Creating a business based on sustainability involves all-hands-on-deck. If you are a startup or small to midsized business, every employee wears multiple hats from time to time.
Everyone in your organization, top down, bottom up, is responsible for understanding their role in driving productivity and profitability through your company.
Building sustainability into your organization involves reviewing your personal, professional and corporate horizons with a fresh set of eyes each quarter.
For your employees this strategy means thinking beyond hourly compensation and a weekly paycheck. For you, as the CEO, this strategy means thinking beyond whether or not you are going to be able to make monthly payroll.
Targeting strategic sustainability extends your vision beyond a 12 month calendar year. This is a huge step for everyone in your organization to take. If your business operates in the manufacturing and manufacturing service sectors, the bulk of your employees are used to receiving hourly pay for services rendered.
No one’s ever asked them to buy into sustainability, let alone develop their sense of strategic vision.
When you view your role within your company strategically, you begin to re-assess your own self-worth. When you become part of something bigger than your weekly paycheck, you start to consider how you add value to an organization in order to sustain it from year to year, instead of from week to week.
- How you create a mindset of sustainability in your organization?
- How you hire, to create a collaborative team who buys in to sustainability?
- How do you train your staff to create a culture of enduring sustainability?
Building your business based on a culture of sustainability makes a tremendous difference in the quality and quantity of your productivity and profitability. Everyone’s focus is on throughput instead of output.
When you create a mindset of sustainability and hire folks who buy in to your vision, everyone wears multiple hats – and not just from time to time. Everyone becomes interoperable: they understand that each other’s throughput creates value for your customers. They have each other’s back and yours as well.
When you create a culture of enduring sustainability, your entire team begins to view themselves as Businesspeople of Worth: to each other and to your customers.
When I work with startups and small to midsize businesses, there are three characteristics I look for as we begin to work together. I’m interested in whether the business model can scale and grow. I assess whether the team is coachable and collaborative. Most of all, I determine whether the company wants yet another quick fix or whether they are “there.” When they are “there”, they’ve run out of quick fixes and understand what’s required is a culture of sustainability.
The difference is in the quality of your business outcome. Make it a sustainable one.
Babette N. Ten Haken, President of Sales Aerobics for Engineers®, LLC, catalyzes business transition, startup growth, and professional development. She works with non-traditional sellers like engineers, manufacturers, and technical startups to create sustainable business models and revenue strategies. She was named a Top 50 Sales & Marketing Influencer 2014, for the second year in a row, by Top Sales World magazine.
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