As organizational advisors, we regularly help entrepreneurs achieve growth and improve the scalability of their organization. Because we want to share our knowledge about effective growth, we started this article series about the 6 focus areas for successful growth among scaleups. In addition, we draw on our experience in helping entrepreneurs and our own experience with the growth of Summiteers. In this article, we will elaborate on the focus area: 'The change'. We talk about setting up change projects Paul van Bekkum, one of the founders of Summiteers.

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The 6 focus areas for effective growth

In the previous articles in this series, you read:

• ‍how to make a plan for growth as a scaleup
• how to improve your core processes and quickly transfer them to new people
• how your organizational structure and consultation structure can change as you grow
• how the roles of founders and employees are changing in a growing scale-up and
• how to measure the progress of your growth goals with KPIs

We have now arrived at the last article in this series, where you learn about actually organizing the change itself. What does it take to achieve growth? Who should be involved in projects that lead to changes in products, services and processes, for example, while the flow of orders and routine tasks seems to fully control the daily agendas? What kind of leadership is needed to achieve the goals you've set? How do you get your people involved in the change?

Separate projects from line work

First of all, it is good to realize that you are dealing with two types of organizations when you scale. One is busy with the further development and growth of the company, the other with the operational work of the daily business process. When those two things get mixed up, people quickly get into trouble with priorities. “So pull them both apart,” says Van Bekkum. “Separate projects from operational work and make it very explicit if some key people play a role on both 'sides' of the organization. And also set up separate meetings for this: about how the store is running and about renovating it. That brings focus.”

This is not complicated on paper, but it often is in practice. The people who need to initiate the change are often also the people on whom the operation relies. Their knowledge and experience is often indispensable in both the operation and in shaping the change. “We often see that the change project becomes the child of the bill. Indeed, change projects are considered important, but the operation is by definition urgent. It often doesn't matter whether you're working on it today or tomorrow for a change project, while calling back an important customer, for example, makes an immediate difference,” says Paul. So the operation often cries out louder for attention than the change project. Having a conversation about this is often difficult, because everything has to be done at the same time. Much more coordination needs to be done because things simply become more complex with growth. There are projects that drive each other fast, because they are often highly dependent on each other. That's why you really have to choose how to make that change happen. Choose what to do, what not to do, and in what order. And keep communicating this too!

“If it doesn't work enough, you can recruit extra people or set priorities even more sharply. This way, you can do one project at a time instead of three,” says Paul. “If there is a buffer, you can also try to free up time and space on the operations side by setting priorities in, for example, the type of customers you want to serve at that moment.” So the solution can also be a better trade-off between effort and returns. You don't have to tackle everything that comes your way if you're going to miss out on real growth and therefore the real opportunities in the longer term.

So in a growing scaleup, you often can't get around the fact that you have to combine multiple roles at the same time. For example, you control the call center every day and are responsible for setting up knowledge management at the same time. Or you're doing sales as an account manager, but at the same time you're working on a project to review pricing.

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For combining multiple roles, we have some practical tips:

1. Make sure you don't mix discussions about change projects and operational work

2. Communicate to your colleagues how much time you have for one role and how much time you have for the other role

3. Communicate in contact with colleagues what role you're flying in, so that the message is better understood

4. Make sure you are simply not available for operational work for half a day while working on a change project

5. Limit the number of projects you do at the same time

6. If necessary, discuss the possibilities of temporarily hiring additional people for project work

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Bring focus

In the first article of this series, 'The Plan', we already recommended that you mainly push the biggest buttons by seeing where things in the organization are rattling the hardest at that moment. There are perhaps a hundred relevant projects that result from this. The temptation is then great to want to start too much at the same time.

We often use a plateau plan; a mountaineering term in which a team from basecamp makes a plan to reach the next plateau. A plateau is a fixed period, for example a quarter, during which you tackle a certain topic or want to achieve a goal. You define all the activities that are necessary in that quarter, such as adjusting processes, hiring people and improving technology. Then you make it explicit which activities are covered in the next plateau. So this also makes it clear what you will not be working on in the coming quarter. And that creates focus and peace! After all, people know that the activity will not be forgotten, but will be picked up later.

Once you have reached the first plateau, look at the next plateau and determine whether the prioritization of projects is still correct or whether other things are now more prioritized. This way, you'll keep iterating on your plan, taking a manageable step up the mountain each time. This process maintains the momentum and energy in the organization much better than when you lay down a plan to get to the top in one long journey.

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Categorize projects

When prioritizing projects, it helps to categorize projects so you know which ones deliver the most. We like to use a simple matrix: impact vs. effort.

The things that little effort (effort) costs and the yield a lot You want to do (impact) first. The things that yield a lot but also a lot of effort costs, you want to do those too, but you have to plan them carefully. Next, you have the things that are also lots of time, money and brainpower costs, but result in almost nothing. You don't want to do this one. And the things that low costs and also not yielding much prioritize yourself well and pick up later. Make sure you first understand all the changes you would like to make, so you know exactly how much time and budget a project requires. It's important to take the time to do this so that you have enough insight before you prioritize based on this matrix.

Once you've prioritized the list of projects, it's a good idea to repeat the exercise once in a while. Above all, don't start a change once without any reflection cycle. “A common mistake with change projects in prioritization is that there are no clear agreements about how to deal with new initiatives in the organization,” says Paul. “What we often see is that a company calls everyone together once, a list of projects divided between people and stops three projects to bring more focus. Then a week goes by, someone comes up with something new and then people think: “That's a good new thing, we should do that, he or she should take it up ad-hoc.” And then all the trouble starts all over again. So there is no process or approach about how to deal with new initiatives. So think about this beforehand. For example, organize a monthly session where everyone takes the new initiatives along with them, then you decide which new initiatives you will do something with and which old initiatives can be removed from the list.”

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How do you get people involved in the change?

By far the biggest challenge is getting the entire organization on the same page, so that everyone knows what needs to be done and what it contributes to. So take the time to thoroughly share your vision of projects with people. After all, the extent to which people feel involved and heard matters a lot. The greater the sense of ownership and a shared vision, the faster you can run together. Please note that sharing ownership also has advantages and disadvantages.

“At Summiteers, we left the development of the company to the group for a long time,” says Paul. “That also often resulted in things happening that we, as partners, thought: either that's just not what we had in mind or just not what we think is smart at the moment. Then we interfered again and it came at the cost of ownership.” We are now working with sponsors on projects. On each project, there is a partner with whom you coordinate the vision and approach for a project and we decide how much time we want to put into it. “The balance is also much better now,” says Paul. “The initiative may come entirely from the group, but it will be coordinated early on whether it is in line with what management has in mind.”

Whether you arrive at your strategy top-down or bottom-up: once you've figured out where to go, take plenty of time to live through and enrich it together. This means that people can ask questions about it, make additions to it and that they can concretize what that means for them.

We wrote earlier about creating support for change this article, where you can find even more advice on the subject.

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Protect your people

Finally, as a manager, you have to choose what to do and what not to do and communicate clearly about it, it's also important to be firm and consistent. “This creates space for people to focus on priorities,” says Paul. Very often, managers say: “This is priority number one, but the other 15 things must also happen.” And then you'll see that tomorrow something else is most important. That's not really choosing. In fact, this has the opposite effect on the output and motivation of your people. If you communicate well about the goals that the company wants to pursue and which projects go with them, people in their work can make the decision themselves and they don't have to ask that all the time. And also make sure you are available if colleagues want to discuss their priorities. That's actually a time when they give you, as a leader, a chance to focus on what's important to you.

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Want to know more about the challenges of effective growth?

This was the last article in the series “6 focus areas for effective growth among scaleups”. In the previous editions of this series, you can read much more about growth tips for scaleups. The links to the articles can be found at the top of this article.

The six-part model that this article series is based on results from the scale-up organization scan developed by Summiteers. The scale-up organization scan helps companies to zoom out, quickly identify possible pain points and reveal any noise between founders and the organization. If you want to exchange views on your challenges to grow effectively or explore whether the organization scan is interesting for you, please contact Paul whether Casper.

Of course, you can also get in touch with us via LinkedIn and our website.