Know Your Purpose – two words to help guide your personal and business direction.
Every month I meet with a small group of fellow consultants from the Chartered Institute of Personnel & Development (CIPD). This month we discussed how we identify the clients we like to work with, which brought us round to discussing the recent Business Roundtable thoughts on business purpose. Briefly, they think that many firms focus too much on creating shareholder value, and that focus needs to be wider, and for the benefit of society as a whole (while still making a profit) . But how do you know whether you are working with purpose or not? With the help of some ideas from Bryony Thomas’s book Watertight Marketing, it comes down to two words. They both relate to your heart – how you feel about something – which is not what you may expect to hear from me. Try this with your next client call: does your heart sink, or sing?
For more discussion on the Business Roundtable thoughts: https://ceoworld.biz/2019/09/03/why-the-business-roundtable-is-a-page-behind-on-purpose/
Buzzwords of the Week –Cost Plus
Definition – a basic pricing mechanism which involves adding a markup the cost of goods and services to arrive at a selling price. Under this approach, you add together the direct material cost, direct labour cost, and overhead costs for a product, and add to it a markup percentage in order to derive the price of the product. Cost plus pricing can also be used within a customer contract, where the customer reimburses the seller for all costs incurred and also pays a negotiated profit in addition to the costs incurred.
Alternate View – has its place, especially in construction – maybe for your own home extension? A very simple method of pricing, in a world where value and market comparisons have a far bigger effect. The main determinant of price? What someone is prepared to pay.
Winning with Finance – this one-day introduction to finance is ideal if you don’t understand what your finance director is saying and are too embarrassed to admit you don’t know. my next public programme is on Friday 20th September at Warwick University, in association with Denny Training. More details here