Cowden Consulting Strategic Planning for Business Success by Richard Gourlay

The art of Leadership: do less and BE MORE.
The challenge for leaders today is that expectations about leaders are so high. They are in charge, and that means that they must know everything that is going on, being able to wave magical wands to fix anything at a drop of a hat. This expectation acts like catching hooks on leaders, pulling them into doing rather than leading their business. 

Leaders to stay leading, must therefore member the golden rule that any business is a group of people delivering something. If you want them to succeed then the leader must create the successful conditions for that success to happen. Leaders therefore must design and build the environment for success, and then make it sustainable, so the environment becomes a stable one to continue that success. 

Leaders need to therefore focus on their people leadership skills, not task or output.  




Leadership Vision For leaders to lead they must first identify their core purpose in leading, or as Simon Sinek calls thei…

Leadership: Measuring Outcomes 
Many leaders struggle with leading people effectively. One key challenge that leaders struggle with is in creating key results focus attitude that measure outcomes instead of outputs.
So what is the difference between an outcome and an output? Why does that matter and why is it difficult to differentiate between the two? And why is it crucial for leaders to focus on Key Results measures of outcomes and not just outputs?
Outputs vs OutcomesAn output is something that people do, while an outcome is something that happens as a consequence of that doing activity.  “I have made 50 calls to prospective customers” is an output, “I’ve closed a new customer” is an outcome. 
Measuring the activity, the output, tells you how busy someone is, measuring the outcome, the result tells you have effective they have been at the task in hand. Outputs, being busy always start out as the simplest measure to activity, but they are a false measure of success. Outputs are activity…

Company Culture: Defining Business CultureCompany culture has been the key driver of differentiation between companies.  A positive company culture defines the gaps between average performers and high performer companies within any sector of business.  Company culture demonstrates its true personality, is the environment in which employees exist.  Culture is what differentiates brands within sectors.  It is culture which employees buy-in, from first engagement through to life-time employment. Culture matters from cradle to grave in loyalty in employing people and in creating loyalty with customers.  Company culture is the only real differentiation between leading brands in maturing market sectors.   Company culture is not a single element but includes the entire working environment, established, maintained and driven by its leadership.

Yet despite the importance of culture within the workplace few leaders focus on identifying, creating, developing and sustaining the right culture with…

How to create, drive and sustain change in the workplace 
Executive Summary Change is the only constant in business.The challenge is that success reduces the need for change, until it is too late. Businesses which continually succeed do so because they respond to the changes in their market. Those which can adopt the quickest and proactively succeed in adapting and developing to meet their customers needs, succeed at the expense of those that are unable, unwilling or slowest to adapt.  The drivers of change in business are often driven by a company failing to achieve outcomes in turnover and profit. Change of course is easy to talk about doing, but difficult to achieve.  Changing anything that exists takes more than suggestions, words or even plans. In this article I want to share how I work with high growth organisations to create and sustain change and remove the blocks and active opposition to change within an organisation.

In today's flat rather than traditional hierarchical …

Summary: What to focus on in selling your business. 
The time to sell your business is when you want out. The best time is when you have a new exciting project that you want to commit to. The optimum time to sell is when investors are excited by your sector and your business is in tip-top fighting condition within a dynamic market.  This simple checklist should be at the heart of all business owners when looking to define their exit strategy timetable.  Buyers buy because of the potential they can see in making money from the business they are buying. They will pay a premium for a well-run company, with a motivated and dedicated management team, delivering efficient processes to loyal customers.     
Buyers ExpectationsBuyers look at potential business acquisitions through the lens of perceived financial risks and rewards. Buyers weigh up the potential rewards over 3 to 5 years both in terms of profits coupled with its potential asset value (share value) as their return on their exit pla…