Service Leadership
Total Profit Solutions for IT Companies™
Service Leadership Index™
- Q/Q Revenue Change - BIC Profitability SPs: Q4-08 2.0% Q1-09 16.1% Q2-09 168.3% Q3-09 -75.7%
- Q/Q Revenue Change - Median Profitability SPs: Q4-08-9.7% Q1-09 -38.4% Q2-09 15.4% Q3-09 32.3%
- Q/Q Revenue Change - Bottom 1/4 Profitability SPs: Q4-08 -12.2% Q1-09 1.9% Q2-09 16.5% Q3-09 -42.5%
- Product GM% - BIC Profitability SPs: Q4-08 21.2% Q1-09 23.4% Q2-09 24.3% Q3-09 25.1%
- Product GM% - Median Profitability SPs: Q4-08 18.7% Q1-09 17.2% Q2-09 23.8% Q3-09 18.6%
- Product GM% - Bottom 1/4 Profitability SPs: Q4-08 3.4% Q1-09 25.1% Q2-09 55.5% Q3-09 15.5%
- Services GM% - BIC Profitability SPs: Q4-08 52.6% Q1-09 53.6% Q2-09 50.5% Q3-09 54.9%
- Services GM% - Median Profitability SPs: Q4-08 37.8% Q1-09 47.5% Q2-09 31.9% Q3-09 46.3%
- Services GM% - Bottom 1/4 Profitability SPs: Q4-08 38.6% Q1-09 41.6% Q2-09 38.7.3% Q3-09 44.1%
- SG&A% - BIC Profitability SPs: Q4-08 30.2% Q1-09 29.1% Q2-09 38.1% Q3-09 26.4%
- SG&A% - Median Profitability SPs: Q4-08 27.1% Q1-09 35.3% Q2-09 35% Q3-09 29.9%
- SG&A% - Bottom 1/4 Profitability SPs: Q4-08 42.0% Q1-09 42.8% Q2-09 35.7% Q3-09 39%
- EBITDA% - BIC Profitability SPs: Q4-08 14.5% Q1-09 17.7% Q2-09 13.6% Q3-09 21.9%
- EBITDA% - Median Profitability SPs: Q4-08 3.9% Q1-09 4.0% Q2-09 -1.8% Q3-09 6.9%
- EBITDA% - Bottom 1/4 Profitability SPs: Q4-08 -7.1% Q1-09 -9.7% Q2-09 -14% Q3-09 -2.6%
- Q/Q Headcount Change - BIC Profitability SPs: Q4-08 -1.1% Q1-09 15% Q2-09 164.2% Q3-09 -71.4%
- Q/Q Headcount Change - Median Profitability SPs: Q4-08 2.1% Q1-09 -32.5% Q2-09 57% Q3-09 -41.9%
- Q/Q Headcount Change - Bottom 1/4 Profitability SPs: Q4-08 2.1% Q1-09 12.2% Q2-09 62.3% Q3-09 -48.6%
Quarterly Solution Provider Performance
Shareholder Goals, Strategy and Execution
In addition to creating jobs for good people, the primary goal of any company is to create value for those who risk their equity to create and grow the company: the shareholders.
At Service Leadership we believe that the business strategy of the company starts with the shareholders’ goals:
- How much do shareholders want to invest or risk,
- Over what period of time,
- For what expected returns?
Once these are established, then the strategy to attain those goals can be properly formulated.
Service Leadership provides in-depth support of shareholders and executive teams as they formulate their goals, the strategy to attain those goals, and the execution needed to carry out the strategy.
Shareholder Goal Setting and Strategy Definition
Each economic cycle offers new ways to maximize shareholder value. Our job is to bring the most appropriate ways to light, and the ways to leverage them, assuming the company’s current situation and resources, the economic environment, and the strategic and tactical state of the Solution Provider industry.
Given our knowledge of these factors and your company’s goals and resources, an engagement with Service Leadership can accelerate and enrich the discussion of what strategies are available to the company and how much investment and return the shareholders can expect from each. Our Value Creation Strategy Development engagement provides a crisp and cost-effective way to illuminate the paths available to the company, allowing shareholders to make the most informed investment decisions.
For companies who have fully thought through the shareholders’ goals and business strategy, but wish to have them validated and critiqued, Service Leadership also offers our Value Creation Strategy Review engagement.
Click here to learn more or click here to get started.
Execution
As important as it is to set shareholder goals and define the strategy for attaining them, Solution Providers face the task of executing effectively every day in the midst of an extraordinarily complex business model. Coordinating the daily flow of expertise and equipment to satisfy demanding clients in a profitable manner is no small feat. Doing so while migrating the business model to meet the shareholders’ goals in even more challenging.
Fortunately, Service Leadership brings to the table, tools, techniques, resources and executive coaching proven over two decades of successful Solution Provider growth and leadership.
Effective execution comes down to several foundational components which, if correctly established, remove many of the obstacles faced by management in their day to day battle for growth and profits. Without these foundational components, it is all too easy to have inadvertently ineffective, counter-productive or even conflicting activities going on within the company, requiring constant executive attention to manage but with no durable resolution in sight.
Service Leadership’s offerings are designed to quickly and efficiently help Solution Provider executives get the proper foundational components in place so that the basics of the business are in alignment, allowing management to focus on the exceptions and opportunities where the company can gain real value.
The critical foundational components for effective execution are:
- Accurate and actionable financial measurement through appropriate Chart of Accounts design,
- Win/win incentive compensation plan design and implementation for sales, service and management,
- Service offering development, transition and maturation, including scoping, pricing, contracting, team responsibilities and risk management,
- Sales and marketing tactics and execution, including lead source growth, sales activity management and revenue forecasting,
- KPIs, metrics, benchmarking and continual improvement.
Service Leadership provides three complimentary ways for your management team to get these foundational components in place, depending on your company’s resources, schedule and learning style:
Toolkits and Web Learning
Hard core operational expertise in “protein bar” sized chunks. A selection of unique Service Leadership interactive tools each combined with a succinct 60-90 minute web learning module, designed to provide the busy executive with precisely targeted knowledge to put in place a missing foundational component or to review/revise one already in place. Each is bargain-priced at less than $130 for a company-wide license.
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Targeted Consulting Services
Perhaps your time constraints and resources require a helping hand. Service Leadership’s short duration, high impact targeted consulting services can be readily called on to help the management team accelerate their knowledge and implementation of the new foundational component.
Together, using efficiently structured interaction, your management team and Service Leadership together define the specific challenge or goal, select and refine the appropriate foundation component and then get it in place with minimal risk and disruption. In addition, we ensure succinct knowledge transfer to enable your team to continue to leverage the new component.
Our targeted consulting services apply to virtually every aspect of Solution Provider management:
- Finance and Performance
- Financial and operational assessment, planning and optimization,
- Budgeting and forecasting,
- Financial and operational diagnostics and benchmarking.
- People and Process
- Organization, responsibilities, work flow and performance measurement,
- Position description, definition, and candidate interviews,
- Compensation and incentive plans for sales, service and management,
- Offerings and Value Propositions
- Services development, evolution and pricing,
- Sales and service operational maturity assessments,
- Account management and portfolio optimization.
- Sales and Marketing
- Practice-led sales model,
- Customer segment analysis and planning,
- Lead generation and marketing,
- Sales process and activity-based management,
- Funnel management and forecasting.
Twenty-plus years of building Solution Providers from small to large (up to $2bb in revenue) and eight years of consulting with other Solution Providers has enabled us to identify and concentrate the key success factors in all critical areas of Solution Provider operation and make them available to you.
Click here to learn more or here to get started.
Advanced Peer Groups
The third option for Solution Provider executives seeking executional improvement is joining one of our advanced peer groups. Unlike many peer groups which feature large numbers and a broad range of business models, Service Leadership Index™ groups focus on in-depth interaction and recognition of business model relevance. In addition, vendor funding is not accepted, to assure total confidentiality and focus.
There are three Service Leadership Index™ membership options. Click here to learn more or to join.