Growth Brakes – Mandat Managementberatung GmbH

We Are The Economy

27. Januar 2013/in Wachstumsirrtümer & Wachstumsbremsen

I had planned a trip to London for Tuesday with three appointments. Security staff at a couple of airports was on strike last week – they want to get up to 30 percent more money – and the union announced to extend and intensify the strike without any warning.I took preventive action and just cancelled my Tuesday trip in advance in order to not let someone wait for me in case of the strike.

That means:

No meeting with one of my colleagues
no meeting with a service provider I consider to hire
no meeting with a cooperation partner

Here’s an excerpt of the direct economical effect:

Lufthansa: I return the full fare flex ticket.
airports Dusseldorf and Heathrow: no handling fees, no starting fees, no landing fees, two times if the flight will really be cancelled
no first class ticket at Heathrow Express
no revenue for taxis and limos
no revenue for the hotel room where my cooperation partner and I would have met
no revenue for the restaurants we would have had lunch and dinner at
no fees for Amex
no fees for the bank where I would have gotten GBP from
a lot of taxes that are not being paid

Do I hear anyone complaining about „the economy“? We ARE the economy. Already forgotten?

Growth Challenges

21. November 2012/in Growth Intelligence & Profitable Growth

One of our US colleagues, my friend Chad Barr, recently asked in an international forum what the key challenges of our clients are. I thought this was a superb question to think about. Here is my answer that results from our current projects:

Low or medium growing companies:

Lack of differentiating from the competition.
(Not) attracting the target group exactly enough (if they even know what their target group is).
Ego trumps long-term strategy.
Archetypical growth brakes institutionalized in companies departments.
Not knowing where they are on the growth curve and take inappropriate action therefore.

High growth (or companies with a high growth attitude):

Handling high growth with the existing systems / processes.
Transferring people from „normal growth thinking“ to „high growth thinking“.
Getting the right people on board.
Convincing their shareholders that the management isn’t doing a kamikaze ride.
Thinking long-term.

What are the key challenges you are facing trying to grow your business?

The Seven Most Effective Strategies To Impede Growth

11. März 2012/in Growth Brakes, Growth Brakes, Growth Brakes, Wachstumsirrtümer & Wachstumsbremsen

Just in time for the start of your week: Don’t let anybody stop you growing.

There are myriad ways people are trying to impede growth, because to grow means to change. Take a look at the dark side of growth now: Here are the seven most effective strategies to impede or even to slow down growth, because growing makes a lot of people feel uncomfortable.

• Making everything top priority
• Endless safeguarding
• Pursuing a personal agenda
• Throwing smoke grenades
• Noncommittal behavior
• Creating project inflation
• Questioning successes

Did you face one of these strategies in your company? How do you deal with them? How do you take care, that your company grows, though? For each of these strategies there are one or more counter strategies. The point is, that you are able to realize that someone tries to stop you from growing your firm.

Yours,
Guido Quelle