The Business Growth Paradox

Posted: October 18, 2017 by Robert Craven

The Growth Paradox is simple. It is the (naïve) belief that as you grow the business and take on more team members, clients, and business systems that things should get easier. And, of course, they don’t. What happens is that things get harder and more complicated. Much more complicated.

The numbers say it all. One staff member, one product, one client is easy. Ten staff members, ten products, ten clients and suddenly the web of potential relationships becomes enormous.

The complexity makes growing the business feel like wading through treacle. It acts like an anchor on your growth aspirations. It weighs you down at every turn. So, no surprise that so many business owners simply give up. The pressure to slow them down feels like it is greater than the pressure to grow.

 

The solution, for those that have read my work before, is to focus on the three fundamentals:

1. The right leadership and strategy
2. An effective marketing function, and
3. Teams: The right people in the right jobs: a scalable infrastructure.

Strategy, marketing, and teams are the trinity of business growth. It is a simple as that. And, surprise, surprise, great businesses are obsessed with, wait for it, strategy, marketing, and teams.

 

The key questions

At its simplest you and your senior team need to confront and answer the following questions:

1. Where are we going and how are we going to get there? (= strategy).
2. How can we sell more ‘stuff’ to the right people at the right prices? (= marketing).
3. Why can’t we get on better and how can we organise ourselves more effectively? (= teams).

 

I was banging on about strategy, marketing, and teams back in 2001 in my first book, Kick-Start Your Business. The fundamentals just do not change!