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Do you have a BIG Strategy™?

 

Big Stra•te•gy (big strat’-e-je) n.  A way of competing that allows small companies to beat much larger, and seemingly more formidable, rivals; a way to appear larger than you really are.

As a small business, you naturally have the ability to be more agile than much larger companies– and you  can use that agility to beat them at every turn. To pick off the choicest customers because of your intensity and focus.  To be their worst nightmare.

But its tempting for a business owner to look up to these larger rivals and begin to copy their moves, to offer more product or service lines or to go after a broader set of markets. The thinking is that industry leaders are leaders for a reason . . . so let’s do some of what they’re doing.

But you reduce your chances of success when you match your rival’s competitive moves. You become lumped into group or category of companies and force the customer, who sees no real differentiation in your company, to base their decisions on price and then financial strength. And, to a customer, size equals strength and the small business oftentimes loses or must reduce their price to win.

The “smallness” of your business can be a BIG competitive advantage if you stay focused on what you do better than anyone else and resist the urge to copy your competitors.

So, if you find yourself frequently competing on price, you might not be as differentiated as you think.

The Big Strategy™ concept is based on proven competitive strategy methodologies developed by Harvard Business School — but they’ve been “right-sized” to better fit the needs of small and medium-sized businesses.

How BIG is your strategy? Take this Online Assessment to find out.

 

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Free Download: 4 Principles of a Big Strategy

Check back for free tools, approaches and check lists that can help you build a better, more competitive, business:

4-principles-of-a-big-strategy

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How Strong Is Your Strategy?

Now is a great time for you and your leadership team to step back and take a fresh look at the strength of your company’s strategy.  But how do you measure a strategy’s strength? Here are a few questions from my strength-of-strategy questionnaire to get the conversation started with your executive team.  (Some of these questions were adapted for small business from Paul Leinwand’s and Cesare Mainardi’s Coherence Profiler.)


Would you say your company has a meaningful differentiation that gives you the right to charge more and/or earn higher margins than your competitors? 

Not at All (1)

Unlikely (2)

Maybe (3)

At times (4)

Definitely! (5)

 

 

Which of these best describes how your executive team thinks about your strategy when looking for growth? (Pick One)

√   We look at what we’re great at and find a market where we can capitalize best on those capabilities. (5)

√   We choose an attractive market and figure out how to be successful in it. (3)

√  We pursue a broad portfolio of strategic options and spread the risk. (0)

 

Does your company have a clearly stated set of capabilities that you are GOOD at (not necessarily better than competitors) or GREAT at (something competitors find hard to beat and customers value)? 

√   Yes (Good at) (3)

√   Yes (Great at) (5)

√   Not Sure  (0)

√   No (0)


What’s Next?

Use the scoring to get the conversation going, not as a pass/fail:

  • Does your team have differing thoughts about the effectiveness of your current strategy?
  • Do they know what your strategy is? Can they state it? Do they hold a consistent view?
  • And, do they know what they can do to contribute to the strategy in a way to make it stronger?

If it looks like your strategy is strong, then shift the conversation to looking for ways to make it even stronger. Chances are your competitors are not far behind. But  if your discussion exposes a few weak areas, then follow this link to my short topic Four Steps to Reconnect to Your Strategy.

If you would like my complete 14 question strength-of-strategy assessment, drop me a quick note at jcollins@tpstrategy.com .

 

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Services

Breakthrough Growth Offerings

We help private companies quickly get into action to solve the following problems:

• Below average gross margins
• Ineffective marketing efforts
• Stagnant revenue growth
• Failed new product & service launches
• Innovation-resistant leadership teams


Four-hour Growth Workshop

A four-hour executive team workshop designed to imagine innovative growth pathways and new value propositions or business models that create more formidable competitive positions. This workshop can also be designed for group and industry association meetings.

Deliverables: An assessment of your current value proposition and growth strategies and two to three high-level strategy prototypes to test, validate and refine.

Click here to email us for more details.


One-day New Product/Service Innovation Workshop

A full-day session where your executive team learns how to innovate your products and services to create opportunities to increase prices and earn higher margins. Intensely focused on understanding what matters most to your target market, this workshop brings innovation and design thinking methodologies tailored to the needs of private businesses.

Deliverables: An assessment of your current value proposition and growth strategies and two to three high-level product or service concepts to test, validate and refine.

Click Here to email us for more details.


Two-month Growth Strategy Planning

A two-month process that includes uncovering deep market insights, two to three on-site facilitated strategy development workshops, independent research & analysis and change-leadership coaching with the CEO during the process.

Deliverables: An audit of your current strategic direction and business model, prototypes of possible winning strategies, a hypotheses of what matters most to your key market segments and a description of your high-level strategic priorities.

Click Here to email us for more details.


Customer-centered Strategic Planning

A comprehensive three-month process with a modern take on typical strategic planning that centers around what matters most to your ideal customers. Designed for those firms that are at a turning point in terms of growth and profitability.

Includes three to four onsite facilitated team strategy sessions, interviews with top customers, independent research & analysis and consulting/coaching sessions with the CEO.

Deliverables: A strategic plan including a defined growth strategy, SWOT analysis, a value proposition, key objectives & strategies and implementation plans.

Click Here to email us for more details.


Innovation-centered leadership team coaching

Creating new growth strategies is the easy part. Time and again, we see new growth initiatives fizzle out before they have a chance to gain traction. New ideas challenge current ways of thinking, require new risk-taking behavior and create organizational breakdowns that are hard to overcome. The result: growth does not happen as planned.

The reason: Private companies don’t have R&D departments. One person is not in charge of leading innovation. It falls on shoulders of the leadership team to make change happen–and this requires new skills and thought processes which includes:

• How to turn change-related breakdowns into breakthroughs
• How to overcome the internal and organizational resistance to the new and the different.
• How to have open and transparent leadership discussions that keep growth plans on track.

Our approach is not a training program. We coach your team in the context of your specific innovation and growth plans. We work alongside you to help you accomplish your work, teaching new skills and approaches along the way.

Click Here to email us for more details.

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About

CollinsJanet (2)Janet Collins

Janet Collins is a strategic coach and facilitator helping organizations thrive in an ever-changing world.  She has a proven track record of success in key leadership roles in all size businesses – large public and privately held companies, venture funded start-ups, and most recently at a mid-size family business as President of GMi Companies. . . . READ MORE.


 

Our promise is simple:
We will help you outcompete, outgrow and out earn your competitors.

We deliver on that promise by using a proven process—called The Big Strategy Advantage™–that helps you create a winning strategy and a plan that includes coaching you and your team along the way.

The Big Strategy Advantage™ is based on the pioneering work of the Harvard Business School on how businesses create competitive advantage.  Over the last ten years, we’ve tested and streamlined this concept to better fit the needs of small and medium-sized privately held businesses.

about

The Underlying Premise of The Big Strategy Advantage™ is this:

High Performing Strategies  =

Being Meaningfully Different  x  Being Insanely Disciplined

Being Meaningfully Different: We work with you and your team to understand and then define a core strategy that will set you apart from your competitors. In other words, I help you answer the question, “ Why should I do business with you versus your competition?” (Hint: the answer is not better customer services or higher quality.)

Being Insanely Disciplined: We then help you build a focused strategic plan and show your team how  to “hardwire” that plan into the choices they make everyday as they execute the plan, edit your business model and grow your company.

Interested?
Learn more about our Big Strategy Services designed to fit different budget levels »

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Contact

For more information, contact us directly or send us a message via the form below:

Janet Collins:  janet@tpstrategy.com • 513-404-2809 • LinkedIn

 


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