A business can quickly go off track, becoming distracted by perceived opportunities or overly focused on perceived threats. Or simply the owner gets bored! It is important to define what they do so they can be clear about what they will not do.
Getting this focus is what you are going to refer to as the business’s Bullseye. Some call it the sweet spot or core focus. In Good to Great, Jim Collins calls it ‘the Hedgehog’. In Japan, they have the idea of Ikigai. The business’s Bullseye is the intersection of what they are passionate about, what they are good at, what their customer needs and what they can be paid for.
What they are passionate about
They have defined their business’s purpose, their reason for being. The purpose should answer the question of what they are passionate about?
What they are good at
A whole lot of passion with no competency is not a recipe for success. We can often understand a business’s core competency by looking at the owner’s own experience in a domain. It’s essential to be realistic about their business proficiencies and where their strengths lie.
A business can always hire in or develop competence, but when you are trying to determine your Bullseye, you want to focus on ‘your core competency’ – the ones that are part of your DNA.
What the customer needs
They need to be crystal clear about what the customer needs. Sadly, we have seen many businesses fail because the owner assumed they knew what the customer wanted.
Understanding their customer needs is not a do once, set and forget exercise. It is important for their ‘customer’s voice’ to be in every decision they make in their Economic Engine. You will take a deeper dive into understanding customer needs in a later session in the afternoon when you look at the different Customer Roles and Customer Stories in their target markets. If there are some more learnings, come back and add to What the customer needs in the Bullseye.
What they can be paid for
They need to establish a fair commercial exchange that the customer sees as valuable while providing financial security to the business. Having just thought about what they are good at and what the customer needs now you will facilitate a discussion as they consider what they can be paid for. They may not get anything out other than their current commercial model but try and get them to think out of the box a bit. There may be some hidden gems that could lead to some innovation of their commercial model.
It can be helpful to see if there is an opportunity for some commercial arrangement that could include some form of an annuity or ongoing arrangement that would keep the customer close and therefore better served and support the businesses financial security.
Introducing Objectives and Key Results