The Building Blocks Of Sustainably Scaling Your Business

Have you heard of the golden triangle, or PPT as it’s sometimes called? Candidly, I’m not sure where it first originated, but it’s one of my very favorite business concepts. As you may have guessed, PPT stands for people, processes and technology. These are three key business development fundamentals, and they’re incredibly important as you prepare to scale. So to help you get ready, here are a few of my suggestions for company growth, through the lens of the PPT framework. 

People

If there’s one prong of the golden triangle that’s most important, it’s your people. Having smart, capable and satisfied team members on board is absolutely necessary in building a strong business and yielding happy customers. This is why companies are now doubling down on recruitment incentives and employee wellness programs; they understand that the more content and healthy their employees, the better for everyone. 

So before you can scale, you need to audit your own team. How is your internal hierarchy structured? Do you have any sort of employee satisfaction measurement tools in place (like eNPS)? How would you need to augment your team at each next stage of growth? These are all important considerations because digging into the answers will help you fill gaps now, and plan for the gaps you may experience as you scale. 

Processes

Ideally, doubling your sales shouldn’t require doubling your workforce. If your expenses grew commensurately as your sales grew, it just wouldn’t make business sense. This is where processes come into play. The more streamlined you can get your operations, the fewer team members needed to maintain it – and the better your bottom line. So putting the right processes in place ensures you will grow profitably. 

For example, do you have processes in place for onboarding new employees? This will become more important as you make more new hires. Have you established clear processes around product development and fulfillment? If so, are these processes documented and accessible? Your processes will act as the backbone of your growing operations, while having them documented will keep you from losing ground if the current owner of the process leaves.  

Technology 

Who doesn’t love new tech, along with the moon and stars that it promises? Of course, as owners, we need to keep our tech-hungry selves from over-buying and under-realizing ROI. But, there’s certainly a need for the right technology, especially during seasons of growth. Here are a few foundational types of tech you should have in place before you scale: 

• Accounting
• HR
• Ecommerce 
• Marketing 
• Sales/CRM

There are also more sophisticated types of technology that may come in handy once your company scales, like customer data platforms (CDPs), employee training software and machine learning programs. But these can be incorporated in your operations down the road when there’s a demonstrated need for them. Focus now on the foundational tech. 

Agile, Not Linear

The last of my suggestions for company growth is this: view your people, processes and tech holistically. You can’t address each of these fundamentals in siloes or you’ll never address them adequately. For example, as you audit your team, think about the software you may need as you grow. Is there anyone on your team currently who knows how to use this software, or will you need to hire someone to manage it? Alternately, does the software provider offer free training to all employees? All of this should be factored into your projected expenses. And, continuing with this example, consider the processes that will be needed to support the implementation and adoption of this new technology. 

The golden triangle is all connected, and interwoven. If you review the health of these business development fundamentals as they currently are, and plan to support and maximize them as you scale your business, you will be setting yourself up for success. I wish you the best! Drop me a line and let me know how scaling your business is going.