GrowthWheel: A Visual Overview of How to Grow a Business

What is GrowthWheel?

GrowthWheel is a worldwide business advisory system designed for small business advisors to help entrepreneurs start and grow their businesses.

The GrowthWheel Framework provides a 360º view on advising entrepreneurs, startups, and small businesses. The GrowthWheel framework is designed to apply across all industries and in all life stages. It helps facilitate structured conversations about the business, identify challenges and opportunities, avoid blind spots, and highlight the most important areas of focus to grow a business.

4 Challenge Areas

The GrowthWheel Framework highlights four challenges with 20 focus areas.

Regardless of the industry or life stage, all businesses share four common challenges:

  1. Creating an attractive business concept.
  2. Establishing a strong organization.
  3. Building lasting customer relations.
  4. Maintaining profitable operations.

Creating an Attractive Business Concept

Creating an attractive business concept focuses on getting the right business idea, designing the right product portfolio, targeting the right customer segments, utilizing the right revenue model, and identifying/maintaining a strong market position.

Creating an attractive business concept includes the following five areas of focus:

  1. Business idea
  2. Product portfolio
  3. Revenue model
  4. Customer portfolio
  5. Market position

    Establishing a Strong Organization

    Establishing a strong organization focuses on identifying the right ownership and board, recruiting and developing the right employees, outsourcing through the right partnerships, suppliers and contractors, mapping core business processes, and having the legal framework in place.

    Establishing a strong organization includes the following five areas of focus:

    1. Ownership & board
    2. Employees
    3. Partnerships
    4. Business processes
    5. Legal issues

      Building Lasting Customer Relations

      Building lasting customer relations focuses on networking to meet the right people, marketing and organizing an effective sales process, getting in the media and leveraging communications and public relations, and shaping the brand.

      Building lasting customer relations includes the following five areas of focus:

      1. Networking
      2. Marketing
      3. Sales & services
      4. Communication & PR
      5. Branding

      Maintaining Profitable Operations

      Maintaining profitable operations focuses on making sure there are the right financial practices, ensuring there is enough funding, setting up the right production and delivery systems, and implementing IT systems.

      Maintaining profitable operations includes the following five areas of focus:

      1. Financials
      2. Funding
      3. Production & deliveries
      4. IT Systems
      5. Facilities

      The GrowthWheel Process

      The first step is to complete a 360 screening of your needs. The screening toll provides an overview of the business and highlights focus areas. After completing the screening, your GrowthWheel Advisor will recommend decision sheets to help guide decision making and create a 30-60-90 action plan that outlines the decisions and timeline.

      Getting Started with GrowthWheel

      The first step is connecting with a GrowthWheel Advisor. Mark Johnson, the Executive Director of the Technology Innovation Center, is a Certified GrowthWheel® Business Advisor. Send us a message today to get started!

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