As defined by Wikipedia.com, Excellence is a talent or quality which is unusually good and so surpasses ordinary standards. It is also an aimed for standard of performance.
Applying Core Values to Business
If we are to consider how to apply EXCELLENCE for business, it can be used as a measure of performance of the business processes itself, the owners and employees of the business, the delivery of product/services and on.
In order for a business to achieve excellence it is important to remember that EXCELLENCE grows from the small seeds of desire; wanting to provide extreme value for money.
What does it take to achieve EXCELLENCE?
I have heard the theory that it takes a business owner a specific number of hours to achieve success in business, and funnily enough, that same figure of focus – 10,000 hours of contact on your passion, complete unwavering focus, it also what it takes to be an excellent athlete, musician or professional. This is equivalent of 10 years hard work. It is also the length of time a child is in school from Prep to 12th grade!
It can go faster though – so the theory also goes that if you want to achieve success and EXCELLENCE in your business faster – put more hours in each day. The focus and dedication that is born from so many concentrated hours will be rewarded by increased customer numbers, increased profits and satisfaction knowing you are doing your best and that your business is running at its peak.
Does this mean there is no room for improvement? No, it does not. Once the level of success and EXCELLENCE is attained it is important to keep seeking new ground, new levels to reach. This can be achieved by making delivery times shorter – answering customer feedback faster and proactively or producing the same product with less impact on the environment, are all ways to continually improve the outcomes of your business methods.
How to measure Excellence in Business
One way to ensure you are following a path that will lead to EXCELLENCE is to implement a Quality System to track the processes and interactions within your company. This is a way of setting meaningful, measurable targets and showing improvement. Does your sales department speak to the design department?
Why Should You Care About Quality?
Ask yourself a question… take your eyes off the computer screen and look inside your head.
Do I have customers for my business?
If you have answered yes, then ask yourself another question… take a big breath in and let it out… go inside again, deeper…
For the future financial health and well being of my business will I need to retain these customers in coming years?
What will make them stay with me?
People will naturally look for the best value. How will you assure them your products and services are a good investment?
And eagerly purchase every product you create.
And how will you differentiate your business from other businesses. The competition is only going to get tougher.
How to stand out from the crowd
There are many things you can do to set your business apart from others. Providing great value and generous information has always been the catch cry of online business.
Another opportunity to separate your business is to stop looking at your customers as customers and start looking at them as individuals and people. Find a way to communicate with them in a way that creates a relationship between the two of you. This way they become clients instead of customers (which implies a short term relationship).
With so much scamming and hacking into personal details, people are wary of giving their credit card information to just anybody. How can you help them feel better about making the purchase, ease their minds about the risky side and let their hearts guide a hand to a pocket, put the hand into the pocket and take out the wallet, open the wallet, find the credit card, take the card out of the wallet and hand the card over to you, or with online businesses, click on the “Buy Now” button.
Remember you still have to make them feel good long enough to get the purchase completed, so if there is a way to sweeten the deal, do it.
Using Quality as a marketing tool
Another way you can instantly get that card out of the wallet is to display certification proving your business practices are safe, reliable and risk free. How can you get this certification? It’s not something you see all the time now, but more and more sites are putting a “Security Tick” in the header as an indication their site is safe and secure.
You can set your site apart by having “Quality Tick” that really means something. This tick shows your people that you care enough about them to put provable, tested business systems in place to protect their private details and the delivery of products and information.
Ultimately everyone will define for themselves what Success or Excellence stand for. This is a wonderful process to do with your staff if you have any – see what ideas they can come up with.
Tags: Business Excellence