Article by Jerry Jendusa
Many business owners know this. You spend so much time crafting that perfect business plan. It’s over 100 pages, it covers every part of your business, it includes graphs, an index, market potential reviews, and perhaps even a glossary!
The reality is that when businesses have these complicated plans, they collect dust on the owner’s highest shelf. They were made for bankers, investors, and other external stakeholders. They were not made to actually grow the business, nor to share with employees.
Lets fix this.
We had this same problem when we owned EMTEQ. We found the solution when creating the Single-Page Plan. This simply effective alternative to the typical 100 page business plan united our company and literally kept everyone on the same page. How did it turn out to be effective?
1. It’s defined.
The Single-Page Plan includes a business’s vision, mission, BREAKTHRU Initiatives, and targets aligned with our 5 Growth Categories: Growth, Customer Delight, Innovation, Productivity, and Great Place to Work (GPTW). The structure of the plan keeps it defined so teams can focus on its content, not format.
All parts of the plan are on one page, making it easy for employees to understand and align with it. At EMTEQ, our employees would all have a copy of the Single-Page Plan in order to become familiar with it and understand how their input could make a difference.
2. It’s ready to be executed.
Being simple enough for all employees to follow makes it easier for the company to execute off it. The BLU Growthpath Operating System calls for a monthly execution cycle which includes a Monthly Action Plan (MAP) Meeting. Are the targets outlined on your Single-Page Plan on track to being achieved? Who is doing what, by when, to make sure it does? What is the status of your BREAKTHRU Initiatives? Will this status improve or hurt your targets within the Customer Delight pillar? What about the Innovation pillar?
The Single-Page Plan, accompanied with our process, improves team’s accountability towards successfully acheiving a plan.
3. It motivates employees.
We mentioned before that we gave employees at EMTEQ their own plan. When we would walk around with our own copy of the plan and when employees saw it, they recognized it, and knew how important it was. The transparency of the plan led employees to ask themselves “what’s in it for me?” and the simplicity of this plan lets them see their impact. Whether it’s a motivator like gain-sharing or profit-sharing, having a transparent and simple way for employees to understand what their impact can be, they will be more motivated.
Ready to get your organization on the same page in a single page? Contact BLU or connect with us on our LinkedIn page.
