The 4 Business Quadrants – Your Foundation

Date: 24 June 2013
Category: RealTime CEO
Tags: RealTime CEOs, Business Quadrants

In our introduction to The 4 Business Quadrants, you will see that the first quadrant is “Your Foundation”. The foundation of your business is your business’s reason for being.

Also, when we discussed Business Differences and Similarities , we noted that one of the things linking businesses around the world is that they all have a business foundation. Why does your business exist?

This sounds an easy question to answer until we establish the rule that you cannot answer it numerically. You do not exist to make profit, cash flow or money. These are the results of you doing what you do well.

Your business’s reason for being (or business foundation) is a deeper issue providing you with a compass to determine all other business strategies.  If it is not well defined in your business, then all other strategies will be compromised.

How do you assess your business foundation?

One of the easiest ways to assess your business foundation is to ask a number of your staff members, “Why do we exist?” Once they have answered in a predictably numerical fashion, ask the question again explaining that you are seeking a non-numerical reason. If the next set of answers all follow a common theme, you have a strong foundation. However, if, as in most cases we have experienced, there is a huge variety, then your foundation is weak.  Presented with this situation, I am sometimes tempted to ask if all the attendees who answered the questions work for the same business!  

You may be surprised how powerful this simple exercise is.  It can generate passionate and valuable conversations amongst your key employees as well as give you a clear understanding of their views of your business.

Once you’ve established your foundation, you need to communicate it clearly to your team. Everyone needs to know your foundation to be able to move forward together. The foundation needs to be the basis of your business culture. Make it an integral part of all your business disciplines: interaction with your market, interaction with your people (internal and external) and a guide for your procedures and operations.  

To be able to steer your business in the right direction, you need to have an accurate compass and that compass is your foundation.

Is your business foundation able to support your future vision for for the business?  Come back next time to hear about how your foundation plays into the interaction with your market.

Make sure you come back to read about the other areas of the 4 Business Quadrants – Your Market, Your Operations and Your People. 

To find out more about how we can help your business, check out some of the tools available through RealTimeCEO.