Company Background:
A four year old, systems integration firm targeting small to mid-sized companies had built a successful and reputable firm. In this short time frame they had quickly become the number one integrator in their region for a noted platform company. With this growth, the CEO was dealing with multiple options for future growth and how best to structure the organization to scale efficiently and profitably.
The Situation:
Faced with how to manage growth, the CEO joined a group of other CEOs to help him gain insight as to how to manage this growth. From this, and from information he had gleaned from some books on managing growth, he was confused. Ultimately he wanted to design a three-year plan with his newly formed executive team. He was looking to his team to help size up the possible growth strategies and determine the right ones for the Company. As a small company he was keenly aware of mandating change to the staff, so he also wanted to keep the staff involved as they would be key in executing on the final plan.
The Process:
Over a three-month period, Inner Resources led the executive team in the development of the three-year plan with the input and assistance of many of the staff. Prior to the executive team meeting the staff were polled to gain their insights on future growth opportunities. Armed with this information, and after an intense session with much in-depth analysis, the executive team decided on an initial course of action that would ultimately make the company the leader within their target market. After the first executive session, participatory assignments were given to key staff to provide more ground-level insight and feedback
The executive team presented a draft of their three-year plan at a company-wide meeting and gave the staff an opportunity to give feedback as well as brainstorm on the activities necessary to make the plan happen. Three major initiatives drove the focus in the first year. As a result of staff involvement every employee was involved in at least one.
The Outcome:
Because the process required buy-in from all the staff, the CEO used the Strategic Plan to design a performance incentive program to “manage by objectives.” These objectives, strategically linked to the plan, gave each employee the opportunity to increase their financial rewards.
Inner Resource continues to coach the CEO on how to get individual performance objectives clearly defined for each staff member through the executive team that, in turn, tie into the incentive program.