What needs to be done to take the company to the next level?

In running any organization, small business owners must decide how they wish to operate: as a leader or as a boss. A leader develops a strategy and provides direction for the business to thrive and grow. A boss implements the strategy, come what may. To run a small business effectively, one should decide to be a leader.

Being a leader is a mindset shift in how you operate your business. It is also shifting away from a “doer,” being in the minutia of your business as opposed to strategically working on your business. Leadership requires knowledge of the market, the consumer, and external factors which affect the business. Thus, the leader looks outside first: what is going on that will affect the sale of the product or service and how can those factors change the way a product or service will be promoted, marketed, and serviced. A boss may blindly crank out the product or service, no matter what.

[Related: How Today’s Brightest CEOs Are Scaling Their Business, and How You Can Follow Suit]

A leader must have three crucial qualities: self-awareness, cultural development, and critical decision-making, to take a business to the next level.

Self-awareness: how do you “show up” for your business? Do you treat it like a hobby, something that you pay attention to every so often? Or is your business a commitment that you have chosen to invest in, nurture, and grow? Your intentions for your business will drive your actions and your results. Recognize how you interact with your customers, work with your team, and collaborate with your partners. Ask questions: what ‘s working, not working, and could work? As a leader, this can be eye-opening to help you identify gaps and pivot when appropriate.

The second thing to consider as you grow your business is your company culture. As your business grows, hiring people with the right skills and behaviors are critical. You need to decide what type of culture you want for your company. If you micro-manage, employees and partners will feel constricted, fear making mistakes, and be unwilling to tell you their opinions. Your resistance to relinquishing control, your lack of trust in your team, and your fear of failing, will not serve your company in the long run. A better way to lead and manage your company is to just let go. That means hire excellent people and let them execute the strategies you laid out for them. Create a culture that coaches, develops, and trusts: you, your vision, and each other. This style builds trust, creates good-will, and generates enthusiasm to get the job done.

As you create this inclusive culture, encourage and consider others’ perspectives. These are keys to leading an effective company. Then, as a leader, find mentors and advisors. Surround yourself with people who are smarter than you and willing to tell you their opinions. Leverage their strengths and weigh your options.

As you move your business forward, change your mindset from boss to leader. This will help you in gaining clarity with creating your vision, executing your strategy, and developing an effective team to support your business growth.

[Related: Perfecting Your Leadership Style to Create an Effective Team]

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Simone Sloan is a Business and Leadership Coach who brings insights to create actions that deliver real business results. As a pharmacist and MBA, she has honed her business skills as a marketer in business and medical communication, global business strategy, and business cross-functional team management.

Taking your business to the next level should be a permanent goal in the mind of an entrepreneur and a powerful reason to invest a smart and dedicated effort to achieving business growth.

If you own a small, medium or large company in any phase of the business life cycle (launch, growth, shake-out or maturity), there is always room to be more innovative in the way you deliver your product or service, and to make improvements to grow your business. This goal is not something that you should pursue one time or occasionally; in fact, it is the opposite. Continuous business growth should be the driving force of your daily adventure as an entrepreneur, a permanent vision of future success, and an ongoing process of innovating and pursuing meaningful goals.

Each company will have different goals depending on its current status. For example, one company might be improving the design of its current product or introducing a new one, whereas another company might be improving its customer service area, penetrating a new market or building an international partnership. The list of possibilities to business success is endless.

Taking your business to the next level will allow your company to survive in difficult times and to grow when opportunities arise. Here are five tips for you to consider to improve your business.

1. Talk to your customers

This advice is the one I hear the most from seasoned business people given to young entrepreneurs. Often the daily management routine and business operations usually takes the entrepreneur away from clients. As an entrepreneur you will deal with many areas, all important, from sales and marketing to finance, accounting and human resources. Even though your days might be busy attending to issues in all these areas, you have to create room to keep in touch with your clients. They are the most reliable source of information for you, so you have to invest and book the time to build solid relationships with your customers. If you succeed, clients will tell what your company is doing well and what it can do to improve.

2. Analyze your competitors

Can you list all your competitors? Can you rank them in order of relevance? What are your advantages and disadvantages compared to them? What are they doing better than you?

Sometimes we may know the names of our competitors, but we don’t break down the analysis beyond the list of names. You have to be able to identify their strengths and what the market likes about them in order for you to compete, improve and offer something superior. If you want to grow your business and take it to the next level, you need to carefully watch your competitors, learn from them, and plan how you can outperform them.

3. Listen to your team

Regardless of whether you have a very small or large team behind you, you need to create a space where you can talk with them about the opportunities and threats for your company in the marketplace. Formal meetings are best, but informal conversations work as well. Encourage these conversations so that you can hear their ideas and empower your team to fully participate in the process and to support you to improve your company. You may be surprised by the excellent ideas and inputs your team can provide.

For formal meetings, prepare an agenda and share it with your team in advance, with the goal to review and analyze how your company is doing in the process of moving to the next level. For informal meetings, grab a coffee with your team, no formal agenda, give a brief overview of the status of the company in a casual manner (no presentations), promote spontaneity, and let them guide the conversation.

4. Networking

The Cambridge dictionary defines networking as “the process of meeting and talking to a lot of people, especially in order to get information that can help you.” As an entrepreneur, you have to dedicate effort to network as often as possible. Luckily, there are many ways to build stronger relationships with potential clients, partners, authorities and stakeholders.

I would advise you to find and join business groups in your community that meet periodically to discuss and analyze different business issues, which can be related to your sector or a mix of different industries. Likewise, I would also suggest you invest money to join your local chamber of commerce, and attend business conferences or seminars at least twice a year.

Networking will give you a tremendous learning opportunities, knowledge and new connections to lead your company to the next level, with the support and advice of others.

5. Think outside the box

Taking your company to the next level requires thinking creatively. In order to be able to do that, I would advise three important steps.

First, support this process with quantitative and qualitative information that are available for you. For instance, you might want to consider data and/or reports of Statistics Canada, such as its profiles of a community or region, as well as its retail and wholesale indicators among many others. There are also extensive business databases and analyses that are available through libraries, universities, and business promotion offices.

A second piece of advice would be to analyze mega-trends happening around the globe and affecting businesses. Although you might not currently have international operations, you need to keep an eye on global trends and try to prepare, anticipate and take advantage of mega-trends locally.

Finally, to think outside of the box, you need to give yourself the space and time to reflect and decide what your next steps will be. In this respect, I was reading recently that Jeff Bezos, the founder and CEO of Amazon, sits alone every morning for a considerable amount of time just to think about the performance of his company. You now know this is one of the reasons why he is one of the most successful entrepreneurs of our time. So give yourself time to dream and think about how you will take your company to the next level.

About the author

Juan Navarro is an Educator, Entrepreneur and Researcher. Director at CMX Partnerships, Associate Faculty at Royal Roads University and volunteer mentor at Futurpreneur Canada.