Assessing Business, Setting Directions

http://www.vsapac.com/

One of the basic rules of consulting or business advisory is to have the ability to listen and organise information in the quickest way possible.

Business clients tend to provide “big picture” strategies in all directions, and we have to ensure that the information rendered is organised and segmented into different categories such as a) business conditions b) strategic priorities c) company structure issues d) business model positioning.

Failure to understand and compartmentalise information would mean failed or incomplete diagnosis – which then gives rise to flawed prescriptions or solutions. If implemented, these would lead the business to head the wrong direction through wrong implementation.

Whether you are an entrepreneur or advising entrepreneurs, it is important that you don’t provide superficial advice. We have observed that most consultants or business advisors have the following weaknesses, no matter how matured or experienced they are:

• Concluding too early
• Imposing self-experience to other businesses in a bid to impress, which may be fundamentally different to the entrepreneur’s settings
• Not focusing on the right critical issues i.e. not what the client wants or needs
• Giving generic, theoretical advice without customising to their setting
• Expect clients “to pay first, then get advice” – without showing value
• Weak technical fundamentals – not being able to link strategies and financial outcome; and spending time about what’s the right thing to do, what needs to be done, but wouldn’t be able to explain how it’s to be done and what’s the targeted financial outcome
• Failure to take notes or synthesise information into a single implementation framework
• Not able to communicate clearly through use of diagrams and flowcharts that brings all the points together: both business information and advice rendered
At Vector Scorecard (Asia-Pacific), we have successfully developed a business diagnostic methodology that comes with a diagnostic toolkit and a comprehensive trainer’s manual on how to do a good preliminary analysis of a business situation. Using decision tree and mind-maps that can be customised in numerous business scenarios and industries, BASNEVA ensures that you have what it takes to handle business situations and act upon them.

BASNEVA methodology adopts a lateral thinking approach with speed in mind – and trains you to be focused, disciplined and unbiased in your assessment of business settings. As a result, you can prescribe higher quality solutions with identified markers for implementation in various phases.

BASNEVA has been successfully applied to more than 3,000 SMEs in ASEAN and has significantly aided policy makers and SME champions to do the right thing - LISTEN.

For more enquiries, please write in to advisory@vsapac.com