To sustain a business, some abstract factors drive long-term success. These include a company’s culture, values, ability to change, and ability to listen to customers. After decades of successfully developing a strong culture, NPI shares with you tips for building your own success.
Determined focus and constant pursuit are the heart of every successful business. According to the Small Business Association (SBA), 30 percent of new businesses fail within their first two years. By the end of the fifth year, roughly 50 percent of small businesses fail. After 10, the survival rate drops to about 35 percent. Only 25 percent make it to 15 years or more.
So what’s the secret to longevity in business? Brooke Hamilton, President & CEO of NPI Corp, offers the following tips, after celebrating cooperation with the Tulsa and Green Country business community for 46 years.
Evolve with values
Invest time and energy to establish well-defined values and evolve with a desire to deepen customers’ experiences. Companies that struggle with this idea often react to market forces first. Then, they work to fit their values into a solution. In adjusting values in pursuit of a market opportunity, you compromise the values that anchor existing relationships. This reveals to everyone that profit, not shared purpose and value, is the only goal that matters. As a result, you could miss an opportunity to deepen the customer experience.
Think about it: if values are loosely-defined, you become subject to external forces. This leads to the belief that customers are more emotionally connected to products and services than the experience. Customers may say it’s all about the product, but their experience, rooted in your values, keeps them coming back to you.
Adapt to change
Evolution is vital for a business to survive in today’s world. Change is certain, particularly in the rapidly evolving world of technology and its impact on how businesses operate. Changes in areas of healthcare and human resources continue to provide challenges across all industries.
Things change–priorities, management, employees, etc. However, companies that demonstrate a commitment to maintaining their mission, vision, and values achieve success.
Listen to your customers
Excellent customer service starts at the top, when upper management takes a real interest in understanding customers’ needs. There are a variety of ways to maintain and monitor customer service. Using surveys, social media, and daily interactions with staff are simple ways to achieve this.
Additionally, you can apply training and education programs for your employees to improve customer service. This helps to build confidence in answering questions and managing customer expectations.
Build a great company culture
Leaders create the culture of an organization. Their values, actions, and words form the company’s story, thereby shaping the culture. In many businesses, executives are often unaware how their actions and words impact everyone.
According to Michael Stallard, author of The Connection Culture, there are three types of cultures:
- Culture of control: People feel controlled by one or more autocratic leaders. Micromanagement, excessive rules, and red tape characterize this outcome.
- Culture of indifference: Employees feel their coworkers don’t care about them, and they see them as a means to an end. This type of culture makes people feel unsupported, left out, and lonely.
- Culture of connection: This is considered the best type of culture. Employees thrive, both on their own and as a group. People feel connected to their colleagues, leaders, their work, and the people the business serves. Organizations with cultures of connection spread an inspiring vision, value their employees, and give them a voice.
Company culture lays the foundation for success in good times and in bad. It starts with upper management presenting the mission, vision, and values the company embodies. Communicate expectations and help employees realize their direct impact on business goals, and you’ll build a culture that benefits everyone.
Written by Brooke Hamilton