Clarify your team’s roles

Question:

Do you ever feel like you are having to cover for a gap in your organisation?

Answer:

At The Alpha Group we make certain that you clarify your own and your team's roles and identify the mutual help they all need in your roles.

So, how does this happen?

Easy, its a six step-process using the power of the peer-to-peer advisory board.

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Firstly the peer-to-peer advisory board help you identify what is your strategic problem.

In many companies there is confusion amongst the management team about who is responsible for the many activities in running and growing the business.

As a consequence, the roles of the managing director and individual managers/team members are unclear. This results in key activities falling through the cracks, resulting in customer dissatisfaction and staff frustration.

The serious outcome is often low productivity, poor morale and slower growth.

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Secondly the peer-to-peer advisory board help you decide the main business activities in the company.

What are the main business activities in your company?

These probably include the following eight categories:

1 Your strategy

Achieving your company growth goals:

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2 Your product/service development

Developing your successful new products & services:

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3 Your marketing

Attracting your profitable customers/clients:

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4 Your sales

Selling your products & services to achieve your sales goals:

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5 Your client/customer service

Retaining your profitable partners and clients:

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6 Your operations

Efficiently providing your products and services to customers/clients:

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7 Your people and resources

Effectively organising your people and resources:

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8 Your finance and profitability

Achieving your financial and profitability goals and targets

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Thirdly the peer-to-peer advisory board help you identify specific activities within these main activities.

Taking each of these eight main headings in turn:

Your strategy - Achieving your company growth goals.

1 Agreeing your company purpose and principles

2 Deciding your FastGrowth goals & 1-page Business Plan

3 Agreeing the company organisation structure, key roles and the succession plan

4 Ensuring the effectiveness of your Management Team

5 Setting targets for products and services revenues

6 Planning your mergers & acquisitions

7 Marketing your company to your staff e.g. providing regular companywide communications

8 Agreeing profit targets

9 Planning the exit strategy

10 Sharpening your market focus and segmenting your customers

Your product/service development - Developing your success new products and services

1 Deciding your special niche(s)

2 Researching markets and identifying new products/services

3 Creating your compelling business proposition(s)

4 Managing new product/service development

5 Testing new products/services

6 Deploying your new products/ services

7 Organising staff training on new products/services

8 Designing your new services/ products

9 Building, protecting and exploiting your Intellectual Property (IP)

10 Upgrading your existing products

Your marketing - Attracting your profitable customers/clients.

1. Building, managing and protecting your brand value

2. Analysing market data and organising customer research

3. Managing your digital marketing and monitoring social media

4. Managing your off-line marketing

5. Deciding your sales price strategy

6. Generating inbound leads

7. Marketing to existing clients

8. Organising events for prospective customers/clients

9. Creating sales support tools and materials

10. Analysing your competitors

Your sales - Selling your products and services to achieve your sales goals

1. Deciding your sales strategies for various services/products

2. Defining sales team targets

3. Managing a quality customer/client database

4. Managing your sales team

5. Generating outbound sales e.g. prospecting

6. Negotiating profitable prices

7. Processing your orders

8. Managing client accounts

9. Monitoring the fulfilment of orders

10. Managing your Customer Relationship Management System (CRM)

Your client/customer service - Retaining your profitable partners and clients

1. Identifying strategic partners e.g. strategic alliances, joint venture partners, franchisees, licences, key suppliers

2. Managing partner relationships

3. Agreeing targets with your partners

4. Organising partner training

5. Setting and monitoring your service criteria e.g. service level agreements

6. Growing the value of your client portfolios e.g. up-selling

7. Managing partner referrals

8. Managing customer/client complaints

9. Managing customer/client referrals

10. Measuring your customer/client satisfaction and engagement with your company

Your operations - Efficiently providing your products and services to your customers/clients

1. Managing service delivery

2. Managing premises and equipment

3. Managing your production

4. Identifying needs for and arranging training for staff

5. Managing IT infrastructure

6. Maintaining internal systems and planning for business continuity

7. Invoicing and chasing customers/ clients

8. Maintaining Quality Standards e.g. ISO 9000, ISO 14000 and Investors in People (IIP)

9. Achieving acceptable corporate governance e.g. data protection, insurance and fraud prevention

10. Maintaining your contract documents e.g. nondisclosure agreements

Your people and resources - Efficiently organising your people and resources

1. Organising staff recruitment

2. Improving & documenting processes

3. Planning for growth e.g. office accommodation

4. Monitoring & managing staff morale & motivation

5. Identifying key projects and prioritising resources

6. Managing legal contracts for suppliers & customers

7. Agreeing your key performance indicators (KPIs) and monitoring staff performance

8. Managing employment contracts and disciplinary procedures e.g. staff handbook

9. Managing Health & Safety

10. Organising staff appraisals

11. Organising training & mentoring for staff

12. Defining redundancy procedures

Your finance and profitability - Achieving your financial and profitability goals and targets

1. Forecasting your profit

2. Organising your budgets

3. Planning your investments

4. Raising finance for growth

5. Managing your cash flow e.g. through efficient debt collection & purchasing

6. Preparing statutory & management accounts and your exit from your business

7. Managing stock/work in progress

8. Identifying commercial risks and mitigating actions e.g. for your intellectual property

9. Managing staff salary strategy, payroll, pensions & expenses

10. Costing your products & services

11. Paying your suppliers & taxes e.g. VAT

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Fourthly the peer-to-peer advisory board help you create individual roles.

This involves you creating individual roles, for example Implementing Marketing Strategy, this should be an action verb, followed by 2-3 words. Under this they list out the individual activities which contribute to this role.

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Fifthly our members build a matrix of responsibilities for priority business activities.

This involves listing out all the specific, priority business activities and allocating each one to one or more team members.

Sixthly the peer-to-peer advisory board help you agree the mutual help needed with priority activities.

The help you need

For you to be more effective with your priority activities, what help do you need from individual members of your team? What are the benefits to you?

The help others need from you

What help do other members of your team need from you to be more effective with your priority activities? What are the benefits to you?

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Lastly the peer-to-peer advisory board help you take massive action.

**The profound impact on you and your company of clarifying your team’s roles is that you will build a strong foundation for fast and sustained growth in your company. **