Growth Questions for a New Year

August 14, 2025

Phil Krone

For many of us, the period between Thanksgiving and New Year’s Day is often one of reflecting on the year about to close and planning for the one about to open. Here are some thought-provoking questions our clients and prospective clients find helpful to make the most of their reflections. We hope you will, too. As always, we are here to help you facilitate discussions about these questions, or to help you implement the answers.

  1. Which would have the greatest impact on new business development in the coming year:
    1. More first meetings, opportunities, inquiries to quote . . . or
    2. A higher success rate with the opportunities you are already enjoying?
  2. Do you need to find additional ways to obtain competitive advantage that creates value for customers and clients . . . or an increase in the skill of communicating the value of that differentiation while reducing the focus on prices/fees?
  3. People often focus on what will change in their markets in the coming years. For this exercise think about what will be unchanged and consider how well you are prepared to focus on those and have your brand be consistent with those.
  4. If you were a startup business entering your marketplace what would you do different than what you are doing today? Should you do those things now?
  5. How would all of your services and product offerings being connected- that is, being digital-transform your business?
  6. Assuming that all products and services will soon be connected, and that all of the companies behind those services are collecting data, which data would you like to rent, license, or buy to provide you with a competitive advantage?

If you would like to discuss these issues with us, please give us a call at at 847-446-0008 , or write to  pkrone@productivestrategies.com.

 

This will be our last column for 2016. I hope you and your family have a wonderful Holiday Season and a productive New Year!

One last note:  Last month we asked for volunteers to come pack with us at a mobile event for Feed My Starving Children. We filled our shift and want to thank all of you who volunteered. If you would like to donate please visit  www.fmsc.org

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