I had a new client start working with my firm last week. Like you, my new client came by way of a referral from one of my ideal clients, Mission Wealth Management of Santa Barbara, CA.
Why am I telling you about my new client? It is because of the concept behind the industry this new client is in, the residential design-build industry. As the name suggests, they first design the project and then build (construct the project). It can be either new construction or a re-model project.
This got me thinking that the concept of design, then build is a great way to describe how we work with our clients and how I believe you need to go about the process of growing your business – design what you are trying to accomplish first, and then build it. Taking the time to intentionally decide where your business is going, what it will look like when you get there, and how you will get there is the design portion of building your business. And because building a business is a process and not an event, this cycle of design–build will repeat. How often it repeats will depend upon how fast you want to grow. In a way it is the continuous re-modeling of your business.
Case Design
Do you take the time to do the design work up front, before you start building your business? You do for your clients, don’t you? Don’t you ask them about their vision and goals, develop a strategy to give them the best chance to reach those goals, and then map out an investment or financial plan (your version of blueprints), before you implement the plan. Some of you even call this activity in your firm case design.
You are designing a solution for your clients before you implement. Unfortunately, that is not how we approach work in our own businesses. Most of us do not design solutions to our growth problems. We rarely take the time to step back and consciously design the improvements in our company (re-model). We are all too busy. We spend most of our time focused on short term tasks associated with putting out fires and dealing with daily problems. We just go to work, doing what we do each day, with little or no thought about how we would like our business to operate or how to make it work even better.
Your business is working exactly as it was designed. If your business is not producing the results you desire or if you have recently hit a plateau, it is time to get back in the habit of working ON your business, doing some design or re-design work.
Business by Design
The process of growing a business starts with your vision of where you want to go and your plan to get from where you are now to where you want to go. In business we call this type of work strategic planning. Strategic planning is your version of design work. It is your process for intentionally deciding what your business will look like at some point in the future, developing strategies that give the best chance of reaching that vision, and then mapping out your project plan to make it happen. This strategic planning or design step comes first before the execution of the plan.
When we work with our coaching clients, we have a proprietary process to help them articulate their compelling vision of the future, their strategy to reach that future, and then their plan to make it happen. We even call this work with clients the Business Design process.
PART TWO in Two Weeks!
