You’ve taken the plunge and started a new business. You made it through the first year and turned a profit - congratulations. When an entrepreneur takes an idea and turns it into a profitable business, it’s a cause for celebration. But it’s not enough to just keep doing the same thing -- continued success is going to depend on different and evolving strategies. In order to scale up and grow in a big way, business owners have to prioritize a growth to-do list.
Mohan Sawhney, a professor at the Northwestern Kellogg School of Management, notes that “[while] it’s tempting to view business growth as a smooth, linear path, the reality is much more complicated.” Often, the talent and leadership that enable rapid expansion in a company’s early stages may not be enough to keep fueling high growth and this causes businesses to stagnate.
In order to properly make this pivotal transition, business owners have to understand all the elements at play, and accept that scalability is needed across all operations. Here are four fundamental steps growth-stage businesses must take:
