Estimated reading time: 5 minutes
(Editor’s Note: Today’s article is brought to you by our friends at ChartHop, an organization focused on helping leaders in scaling transparent, productive, and intentional organizations. They recently raised $35 million in funding based on their strong business growth. You can read all about it on TechCrunch. Enjoy today’s article!)
I’ve said on more than one occasion that organizations are very focused on economic recovery right now. And I still believe that’s true. So, I was particularly interested to hear how companies were reporting on their financial progress during Q2 earnings calls.
Organizations that want to focus on business growth right now need to think about how they are going to build (or possibly change to) a supporting organizational structure.
One of the companies that caught my attention was Pepsi. Their quarterly revenue rose more than 20% from a year earlier. What struck me was a quote from their CFO Hugh Johnston. “A lot of the things we did through the pandemic, continuing to invest in the business, are paying dividends now that mobility has increased, and consumers are getting out more.”
I’m not here today to debate about Pepsi as a product. But I do believe that Johnston’s comment about strategic business growth is important. It reminded me of something that I read in ChartHop’s “Guide to Intentional Growth” about laying the groundwork for business success. Organizations have an opportunity where their business growth is concerned. I say “have” because I believe it’s not too late. But it does take planning.
Build a Supporting Organizational Structure
One of the reasons that I titled today’s article “think like a startup” is because organizations have a terrific opportunity right now to make some of the changes they’ve always wanted to make. It kinda reminds me of a startup.
A startup organization doesn’t have much structure at first. As time goes on, they add staff, and even then, they still might not have much of an org chart. But after a while, a natural order starts to fall into place – both in terms of organizational structure as well as individual roles and responsibilities. Certain employees will accept ownership of tasks, like the office manager who starts keeping track of everyone’s vacation time.
Groups or teams of employees will start collaborating because they see the value in each other’s talents – for example, marketing and HR will work together on company branding initiatives. And employees will ask other individuals with more experience for guidance or approvals. This might happen when someone needs a new computer – the employee, accounting, and IT will work together to make sure the right equipment is purchased (and paid for!)
Now, don’t get me wrong, this doesn’t all miraculously appear one day in a startup. And sometimes employees need a little nudge in the right direction (if you know what I mean). My point is this – one of the reasons we hear about startups being successful is because they are flexible and agile. They don’t let years of history keep them from creating change. In fact, they embrace change as a way to move forward. They create their strategic business growth strategies and then build the organization to support them.
Unfortunately, there are organizations that sometimes make the mistake of building the organization and then their business growth strategy. You’ve probably seen it too. It can be difficult for these organizations to get out of their own way and, like I said … think like a startup to create necessary change.
Organizations that want to focus on business growth right now need to think about how they are going to build (or possibly change to) a supporting organizational structure.
Seeing the Plan Can Help You Achieve It
Recently, I had the opportunity to hear about ChartHop and their story. ChartHop is a company that’s helping organizations achieve their business growth strategies by providing employee data visualization tools. One of the features that ChartHop provides – that’s very relevant to our conversation about business growth – is the ability to create workforce planning scenarios using the employee data from your existing HR Information System (HRIS).
This is exactly how workforce planning aligns with and benefits the company’s business growth. Organizations create strategic plans and then they need to find the people to help them achieve those goals.
Realistically, there’s more than one way to accomplish that. From a talent perspective, organizations can buy, build, and/or borrow talent. They can plan multiple scenarios using a variety of combinations. What I liked about the ChartHop platform is that the organization could easily create, edit, and change their workforce plan based on their strategic goals and assumptions. The data visualization would allow the company’s talent strategy to be as agile as changing business conditions dictate. The results could be huge in terms of HR’s ability to source, hire, and engage the best talent – which we all know is a priority.
The Key to Business Growth is People
Organizations have an opportunity to create competitive advantage. Like the Pepsi quote mentioned at the beginning of this article, it requires investments and planning. A big part of the investment and planning piece is related to talent.
HR Bartender is excited to have partnered with ChartHop to provide you with a copy of their new “Guide to Intentional Growth”. I believe their “think like a startup” reference is spot on and can help organizations focus on – and move toward – the future.
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