Strategy

Underpinning any successful business will be a clear set of plans, actions, and goals which at its heart should be customer satisfaction, employee satisfaction, and cash flow. Strategic planning is therefore fundamental to business success.

But what is business strategy?

At its core, a strategy starts with identifying and agreeing on the right goal for your business, then aligns resources and decision-making to achieve it. It is as much about what your organisation must not do, as what it should do. This is one area where sole traders and micro-enterprises have a distinct advantage over larger enterprises. Fewer people need to contribute, understand, and buy into the strategy. Tighter controls on all business decisions then follow. But as an enterprise grows, so too becomes the challenge for a business owner to not just control but observe everything within their business, however much they would like to. How many of your business employees not only fully understand your business strategy, but as significantly, know what is expected of them to help achieve company goals? 

A good strategy is nothing more, nothing less, than a roadmap that guides and directs those within a business in the What, Who, Why, and How of decision making. 

• What – are your business goals and mission? 
• Who – provides you with value to realise these goals? 
• Why – do your employees work for your business? 
• How – do you allocate the appropriate resources to achieve the goals? 

When all 4 are fully understood and aligned, a strategic plan can be created which will be unique to your organistion, flexible, and agile to adapt to changes within your business environment. 

This is Where ATO Assists

We advocate that strategies are most effective when kept simple in scope and objectives.  That is not to say they need to be limited in purpose. Rather it is about choosing what a business must prioritise as its goals, then diligently and single-mindedly implementing the actions necessary to realise them. The more complex a strategy is, the more risk that goals become opaque, and the message confused. We know from experience as business leaders that being able to convey a business strategy effortlessly to anyone inside and outside of an organisation is key to its success. The simpler and clearer the message, the better it is understood, and followed to completion.  

How We Add Value

Creating a business strategy is where many business leaders struggle. Why? Often it is because aligning the four elements above leads to an obsession with the detail in answering the “How” question rather than understanding that this is just one of the 4 elements that together create the strategic direction and roadmap for the business. Clear decision-making informed accurately by the environment and conditions and competencies of your business and its place in the market is fundamental to whether a strategy will work, or not. It is our job at ATO to work with your business leaders to ensure that a strategy has goals that are right and fit for purpose, that the decisions are not just reflective, but absolutely informed by achieving these goals, and that resources are allocated appropriately to do so.