Differentiating offerings and growing ahead of the market is much more complex than it used to be. To combat overcrowded marketplaces, company strategy and execution must coincide with research initiatives and teamwork. This grows stronger over time and takes place at the molecular level of your firm.
Injecting strategy into your DNA requires a disciplined approach that aligns motivated team members with the tools and systems needed to develop and execute a compelling strategy.
The Strategic Growth & Innovation team at Cherry Bekaert has spent decades working with industry leaders to develop a playbook of tools any organization can use to push their strategy further. Here are four steps to cement strategy into your team’s DNA:
1. Define: Create and Follow a Disciplined, Scalable and Repeatable Strategic Growth System
There are many systems companies can use to develop, deploy and iterate on their strategy. Our team’s guidepost is the Growth Development Process. The GDP allows our consultants to get a macro picture of our client’s environment and develop a tailored strategy appealing to the customer’s needs. It starts with defining the client’s market and ends with executing against a portfolio of high-potential initiatives. Here are its main components:
- Strategy – Define a ‘North Star’ and strategic priorities by evaluating market opportunities and setting a growth goal
- Innovation & Initiative Development – Translate strategy into a prioritized list of short-term and long-term initiatives
- Execution & Tracking – Deploy the initiatives in-market and monitor results for scaling and iteration
2. Align: Get Your Team Motivated and Aligned on the System
Injecting strategy requires the entire organization to be on board. It is crucial to train leadership, management and team members to focus on the new system and drive results.
Find new ways to get the team excited about what the strategic growth system will do for the organization. Encourage collaboration over competition, celebrate team wins and use a cooperative planning process. This will increase engagement and close the communication gap between leadership and team members.
Include the entire team throughout the process of establishing the system. When teams and individuals work toward the same vision, understand overarching goals and see how their contributions connect to broader organizational purpose, alignment is achieved.
3. Equip: Supplement Your Approach With Tools Your Teams Can Utilize to Move the Strategic Growth System Forward
There are a myriad of tools that teams can use to help develop and execute a compelling strategy. One example is target setting:
Target Setting
A good strategy starts with setting an ambitious but attainable target. There are many steps to choosing the right target, but an often overlooked one is determining the growth gap relative to the goal. To find the growth gap, start by looking across your portfolio for what is achievable based on historical growth and new initiatives. Then, add risk adjustment to determine how much you might be falling short relative to your growth goal.
Knowing the target is one thing—identifying growth potential is another. Our team leverages market mapping to determine where to play in the market. We look at each segment to determine where the most significant growth potential may exist based on market growth, competitive pressures, the company’s positioning and much more.
4. Apply & Iterate: Ensure Your Team is Putting the Tools to Use and Not Only Developing but Implementing Prioritized Initiatives
After setting up the right system with enabling tools and team alignment, the final step is to review progress regularly to iterate and improve the strategic growth system over time.
Set up systems for tracking and accountability to ensure the team can see their growth as they work with the new system and tools. Use collaborative planning processes to help get all the information needed to intersect bottom-up tactical planning with top-down organizational strategy.
This process only scratches the surface of what is required to develop a robust strategic growth system, and the Strategic Growth & Innovation team at Cherry Bekaert can help with this and more.
