Evan Rutherford - Driving Business Performance

Keys to Business Success

• The life plan comes before the business plan"for what is a man profited, if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul?" Matt 16:26.
  During our initial assessment questionnaire and interview, we will not only drill down into business issues but also explore your personal interests and preferences. We will encourage personal development in relationships around you as well as helping you evaluate fit and life purpose issues.
• Plan, Plan, PlanDoing the right thing versus doing things right.
  ER will lead through an intensive Strategic Planning Session to help assess where your business is, where the potential lies and how you will get there. From this session, the groundwork will be laid for development of operational and logistic plans to realize your business goals. At the most detailed level, these include financial and key performance indicator budgets that provide periodic mileposts to show and ensure progress.
• Know your customersHow will they answer The Ultimate Question?
  Our ultimate goal is to have your customer answer an emphatic “Yes” to the Ultimate Question which is “How likely are you to refer someone to us?”. By conducting one of our Toward Awesome Service training sessions or facilitating a Customer Advisory Board, you will be creating an environment that generates satisfied customers. To measure performance, we will design and implement measurement tools that track customer satisfaction.
• Get the right people on your busEvery hire must raise the bar.
  Your success is totally dependent on competent, dedicated, and motivated employees; they are your largest asset. We help ensure that the proper policies and procedures are in place to attract and retain the best talent. We can assist with the recruiting process including testing to measure fit and competency within your organization. We design compensation and incentive systems to maximize staff productivity and minimize turnover – and create a great workplace for your staff. Don’t tolerate mediocre performers or you will lose your stars - "stars don’t want to work with turkeys – create a culture of eagles!"
• Numbers run a business; information that leadsWhat gets measured gets managed.
  We convert “data to information to intelligence to action” by reviewing all information sources and determining “what needs to get measured”. We firmly believe that “what gets measured gets managed”. In addition to reviewing financial reports to ensure that proper accounting and reporting is present, we identify those Key Performance Indicators (KPI) that drive business success and set up reporting. Our underlying goal is to present information to you in such a way that it leads you to make the pertinent right business decision. Our measurement toolbox focuses on trend analysis to drive business performance.
• Cash is KingMake it before you spend it.
  We value cash accumulation for small businesses and treats every outlay as an investment. Each “investment” should generate an acceptable return. One of key reasons for failure of “seemingly” successful businesses is mismanagement of working capital even though “our P&L shows a profit”. ER understands the theory of Fundable Growth Rates and the fact that rapidly growing businesses must understand working capital requirements. We prepare cash forecasts as frequent as necessary to identify and cover short-term needs. ER works with you to plot long-term cash requirements for the next 12-to-36 months and works with you to ensure you will have the resources to draw funds from and that you are putting any excess reserves to good use. We liaison with you and your banker as needed to maintain a liquidity requirements.
• Know your costs: “No” your costsHow they move, what they add.
  Costs or expenses can be a businessman’s best friend as they are responsible for generating profits. However, they must be managed. Costs are predicatable; the business owner must know how they respond to changes in business conditions. One of ER’s first tasks in any engagement is to properly categorize the cost structure so that fixed, semi-fixed, variable, and cost-of-goods categories are fully understood by key decision makers. Controlling costs is essential and we help the business owner “just say no” to any cost unless it can justify its expenditure. Our budgeting approach is a zero-based approach which requires justification for each expenditure.
• Manage your incrementalsDirection is more important than position.
  We believe that movement in the positive direction is critical for business performance. We would rather have a business at “10% and growing 2% a year” than one at “15% as it has been for past 5 years”. A good business prospect may be unprofitable but showing consistent progress towards profitability while a poor business prospect may have historic profitability but declining with each passing year. For each evaluation period, we look for positive trends in all measures and utilize rolling averages to delineate true movement. For instance, high top-line growth is only good if the corresponding expense growth is less. Likewise, high-expense growth is not necessarily bad if top-line growth in greater. Managing these relationships is critical to business success.
• Embrace AccountabilityStrong controls, Independent oversight.
  We believe in strong systems of internal controls, board accountability, budgetary controls, and full regulatory compliance. We review controls and make recommendations to improve; these procedural issues are basic and not something that should divert our attention years down the road when our long-term administrative person embezzles $500k from us. We encourage board accountability to bring another perspective convinced that two heads are better than one. Budgets should set the bar high enough that our top-rated staff can excel, attain lofty goals, and reap significant benefits for having done so. Compliance should be a no-discussion matter that gets done and leaves no opportunity for dispersion on our company’s reputation.
• Have Fun!
  Life is too short! The best company employees embrace the “Work Hard, Play Hard” philosophy. The most talented people will perform but need to enjoy where they spend majority of their waking hours. For the experts the secret to having fun is to ask staff.