MeasureProductivity

Imagine you are owner of a successful business. You regularly get profit and do not think about crisis. You do not bother evaluating productivity of your business, since, as you think, everything is going smoothly. But all of a sudden (or vice versa gradually) you understand that you are losing customer. You see that your competitors are growing and taking the most lucrative market segments. But why? Your business was OK just a few months ago.

The answer is quite easy. You never evaluated productivity of your business. You consented to average income which was steady. But in today’s business work there can be no excuses. You either measure your business and develop or you simply die. Many companies have chosen the latter option.

Productivity analysis will give answers to most of your questions concerning business performance. As said in the above example, a business may be giving profits but can be still ineffective. Your competitors will never give a second chance. They will punish you for every lost opportunity and every dollar spent in an inefficient way.

Perform productivity analysis of your company at least one a quarter

Use productivity analysis methods to evaluate your business performance

However, you may use Balanced Scorecard system to regularly perform productivity analysis. This kind of software does not give general answers, i.e. never performs general analysis. Balanced Scorecard tool measures individual KPIs which stand for key performance indicators.

It should be noted that different businesses have different KPIs. It also depends on the business strategic goals and current problems. But at in this age of information you can find virtually all KPIs for any business.

What is key advantage of KPI evaluation? Such type of analysis makes it possible to find the root of the problem. Many managers often fight the consequences of many troubles. Balanced Scorecard will help find what exactly cause problem or genitive trend in business performance.

As a rule business productivity is measured by numerous KPIs. As said above they differ from business to business. So, before evaluating performance and productivity you need to decide which indicators you want to see.

Use of Balanced Scorecard is highly recommended for managers before they make any plans of strategic development. It is really dangerous to expand a company that has problems and negative trends. Small problems will turn into big ones. Besides, expansion always means investing money. So, such investment will be lost.

Balanced Scorecard positively affects personnel as employees become aware of mistakes in work. Moreover, Balanced Scorecard contributes to development of a positive organization atmosphere.

Companies need to consistently measure and increase sales productivity for them to stay alive in today’s highly competitive industries. This can be achieved through effective sales planning strategies and highly efficient sales force.

Finding a concrete way to measure and increase sales productivity is one of the prevailing needs of many companies. This may be an impossible feat given all the internal and external factors that could affect a company’s sales performance.

The term “sales” generally refers to all activities done to be able to sell products and services. This is the completion stage of any commercial transaction. At this point, the customer has already agreed to partially or fully pay a certain product or service. Sale can be culminated through direct selling, pro-forma sales, agent-based selling, door-to-door salespeople, electronic exchange or business-to-business selling. There are several aspects in a company’s sales performance that need to be analyzed and evaluated to determine its sales productivity. This include new customer acquisition, client control and client retention. Acquiring new customers may be based on database marketing performance, channel recruitment and development, lead generation, and trade show support. Client control, on the other hand, may be based on customer relationship management, system integration tools and partner relationship systems. Lastly, client retention can be evaluated through account management methods, channel management and development of new opportunity in existing accounts. Sales productivity is essential for commercial organizations because a business cannot expand when its sales volume do not increase.

Improving one’s sales performance is getting more difficult every day. This is essentially because of tighter competition, development of more innovative products and technological advancement. More recently, companies have taken to providing their sales force communication tools like mobile phones, pocket computers and laptops in order to make them more efficient with what they do. Companies also have come to acknowledge the importance of conducting regular training sessions to their sales people to make them more convincing as sellers. A perfectly designed sales plan will not work if a company does not have the sales people who can meet their sales targets. Moreover, the sales force should be able to continue to supply a steady flow of customers and increasing sales revenues.  Given the important role that they play, sales people usually take part in the sales planning stage. It is at this stage that activities aimed at improving sales are planned and prepared. Sales targets are also set during this stage with the use of sales planning system and appropriate software. Sales goals and activities may be planned according to regions, channels, products or clients. Sales tracking is also an important part of managing sales. Through this, sales are continuously monitored to ensure that they conform to company targets. Sales reporting is likewise important as this allows companies to recognize the efforts of those people who consistently achieve their sales objectives.

More recently, sales management software products have been offered by software developers to their clients. They contend that these products enable the latter to measure and increase sales productivity. Through these software products, it is now easier for sales departments to develop effective sales plans, track sales completion and obtain real-time sales reports. Furthermore, the data obtained from these will allow companies to come up with new ways of attaining sales growth.