It is generally held that a business that tries to survive at its current level is one that is destined to stagnate and fail.
Development and growth are therefore essential for business survival.
But making the moves to grow and change without the certainty of success can be a frightening prospect, even if it is essential to survival.
Yes, of course, you cannot plan for or guard against everything unexpected that might happen when you take the plunge but there are ways to make sure what you are doing is a calculated risk.
It is important to know your business well. That means regular scrutiny of management accounts and monitoring of the products or services that have consistently done well as well as identifying where there is room for additional ones to be developed.
Having accurate and up to date records is therefore crucial and even more so is regularly reviewing them.
Our free cash management tool can also help with this and is available for download here.
A useful method of assessing the state of your business is to carry out a SWOT analysis. This is an assessment of the Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats in the business.
Strengths and weaknesses are internal to your company—things that you have some control over and can change. This would include who is on your team, your patents and intellectual property and your location.
Opportunities and threats are external. These are things over which you might have no control but identify where you there might be advantages and where you need to protect your business. Examples include competitors, prices of raw materials, and customer shopping trends.
In the current business climate with all its uncertainties a SWOT analysis will at least give you a framework within which to operate and to identify where you can at least take some risks to grow your business.
You may also find this paper useful: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/decision-making-times-market-economic-uncertainty-tony-groom/
And remember, if you want someone objective to talk through your ideas with we are always here.