Business Development

Growth should still remain the focus of Learning & Development businesses in today’s economic climate – and growth can still be pursued, either internally or externally, if your organisation is performing better than your competitors’. Learning & Development is a cyclical business and downturns are inevitable. Unfortunately, when revenues are down it is all to easy to take your eyes off the competition and take short-term measures that will compromise your position to benefit from the upturn.

We can advise on your commercial strategy, operations, profitability and business structure.

Commercial development

• Competitor analysis: How are your competitors dealing with difficult trading conditions?
• Marketing: How good is your route to market? What alternatives are open to you? Are you getting value from your marketing spend?
• Sales: Is direct sales really working for you? How well is the resource managed? Are the rewards in line with business strategy?
• Tendering: What is your success rate in tendering for larger projects? Are you monitoring public sector tenders opportunities? How efficiently do you manage the tendering process?
• New product development: Are there opportunities to exploit market demand in new areas of business?

Operational development

• Business processes and systems: How well are you managing delivery of your product?
• Quality control: Are you providing a consistent experience to your clients?
• Recruitment and retention: Can you find and keep good staff? Is your operational effectiveness compromised by high staff churn?
• Outsourcing of non-core activities: Are you doing things that could be more effectively done by someone else for less?

Improving margins

• Supplier management: Trainers – are you paying them too much? Print, pack and dispatch – are you getting value for money? Venue and equipment hire – are there cheaper alternatives.
• Staff costs: Too much or too little? What should you be paying to retain the right people? How can you reduce the wage bill by outsourcing non-core activities?
• Overheads: Are you paying too much for space you don’t really need?

Business restructuring

• Reorganisation: Is the organisation in the right shape to contend with market conditions?
• Acquisitions: Who might be of interest to you and are they open to offers?
• Divesting assets: Is there an opportunity to profitably dispose of non-core offerings?
• Partnerships: Can you combine forces with other providers to increase market share?

If you would like to find out more about how Leaf of Gold can help you, please contact us at: info@leafofgold.co.uk