“You portrayed much hard-won experience and I greatly enjoyed seeing through the eyes of a complementary area of our profession.”

Keith Gummery
Then a Deloitte partner, now a senior interim finance executive.
Management tips

What never fails to surprise is the extent to which new businesses repeat old mistakes, despite the documented lessons of countless past entrepreneurs and gurus. A small selection of our own tips follows:

• View your business from the perspective of its customers and take regular soundings as to how they perceive the quality and value of your products and services.

• SME leaders are often obsessed with their businesses, given the intense demands of running them. However, it is useful to keep an eye on the competition and developments in the wider markets. Comparative performance should usefully inform actions, back at base.

• Market shifts occur more quickly than in past cycles – whether technology, demand or ‘events’ led. What was profitable yesterday may be less so tomorrow. While serving today’s customers, bear in mind that their needs may be forced to change, with a knock-on impact to your own plans.

• Identify your key audiences (e.g. staff, clients, trade partners, suppliers, funders and investors) and ensure that you regularly communicate with all of these groups, at appropriate intervals. Relationships that are properly cultivated with such stakeholders in the good times will prove much more durable in tough times.

• Monthly accounts can be contentious. If yours do not meet the TAM criteria (timely, accurate & meaningful) ask why? It is tough enough dealing with an uncertain future without endless debates about past results.

• When legislating for ‘problems’, ask if you should be legislating better for the solutions to those? One of our clients was able to dismantle an entire ‘after sales’ department (established to deal with numerous quality problems) after it upgraded the standard of product leaving its own factory.

• In comedy, ‘good timing’ is a mark of great talent. In business, it is important to consider not just careful actions, but the wider context and precise timing of the same.

Lothian Associates employs the benefit of relevant past lessons when offering guidance. We bring in the received wisdom and experience of our associates across business sectors. We help clients commit to better-informed decisions and to careful, determined implementation. Arguably, the worst sin of all, in business, is having the available facts and doing nothing with them.


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