There’s this misconception that large companies are doing well; that the amount of inventory you sell and people you employ directly correlates with your success. If this was the case, Yahoo wouldn’t be struggling and Xerox and Circuit City would still exist. These companies failed to innovate, and somewhere along the line, they lost control of their day-to-day operations.
Just because you’re growing doesn’t mean you’re guaranteed success. Congratulations on having a large workforce and a product (or service) that’s in demand, but you’ll need to employ some of these strategies to ensure you don’t end up yet another big brand that went bust.
- Take Advantage of Enterprise Applications
ERP stands for Enterprise Resource Planning, and it’s a type of business process management software that streamlines and automates your processes. Basically, ERPs organize all your integrated applications, as well as automates your departments, such as your human resources department, development, and sales and marketing departments. The ERP landscape is vast, so you’ll want to compare the top systems and choose one that makes sense for your business needs. Taking advantage of enterprise applications is going to streamline your business, improve your inter-departmental communication, and keep you organized. Better yet, if your business is both online (e.g. e-commerce) and offline (e.g. a physical store or chain), you may benefit from an automated data integration solution that connects your ERP to your e-commerce and marketplace, so you have all of the information you need in a single place.
- Use the BPT Method to Solve Problems
When a problem arises, use the BPT method to solve it. BPT stands for “Brainstorm Prioritization Technique.” BPT requires strategic delegation. Identify who is most qualified to come up with ideas, and choose up to ten people to solve the problem. Then when you have between 20 and 100 ideas, divide those solutions by three, and that’s the number of votes team members get. Eliminate the lowest scoring ideas, recalculate, and vote again.
- Never Stop Innovating
Even if what you’re doing is working, there’s always room to innovate. You don’t want your competitors to come up with something better before you do. Your employees must be motivated to innovate especially the creative ones. Entrepreneur.com recommends you do these four things to motivate your creative employees:
- Provide constructive feedback.
- Reward those who work together. Real innovation requires collaboration.
- Make sure employees understand that innovations won’t be immediate. Give them a realistic timeline.
- Celebrate failures. If they worked hard and their ideas were solid, it’s important to reward them even if their ideas don’t work out.
- Put More Focus on Quality
Quality Assurance isn’t just the process of testing your products, software, or services. Yes, you can and should have quality assurance to ensure your customers are happy with what you offer, but you should also have quality assurance that is focused on workplace dynamics. You may want to employ a few people, proven leaders and managers, to head a QA team. This team will be responsible for randomly auditing customer service calls, create workplace goals, analyzing where improvement is needed to improve workplace dynamics, and much more.
- Transition to the Cloud
Transitioning to the cloud can help you be more productive. It’s a great way to streamline your processes, and it could help end IT problems you may be having. It’s the way of the future, and it can help eliminate clunky file systems that are plaguing your office. The cloud improves mobility because it allows uses to connect via their smartphones. Employees can connect to it from anywhere, which improves sharing too.
A lot of up to date systems now rely on the cloud in order to ensure that operations run smoothly and can be easily accessed at all times. This is particularly helpful with Cezanne HR software as you will immediately be saving time and costs.
Your business relies on your ability to grow and function. Don’t ignore the tech advances available to your business, or the new ways to communicate with your employees. If you stay on trend and think about the future, you should do just fine.
