Founders, one of the most exciting parts of your journey is the constant innovation and growth. I loved the ride, the ride in which I ended up building my dream company, one I’m proud of, exiting and living happily ever after.
Navigator is collection of stories, system, tools and techniques I learned and developed that made my business great. You’ll learn insights into how to turn your employees into stakeholders, your products into services and your abysmal organisation into optimal systems. It promises to be an authentic collection of lessons learned the hard way. It was the implementation of these systems that took my business from good to great. These days I research, recall and write about the things that worked, the distractions, the hurdles, the failures and the wins. If you’re on a similar journey I promise they will benefit you. Kevin
I like working with founders but anyone in a mission is the same. Any leadership position can benefit from Navigator.
Navigator divides the parts of your company into three parts to work on. Stakeholder, Service System, These are all related and ultimately all will have to work in harmony for success, but it’s easier if you take one thing at a time. You don’t have to start in any particular place, but I suggest starting with Stakeholder and the first one of those is you.
Self – Service – System
1. Self
Thought: First you’ll need to realise that it’s all all about you, then you’ll need to realise it’s not about you.
Describing someone who has just started in business as an Entrepreneur, is like calling someone who just started running an Olympian. That’s not to take anything away from those who start a businesses, it’s just to begin this journey with some perspective. You may not have just started yesterday, but you may not have progressed in your skills either. The arc of a business owner is a journey from artist, to manager, to leader and if you fulfill your purpose on that journey you can crown yourself a worthy entrepreneur.
The Owner is not just the actual owner of equity. It certainly begins with the owner of equity or the founder, but as the business grows everyone needs to become an owner. As the founder you must embody and go through this journey before you can expect someone else to. As a founder you cannot expect your business to grow unless you do and You cannot stay the same and expect your team to grow either. As you grow from the Artist, the creator of this seed, you become a manager so that you can leverage many skills at once, then through practice and mastery you become a leader who sets the bar. Your goal is not to be the smartest person in the organisation it’s to set the standard so high that those that join you on your journey will never need you holding their hand. They are not employees they become stakeholders
How to build the first stakeholder – YOU:
2. Service
Thought: It’s the Experience Stupid!
You are in the service business whether you know it or not. Whether you are selling a box of cereal or a ticket to heaven you must understand one thing. A customer is not a customer until they willingly comeback time after time to do business with you. Your product is not just what’s in the box. If you want a successful business you must understand that the product encompass everything from the first time your customer sees your product, through the sale process, through the fulfillment, through the smile they have on their face after dealing with you and finishes when they tell someone else about it. That’s why your product, is in fact a service. You can not compete with a cheaper box. You can always compete on experience. Think of the last thing you bought – it was probably an underwhelming experience – insurance anyone? Businesses tend to copy each other, bad ideas become the norm – remember Press 1 for sales! Taking time to understand your customers journey and changing that into an unforgettable experience is the mission.
3. System
Thought: Any system will get you good results, a good system will get you great results.
You can not grow your business with everyone running around like headless chickens. You can not provide great service by having variables. Spinning plates that come crashing down one after another. You can’t have a complex system either. You can’t build layer upon layer of administration. The health service is an example of what you get when there is no much bureaucracy that the service is undeliverable. So you need some simple systems, systems that enable people to do their work not prevent them. Systems add consistency. There’s a good saying that goes “Slow is steady and steady is fast” throwing lots of energy at something wont work.
Work with Kevin @ HTC
If you are interested in working with on Your mission, business, team, products, services, systems then please do make contact. All options are open to proposals so feel free to contact me. You’ll find more information on the services I provide here.