Do you have the optimal strategy in place for your business moving forward?

Many new companies start out when an entrepreneur sees a gap in the market, having the foresight and drive to exploit it. However, mission coherence represents a move away from opportunism to a more structured plan, as the business becomes more established.

Be clear on your company competencies – what you do best. This may be a product, service, or area of your business that you should work to optimise and build around. However, don’t become too reliant on your current competencies, always have an eye on how they can evolve to adapt to changing trends.

Find a balance between ‘hunting’ new customers and ‘farming’ (increasing the profits from) existing customers. It is important to realise that maintaining existing market share is vital for success. Effective ‘hunting’ is meaningless if you are losing your current customers.

Choose your battles; allocate your resources (human and financial) to the markets you wish to compete in. This can be informed largely by supporting data, but also involves a little intuition.

Pick a strategy, this provides structure for improvement, but be prepared to be flexible, review and pivot if needed.