people.

Stage 2 is all about ramping up for growth. This stage of growth demands that you start releasing responsibility to capable people. You have made it past the survival stage and now have 11 -- 19 people who are excited and ready to help you grow. Your focus has to be on managing your growth.

The 5 non-negotiable leadership rules for a Stage 2 company focus on sales, communication and people. Keep your wits about you and before you react to the increase in activity and work load, ask yourself these questions:
-- Am I still focused on driving profits and revenue?
-- Am I beginning to let go of critical aspects of the company to capable people?
-- Am I watching the key indicators of success every day?
These rules of the road will fundamentally drive your business to succeed. By keying in on these critical elements for your current stage of growth, you'll begin to proactively manage your growth instead of letting growth manage you.

Stage 2 Leadership Rules of the Road 11 - 19 employees:

Rule #1: Sell absolutely every day.
Do you organize your schedule to sell every day? Have you set up an effective sales process? Do you have a contact management system in place to effectively follow up with leads, prospects and clients?

Rule #2: Develop, without fail, three employee leaders to be responsible, accountable and proactive.
Have you defined clear roles of responsibility with three supervisor candidates? Do you meet weekly one-on-one with these supervisors to support their commitment to performance-based goals? Do you reward these key supervisors when they proactively demonstrate signs of leadership?

Rule #3: Create a daily, weekly and monthly key indicator instrument panel or flash sheet.
Have you determined key health indicators for each department in your company? Have you organized a system to engage the daily collection of key health indicator data from staff? Have you formulated a daily, weekly and monthly flash sheet system report you can review regularly?

Rule #4: Communicate any and all directions in writing.
Have you set up a simple CEO memo system template when communicating with staff that sets the priority level of tasks, purpose, objectives and directions? Do you have a retrieval system for all written memo directions? Do you use the written memos during work performance reviews?

Rule #5: Drive small action teams to hit goals.
Do you set clear and agreed upon action team goals? Do you organize and facilitate crisp action team meetings? Do you organize/review regular team action lists and delegate tasks and due dates?

Spend time answering each question under each rule -- don't gloss over them thinking they don't affect you. You don't have to reinvent how to manage growth. By spending time every day on these rules of the road you'll watch productivity increase and profits grow.

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