A company and its owner will benefit the most from the project if it’s conducted when the signs of a “ management crisis” first appear.
A crisis appears when a company has succeeded in the sales and delivery of its product and has started to expand. In that moment, the CEO realizes that in order to achieve further growth, it is necessary to transition from the direct management of individual staff members to the management of divisions – it is necessary to create second-level managers.
And in that moment, it doesn’t matter whether the creator of the company has made his best staff members into managers, or if he tries to hire experienced managers, – if there is no administrative system in place, that “first management crisis” will deliver an unavoidable blow. This manifests as the number of staff grow and the efficiency drops. The way it manifests is that while the number of staffs grows, the efficiency drops.
Chief Executives of small businesses think that the reason for this decrease lies in the incompetence of new managers and staff members, or even in their unwillingness to work. This is illogical, as these same staff members were previously achieving good results while working under the guidance of the owner, and now, suddenly, everything has changed.
The reason is not that the employees changed. The real reason is that the executive/owner knows only how to manage his direct juniors and he doesn’t know how to direct managers. It is one thing to pilot an airplane, which in itself is not easy and requires special skills, but to manage a team of pilots is a totally different kind of work. A pilot has to be good with the machine, and a manager with people. And they use two completely different sets of tools.
The reason for the “first management crisis” lies in the fact that the owner puts managers on their posts but did not create the tools for successful performances. He expects them to be as efficient in manual administration as he was. However, the work environment became more complex and the company is bigger. Additionally, he continues to “manually” manage, same as before, but on a new level. This is usually unsuccessful and the chaos within the company continues to grow.
Implementation of Administrative Management System helps to successfully overcome this situation. The owner must understand its tools, work out and adapt those tools to his company, learn how to use them and teach other manages to do the same.
The answer to this question is explained in detail in an article, which is a concise version of one of the book’s “Small Business. Big Game” chapters. This will be published soon. If you have questions please feel free to give us a call.
Our Business Owners Program is developed for and delivered to business owners, that meet the following requirements:
1. The company has 5 to 100 of administrative staff (that are not involved directly with manufacturing);
2. The owner has enough power to be able to conduct extensive organizational changes;
3. The owner cares about the value of products/services, which are manufactured by his company and is interested in a vast business expansion;
4. The owner wants to create a team of competent managers and staff, instead of working alone.
There are situations when implementation is not possible. Below are a couple of scenarios, which have to be handled first, before starting the implementation process. Our specialists can help with the handling of some of them.
1. If there is a difference of opinions between partners or co-owners of the business. This will create too big of a problem and will not allow reaching the success our program.
2. If the business owner does not want to conduct the implementation himself, does not want to increase his competence, but wants the managers or consultants to do it for him.
3. An extremely unorganized business owner that cannot execute the targets included as part of the program.
What distinguishes a well-organized company, where the staff members are dedicated to achieving a common goal, take a great pleasure in their work, improve their skills and produce more and more results?
Commonly, such companies are already big corporations with a long history of established values, high employee loyalty and personnel discipline. However, imagine a small to medium-sized business achieving those important qualities at the beginning of its lifespan. In such a company, administrative tools have been implemented and, therefore, the company is easy to manage, it is comfortable to work in, there are opportunities for career advancement, the responsibility of staff members is high and continues to rise, working conditions are easy to understand, and there is a guided growth for the future of the company.
The business owner sees and understands what occurs within his company and the internal reasons for them happening. With the Business Owners Program, it’s not a guessing game, but becomes fact-based confidence. This allows the owner to assign a Director and correctly turn over the company to a successor if he wishes to do so in the future.
The price of our consulting program is comparable to the salary of an experienced manager to which a business owner would like to hand over all of the problems of operative management. There are two ways to pay for the program; it can either be paid all at once or over a ten month period (the same length of the program itself.) The program totals $66,000, or ten payments of $6600 a month.
A normal business practice is to turn over operative management to a competent manager — this is generally a good idea. This works well with accounting, promotion and marketing, IT-services, and sales. However, if a company owner turns over all administrative duties to the manager without proper training, it could create serious problems. These could evolve to spell disaster and result in the collapse of a company. It’s hard to turn over functions one does not fully understand and depend on actions largely based on intuition. Many companies are founded by people who do not have the knowledge and experience in administration. They are trying to turn over responsibilities that they don’t understand. The best case scenario is that they lose an experienced manager (because they don’t know how to control him), and in the worst case scenario is that they just lose control over the company or even lose the whole business.
Our consulting program is developed primarily for the owners of small to medium-sized businesses. During the program, the owner, first of all, will himself become a professional top-manager in his company. And after that he will create a team of managers, nurture a director and then turn over operations of the business over to him. Lastly, the business owner will start dealing with further expansion of the company.
The program helps the owner start the path of becoming a professional administrator, but that is just the beginning of the road. It takes time to become an expert. As it takes ten years to train a good doctor, it takes time and experience to become an excellent business owner. The program gives the business owner the tools to become a professional administrator, but it’s whether or not the business owner implements the lessons they’ve learned during the ten month consulting and training program that determines their success.
The Business Owners Program is only the beginning of the path. On the program, the owner learns and implements all primary administrative tools and gets his first experience using them. To become a professional in the field of administration, it will take him or her applying these tools to his or hers business and consistently improving the already implemented administrative tools over time.
Yes, but only after the complete implementation of the management tools learned during the program. The program is approximately 10 months long and implementation is done throughout the program. the full length of the program The program doesn’t promise an overnight fix. If the income of the company is relatively low when the owner begins the program, the problem won’t be resolved immediately. During the Business Program, you should invest your time and your efforts in strengthening your promotion and increasing your sales.
If you would like a more detailed recommendation for your company’s particular situation, take part in our free, short questionnaire. We will be able to proceed with the answers to create a detailed plan specific to your company.
Business training is a series of courses, seminars and MBA degrees that usually teach the use of general management tools. Their purpose is to educate executives about the tools of modern business. Unfortunately, these programs do not include a plan for l working out and implementing the administrative tools in a particular company. Unlike business training, our program consists of studying the tools and their application to the business using multiple precisely tested scenarios. The Business Owners Program is a consulting program created specifically for owners of small to medium sized businesses. Its goal is to create an administrative management system in an existing business.
Previous education in business management, such as a bachelors or masters, is not necessary to successfully complete the Business Owners Program. What the Business Owners Program does is give the educated person the tools to apply that degree to his company. Some of our clients have their BAs or MBAs in business, and they’ve said that the Business Owners Program helped them create a foundation for managing their company. Once that foundation was put in place, they were able to apply their education in real world practice
The ability for a business to compete with others depends on many factors, such as the process of manufacturing the product or service, ease of acquiring the necessary resources, successful marketing, and personnel efficiency.
In business fields where increasing staff efficiency can give a significant competitive advantage, implementing a good administrative system would lend to create that competitive edge. For a more detailed analysis concerning your business, you can contact us to receive a short free consultation.
No, as our consulting technology is not programed for remote study. An important part of the Business Owners Program is done while working with a personal consultant. Secondly, the program is conducted through 3-4 day study periods where a few business owners participate at the same time. This gives one the opportunity to implement the tools in their own business but also see how fellow business owners and participants are implementing the same tools in their companies. This part of our program plays a big role in the successful implementation of the management tools, as it allows the exchange of experiences, and gives one the opportunity to hear real life examples using the administrative tools. The success of our program depends on that interaction between you and our trained consultants, and the exchange with your fellow business owners, and that’s why our program can’t be done remotely.
No, our program is not designed for the company directors who do not own the business. The implementation of the management tools requires drastic rebuilding of a company’s management principles. If rebuilding is attempted by the director instead of the owner, it ends up weaking the position of the owner and creates a lot of unnecessary difficulties in the implementation.
This depends on the business itself, and the answer varies on a case by case basis. To find the definite answer, contact us to receive a short free consultation.
Yes, the program is perfectly suited for your company. It is particularly useful if you plan on further expanding your business, or if you want to hand over the operational management to a director and only work on matters of development and strategy.
Implementation of the management tools during Business Owners Program follow a precise sequence of steps. If you execute those steps, the tools will be implemented. Implementation depends to a significant degree on the owner and his ability, desire, and his actions to implement. If for some reason (not due to a consultant’s actions) the owner does not execute practical steps to implement the tools within two months, he will be taken off the program. If this occurs, the owner has the right to come back and resume the program with another group in a year and a half to a year, or whenever he likes.
Our program was delivered to more than 270 companies in different business fields. The steps to implement the management system have been completely worked out and tested. Our team helps the owner understand and drill each step of the program so he can easily apply it. However, we don’t do it for him. This means that the owner is personally responsible for the implementation of the tools in his company.
The program adapts the administrative tools to the particularities of each business. The program has been successfully delivered to companies of entirely different fields.
The price of the Business Owners Program is approximately $78,000. The price includes all the services our company offers, which are necessary for the implementation. These include: a clear plan and instructions for the implementation of the management tools, individual consultations, document templates that ease the implementation, the materials library, trainings, workshops and more.
You can do that and you’ll probably get decent results. However, hiring a consultant will cost you 4-5 times more for the same or smaller results. Plus, as a business owner you won’t be trained to apply the necessary solutions to your business, improve the organization of your company on your own, and will always be dependent on a consultant for help. For during BOP the owner personally executes all the implementation targets, and the consultant helps him with it. As a result, the owner learns how to create the administrative management system. This gives him an opportunity to apply this knowledge in the future to expand the business. It could be said, that one of the ideas of our program is to make the owner into a consultant for his own companies. This principle allows him to not only further maintain workability of the new tools, but also to independently improve the administration of his company and to implement the administrative management system in new activities of his business.
Our goal is to implement a complete system. This yields to the best result. If your goal is to turn over the management sometime in the future and only deal with the matters of development, you will need all of the tools.
No, you cannot apply the tools in a few companies simultaneously during BOP. You will have to choose one business to implement the tools first. During the program you will gain a great understanding of how to do it, and, later on, you will be able to do the same in all of your companies. In that case, after the completion of BOP we will be able to help you with that as well. However, at the completion of the program, our clients are usually trained enough to be able to do it independently. Many of those, who completed BOP, open new companies and can perfectly apply all administrative tools with little or no guidance on our part.
Yes, the program provides everything necessary for this task. The information you learn on the program will allow you to become a professional in management, fully understand the job of a director and then turn over these roles to someone else. And then you’ll only deal with the duties of the owner: product development, process improvement, strategic planning, strategic marketing, etc.
While this approach is not simple, it yields the most successful results. We have to train, drill and oversee the implementation of the management tools, which takes times and effort. However, this method creates a competent business owner who understands the management data and is able to apply in the future.
During the program, the participant may have questions about the new data and how to apply them to their business. Each company is different and has its own special qualities. Throughout the program, the owner accompanied by a management consultant whose sole job is to adi the owner with implementing the management tools and any difficulties that may arise.
To achieve the goals of the program, one has to train. This training is conducted in a group of 12 business owners. This gives the participants an invaluable experience as they go through the their education while observering the changes in other companies.
How to use each tool being implemented is described in gradients. This allows the business owner to train his/hers staff in small increments and ensure that the quality of application is optimum. Therefore, before each new step of the program, the previous step has been implemented and put to use in the person’s company.
We use a precise sequence of steps for perfect implementation. The exact sequqnce has been proven in a real world practice many times over. We don’t deviate from this order as each step was precisely developed, tested and applied successfully.
The program includes a list of clear targets on how to train one’s staff on each tool during the Business Owners Program. This gives the opportunity to not only work out the tools but also to firmly implement them in the operation of the company.
1. Come to our office once month and participate in 3-5 days long training session. During each session the business owner will learn one main management tool, drill its use, adapt it to his/her company and prepare it for implementation.
2. When the business owner is back in his/her office, they will work on and achieve specific implementation targets in the company. They should be prepared to spend about 30% of their work time on implementation. To achieve the best results, one shouldn’t take vacations or extended time off from during the program.
3. Allocate around 12 hours each week for the implementation of the management tools in the company.
4. Keep in regular communication with the consultant. The consultant will be checking if the targets are being met correctly, working out all necessary documentation, giving advice and drilling the data with the owner.
5. During the course of the program to routinely communicate with employees, especially with key staff. As the owner implements changes, it will be necessary to give explanations, sort out any differences of opninons and achieve complete understading of the management tools. This is a necessary condition to make the implementation smooth and comfortable for the company, its staff, and clients.
Implementation of administrative management tools with the aim to systematize business, increase productivity and staff responsibility, create possibilities for bringing the company to a new level of development, delegation of operational management to managers. That allows a business owner to carry out his responsibilities in strategic company management in a professional way.
Preliminary auditing: Management auditing is done by a consultant at the very beginning of the project in the field. During the auditing, he holds interviews with business owner and key employees, gets acquainted with peculiarities of company activities, collects data required by the consultant in course of the project for successful support of the customer. Investigating the situation, he identifies potential obstacles in implementation of the management system. The auditing result is understanding peculiarities of company activities by a consultant and check if successful implementation of the management tools is possible.
The “Business Owners Program” consists of 12 interconnected modules, each of which includes activities, some of them are carried out at the session, the rest are implemented directly in company of the customer. It takes about 10 months to complete all the modules. The average duration of one module is 3-4 weeks.
The session is a group work including training and consultations, which are held in “Visotsky Consulting” office. Usually, the group work session consists of 12 business owners who are not only getting the necessary training for implementation, the session model is made in a way that there is an exchange in implementation experience between the company owners. And the experience that they get can be compared with the experience of a consultant who has implemented the management tools in 12 companies. The schedule of sessions and the list of classes during each session is predetermined and is a part of BOP. Each module has at least one session, duration of the session is 2-5 days of classes.
– learning administrative management tools at workshops and trainings conducted by lecturers – the business owners who successfully use the management tools in their businesses and have been trained as lecturers;
– independent study of written materials with a coach (instructor);
development of diagrams, policies, guidelines and regulations required for implementation together with a consultant, and taking into account the nature of business.
– practical actions to implement this instrument(s) which are carried out at a regular support and under the control of the consultant;
– company inspections by the consultant whose purpose is to check the course of implementation, development of recommendations and implementation assistance;
– evaluation of results of implementation actions, if necessary, to finalize or correct the actions recommended by the consultant.
Implementation of actions in each module is a step in the program; implementation of all these steps leads to achievement of program results. Each program module is a carefully reconciled combination of education, training, and practical activities. The consultant works individually with each customer and helps him overcome all difficulties. During the training we give as much theory as it is required for implementation of management tools, whereas the practices and consulting support are provided in amount enough to cope with any problems that arise. We do not do implementation job for the owner, but at the same time we guide and support him throughout the program.