A guide on a few basics

Introductory note

Diagram- Business planning: areas for adjusting for effectiveness

Business planning for effectiveness:

Effective Management

a. Quality control and outputs

b. Day to day running costs

c. Staff happiness & productivity

Source list

This guide is put together by a member of the public and intended

to serve as a simple guide and not as an official set of protocols.

Effective Business plan

to ensure:

2. Quality control & outputs

3. Day to day running costs

4. Staff

Happiness & productivity

1. Effective management

to ensure effective:

a more effective business

Whether you are setting up a new business or revising an old one, it is important

to consider areas where you can be more effective in your business plan. These areas could be:

1. Management: how can management ensure more effectiveness through their role? Through

this you can ensure that other areas of your business are managed more effectively such as:

a. Quality control & outputs: how can quality help you to be more effective? How can

outputs be reconsidered in production costs such as: Time spent on output? Cost price spent on

output? Labour needed for output as a whole?

b. Day to day running costs: how can changing service providers, reviewing utilities set-

ups and other day to day essentials needed for your business be reviewed or considered for

making your business more effective?

c. Staff happiness and productivity: how can staff be encouraged to produce better

outputs? What sort of incentives are likely to make them more effective?

By considering how you could be more effective in these areas or setting up different trials on

how to go about implementing change for effectiveness, your business can be nurtured and

adjusted to be more effective rather than just be a business that simply runs day to day with no

real adjustments in effectiveness and therefore profit margins.

Effective business planning can save you time, money and help your business make more for

less.

Effective management is the most important area to focus on when trying to make a business

more effective. According to Margaret Francis, [MSW, M.Phil, PGDCIM] on ‘Changing Minds’ Here are some things to keep note of to ensure effective management; an effective manager

should have:

Creative Problem Solving Skills:

1. Describing and analysing a problem

2. Identifying causes of a problem

3. Developing creative options and

choosing the best course of action,

4. Implementing and evaluating effective

and efficiency of the decision.

Communication Skills:

1. Listening skills

2. Presentation skills

3. Feedback Skills

4. Report writing skills.

Image by:

John Drake Flickr

Conflict Management Skills: 1. Identifying sources of conflict – functional and dysfunctional conflicts 2. Understanding personal style of conflict resolution 3. Choosing the best strategy for dealing with a conflict 4. Developing skills in promoting constructive conflicts in organization and teams. Negotiation Skills: 1. Distinguishing distributive & integrative negotiations, position & principle negotiation 2. Identifying common mistakes in negotiation and ways to avoid them 3. Developing rational thinking in negotiation 4. Developing effective skills in negotiation that benefits all parties involved. Self-Awareness and Improvement: 1. Understanding the concept of self-management 2. Evaluate the effectiveness of self-management 3. Developing creative and holistic thinking 4. Understanding the importance of emotions in works as well in self-development 5. Understand of self-motivation 6. Effectively managing self-learning and change.

For more visit ChangingMinds.org

“Quality control is a process employed to ensure a certain level of quality in a product or

service. It may include whatever actions a business deems necessary to provide for the

control and verification of certain characteristics of a product or service. The basic goal

of quality control is to ensure that the products, services, or processes provided meet

specific requirements and are dependable, satisfactory, and fiscally sound.” Wise Geek

This can range from setting up an external observer in offices every so often or a

professional in the field to check the quality of work that is being produced in service or

product outputs.

As long as you as a manager or executive can

ensure that day to day production is practising the

theory of your effective business plan through

quality control, you can guarantee that you are

providing a product or service that customers will

come back for.

Output variables can be honed in on in terms of

time –such as where something like staff training

could ensure a quicker or more effective turnover

rate- and cost price –such as finding better deals for

essential components of outputs- could be reviewed

for more effective solutions.

Image by: Artois Bibliothèques

Flickr

Running costs will always be managed by a balancing act between necessity of business

essentials and their availability, quality and price. Some areas can be reconsidered for

effectiveness to save your business money from within the day to day running costs area of your

budget:

Communications:

• Are you on the best communication network

for the size and usage of your business?

• Could your business qualify for a group

communications set up such as email and

online messaging services to ensure more

effective communication?

Utilities:

• Check that your business energy provider is

giving you the most for your money

• Check that you are not wasting water or

electricity over night or week-ends and for

ways you can cut down on general utilities

costs.

Office supplies:

• Are you ordering day to day essentials

like printer fillers and paper in bulk to help

you save money?

Image by:

Images of Money Flickr

Keeping your staff happy is based on, according to Dominic Monkhouse for Service Obsession,

a few but essential implementations on your part as a manager or executive:

1. Make sure you are the right company for your employees.

It is all very well recruiting individuals you consider to be

perfect, but the feeling must be mutual. If your company is not

right for them, your staff will remain dissatisfied and

unproductive.

2. Give your workforce a voice. Encouraging your employees to

contribute their opinions and ideas to the business not only

unveils brilliant ideas but ensures the “team” actually feels like

one. You could give your staff a quota to suggest two business

improvements per month. If the cost is less than £100, let them

go ahead and make improvements for the greater good. It will

never cost any more than this in goodwill or settlements.

3. Make the workplace a positive space. Offices are the

voluntary equivalent of a prison cell – sterile, cramped and

claustrophobic environments in close quarters with people you

may or may not enjoy sharing personal space with, never mind

a conversation. Making your workspace more aesthetically

agreeable improves employee productivity and efficiency.

Image by:

tuppus Flickr

4. Small but effective perks. Pay rises are not always

the best incentive for employees. Regular and thoughtful

perks can be really effective. “Free Food” day on the last

day of the month is quick and easy, beer o’clock on a Friday

always welcomes the weekend in and free use of the

mooring outside our office goes down well too.

5. When it’s not right, it’s just not right. Employers

(not employees) are the cardinal sinners of failing to

address the reality of working relationships. So introduce a

weekly happy check – ask your employees to rate their

happiness on a scale from one to three, and then speak to

people if they are unhappy. It prevents problems escalating

and lets your workforce know you care about their well-

being.

However, people are all different and sometimes, despite

everyone’s best intentions, it just isn’t going to work.

Employers convince themselves it might get better; trust

me, it won’t. This year, businesses need to have an honest

look at their teams – are they full of people you’d go to the

pub with for a pint? If not, the fit isn’t right and these staff

aren’t adding value in the right way to your customers. Take

courage and confront the situation to do both sides a favour.

Image by:

Sasha W Flickr

Image by:

.reid. Flickr

Please click hyperlinks for quote

sources and for more information for

both text and images

“A business of high principle generates greater

drive and effectiveness because people know

that they can do the right thing decisively and

with confidence. “

Marvin Bower