How to grow your business successfully with a mind to longevity

Although there are very few businesses that are started with the idea of making a quick buck and then either dissolving or selling it on, there seems to be no lack of businesses that are started without proper planning which will get the business performing successfully and with a mind to it getting established and lasting a long time.

Obviously, recent times have proven that not even the longest-standing businesses of the past are able to weather some storms, but where these businesses have failed, others have flourished and have created a strong foothold in their place.

One of the main reasons for this is that the new businesses and those that have survived have relied heavily on technology and the internet. This shift, as well as others, has set a precedent for how businesses can now flourish by adopting a few of their ideas and planning in detail how to safeguard their future should the history of the last couple of years repeat itself.

This means that you will need to look to your employees, suppliers, distributors, and security measures in order to make the best and most stable future possible for your business to grow.

Have flexibility for your employees

There are many different benefits of having flexibility for your employees, whether it is during working hours or locations where work can be carried out. For instance, having a set number of employees starting work a couple of hours earlier than another set who will finish a couple of hours later and perform the same or overlapping job roles will mean that your business has more working hours coverage throughout the day. This arrangement can help your employees too, as there may very well be some that prefer or need to have more time in their homes in the morning so do not mind working that little bit later, or there may very be those that prefer to get their working day completed earlier rather than later so would much rather start their working day early and finish early.

Of course, it is not all about the working hours where you will have to be flexible, but also in the locations where work can be carried out. With the shift in remote or hybrid working conditions that have taken place due to the pandemic, many employees have decided that this is the way they would like to continue to work. Many bosses are not totally embracing this new shift, whether it is due to the trust levels that they have with their own employees on not being able to monitor or keep a close watch to check if their employee is actually working all the time that they are supposed to; or, whether they feel that the quality of their employee’s work will drop considerably if they are not in their normal working surroundings, is totally up to them.

Invariably, it has been discovered that overall, these issues are purely in the boss’s mind, and many employees are enjoying the extra time that they have by not having to commute to work and are still doing their job roles to the best of their ability.

Build-in career paths for your employees

It is important that you build some career paths into your business so that those employees with ambition and drive can not only excel at their job roles but can also see their future careers in your business rather than them having to go elsewhere for promotion prospects or to better themselves as regards title or salaries.

You can do this by offering enticements for your employees to take online courses that will inevitably improve your business from within as well as their own resume, knowledge, and self-esteem. For instance, having members on your payroll that hold a data science master degree will highly benefit your business as they will be able to read, understand and decipher data from your software to help your business make informed decisions about products, services, marketing strategies, and many more areas besides.

With having your employees take part in online courses, they will still be able to work their normal working hours as they will be able to study in their own time and at their own pace. They will not have to pay course fees as you will be doing that for them, and they will be able to continue to earn while they learn without having to relocate and find other sources of income.

Your business will have the advantage of making use of their newly learned knowledge during their progression to becoming qualified, so your business will have access to the most up-to-date knowledge on whatever course you choose for your employees to enroll in.

Encourage your teams to converse

Regardless of whereabouts, your teams are working from, whether it is in the office or whether they are scattered far and wide working remotely, you will have to put in some effort to make sure that they connect with each other regularly so that they can produce the best work possible.

Although some people work very well on their own and remotely, there are many that can feel cut off in this type of working environment, especially when they are part of a team. Providing your teams with ways that they can contact each other rather than just email and text is a good idea as the written word can be misconstrued in its meaning, whereas a spoken word or, even better, face-to-face contact via video call can bring extra clarity to a conversation or situation.

It is also important to make sure that these remote teams get a chance to socialize with one another over video links and get to know each other outside of the working environment. This will strengthen your team’s relationships, encourage comradeship and have them create much better work together as well as keep them happy in their work, meaning that they will be more content to stay within your business.

Sort out a supply chain and distribution networks

When it comes to growing your business, you are going to have to start seriously building relationships with your supply chain and your distribution network. Although you may feel that you only need to have one really good supplier, very recent history has taught that this is not such a wise idea. If you only have one supplier and they fail to get the items that you require for your business to flourish or your business has not got a strong enough relationship with them, you will find that it is your business that goes without.

In recent times there have been so many businesses that have found themselves in this very situation, and a lot of them have ended up having to close their doors for good, as not only have their supplies dried up, but their customers have gone elsewhere where they can get the goods that they desire so badly.

So having just a couple of good suppliers could very well save your business from going through this, and this can also be said for your distribution network. Making sure that you have a couple of ways to get your products to your customers, whether it is directly or via shop shelves, is a good move, this way, you will not find yourself stuck with a lot of merchandise and no way of selling it or making the profits that you will need to keep your business going strong.

Increase your security measures

When you are looking to grow your business, you are going to need some high-quality security measures in place. Now when it comes to your software, hardware, and online security, the best thing you can do is get a reputable and experienced cybersecurity business involved, as they will be well educated in the techniques of the cybercriminal and will know what to look for. Many businesses that offer this type of service will not just conduct a single search daily to make sure that you have no unwanted attention but will carry out checks multiple times a day, keeping your data and that of your customers as safe as possible.

However, there are things that you can do which will also help with your business’s security measures, and these are; educate your employees on passwords and their own personal security procedures, limit the access you give your employees to the information that you hold on your system so that they only have access to the information that they require to carry out their daily job roles and install your own cloud for all your business needs and requirements.

Having your own business cloud is a necessity in today’s modern working world. It can hold your business’s intranet system so that your remote and hybrid workers can access data that they require as if they are sitting in your office working with your onsite teams and will keep the data that they are using safe and secure as well.