What is a Success Number? A Success Number gives everyone a target to work toward that will have the biggest impact on your organization. This Success Number clearly defines winning and must be achieved or nothing else matters.
Your Success Number should be the one number that everyone will focus on. It needs to be a number that is easily measurable and something everyone can understand. It is the number that will define success of the overall business for the year. Achieving your Success Number will depend on all parts of your organization understanding what they need to deliver.
How do you determine your Success Number? Look at your results, assess your strengths, understand your weaknesses, and understand the opportunities you have in front of you. You also need to evaluate the market place, research the state of the economy, talk to your customers, and talk to all your employees. Get their input, ask them what they think, ask them questions, and listen to what they say. Once you show them their input matters, they will amaze you with their insight and knowledge. When you compile what you have found, share it with them and ask for further input. Involve them fully in the process of determining your Success Number. You will get great input and insight and just as importantly you will get buy-in and understanding.
What are examples of Success Numbers? They can be just about anything that your entire team determines are threats/weaknesses or keys to success and sustainability of the business. Typical numbers include sales revenue, gross margin, profit, on-time delivery, and cash on hand. The key is to fully engage your entire team in determining the Success Number and then having them develop plans for what they need to do to support the achievement of the Success Number.
How do you implement your Success Number? After going through the engagement process, you realize the current biggest risk to the business is customer on-time delivery. You are currently hovering around 60% and you need to get above 96% or you risk losing customers. All departments from sales, engineering, customer service, scheduling, purchasing, materials, production, quality, shipping & receiving, etc... all need to determine what they need to do to improve customer on-time delivery. For example, production would need to determine what, how many, and when they need to produce the product to achieve on-time delivery. They need to figure out how to measure and track progress putting in the improvements necessary to achieve their supporting goals that support achievement of the Success Number. The same thing would apply to all the other departments and teams.
Success Number is one of the elements Lead Engage Agency uses in developing custom plans for our clients. If you are interested in using a Success Number as part of your business plan click the button below, fill out a short pre-assessment, and I will send you my calendar to schedule an appointment.
