what to do when growth stalls
Happy Friday, we’ve officially made it through the first half of 2020. While we still haven’t quite mastered how to avoid the awkward Zoom pause, we think we’re getting better. Here’s to hoping the second half of this year goes much smoother, we’re optimistic.
On to this week’s round-up!
🚢 Stalled growth often makes teams feel unmotivated, and brings morale (along with productivity) comes to a screeching halt. Groove HQ’s founder shared his experience bouncing back from stalled growth, where one huge source of tension for them was running too lean. It’s common for startup employees to wear lots of hats, but going overboard and giving employees an overwhelming amount of responsibilities isn’t sustainable. Hiring highly specialized roles is one preventative measure you can take here because it forces you to keep some boundaries. Groove also benefited from a seemingly small tweak to core values. Instead of “fun” they changed their value to “thoughtful execution”, which made the team more conscious of their production.
🦁 As you can imagine, there isn’t a secret formula to becoming a successful founder, but there are mindsets that the most visionary and successful entrepreneurs have in common, as Jeremiah Lam points out. The aspect we zeroed in on was loving what you do. While in theory, this seems pretty obvious, too often, startups fail because founders are focused on external rewards that might never happen. Effective leadership comes when the figurehead is creatively passionate about what they are building. If you understand the what and why of your business, it’s easier to keep your vision inspiring, but actionable.
🧰 Customer success is one of those buzzwords that people love to say but is often confused with customer service. So what’s the difference between the two? As Sujan Patel points out, while the titles are similar, the functionalities of the roles are vastly different. The distinction between the two roles boils down to CSRs being fixers versus CS teams being problem solvers. CSRs are often the frontline workers fixing technical bugs and account issues reactively they arise. CS teams, by contrast, provide strategic roadmaps to improving the overall customer experience. Additionally, they help drive product growth and innovation by working closely with development teams to create outcome scenarios and optimize the end-to-end customer experience.
⛈ Creating an effective forecasting model isn’t just for your local meteorologist. Sales teams should get in the habit of creating practical and realistic forecasting models to help set realistic goals and drive business decisions. Closer HQ points out this process used to be guided by historical data. The events of recent months have made that method obsolete. A sales team needs to be realistic about your forecast. Zoom out from looking solely at the typical sales process, close rate, etc. You need to look at the business environment as a whole, including internal and external factors, to set realistic benchmarks and brace for potential sales slumps.
🐈 The business world isn’t for the faint of heart. Crowded market spaces and increased competition can make every day feel like a dogfight, all too often we tend to get lost in the weeds focusing on short term goals. Enter If You’re In A Dogfight, Become A Cat, by Leonard Sherman. He lays out fundamental questions that all owners, executives, and team members should focus on to create long term and sustainable growth strategies. Sherman uses his five decades of experience to dive deep into the foundational roadblocks that plague most businesses.