Here are 40 Questions to ask before leading Strategic Planning sessions in a Current State Business Review section to “confirm the present.” Some are quantitative, and some qualitative, though having a high level understanding around most of these to inform the foundation for growth.
- What kind of technology are we using?
- What are we creating?
- Who is our customer?
- How many employees do we have?
- How are we organized operationally?
- What are the sequential steps in our value streams?
- What kind of equipment / systems do we have?
- How efficient are we?
- How are we leveraging the tools of the future?
- How are we doing when it comes to quality?
- How much money did we earn gross and net over past 3 years, trends, and profitability margin?
- Which accounts are the most profitable (direct costs)?Are the largest volume accounts the most profitable?
- How many/which accounts make up our top 80% Net Revenue?
- Do we have accounts with ZERO or NEGATIVE Net Revenue (if so, which)?
- Do we have inactive parts for which are we holding inventory/equipment (if so, which and for how long)?
- How much inventory do we have on hand?
- What are our inventory turns?
- What is our overhead (indirect costs) by category?
- How many overhead categories represent the top 80% spend?
- How many represent the last 20% spend (do we have a long “tail”)?
- For inventory, do we pay for significantly more in a year than our COGS?
- Is cash flow significantly different from Accounts Receivable?
- Do we have significant outstanding payments on orders?
- What are the typical terms for clients?
- Can we ascertain the average time to be paid by client?
- (What do we do when payments are outstanding?)
- What is our average lead time?
- What is our equipment capacity and utilization?
- What are our bottlenecks?
- How many new parts have we added each year?
- How are we doing when it comes to waste (of time, of product, of money, etc)?
- What kinds of projects are we working on?
- What is our social impact?
- What is our environmental impact?
- Are our employees engaged in our mission?
- Are they empowered/autonomous/well-prepared/happy?
- What is our superpower?
- Can we handle more work if nothing changes?
- How long will we be a going concern if nothing changes?
- If everything else stayed the same, what one or two areas would have the most impact on the business were they to change?