How to Deliver More with Less Cash

How to Deliver More with Less Cash

Did you know that over 80% of your frontline workers may be busy doing work that adds no value to your customers?

If you need to save cash, deliver more with less cash, that’s where you want to start. Not with the layoffs and not with letting people pay for their own coffee. But with understanding the core processes of your scaleup.

Four Key Engines

So what are these core processes in the company that you want to have a grip on? The four key engines that I typically identify in tech scaleups are:

  1. The innovation engine or trailblazing,

  2. The acquisition engine or sales and marketing

  3. The fulfillment engine or service, customer success and support.

  4. And then the enablement engine, which is typically finance, HR, legal compliance and similar support areas.

    Cycle Time, Error Rate & Cost

The key is that in each of these engines we can think of an object, or item, or person, going through the processes of that engine. Between a certain time and with certain error rates and with certain costs. A new product for the innovation engine, a new customer for the acquisition engine, and so forth. If we start keeping an eye on cycle time on error rates and on cost, we’re starting to see where there’s potential for efficiency improvements.

Team Pride in First Time Right

If you want to just get started with that, I always recommend to start with the metric of “first-time-right”. In other words, bring down the error rate. Because that is one that teams at the frontline can take an enormous pride in improving. And we also know from lean theory that if you get first-time-right better and better, it means that the cycle time goes down and the cost goes down. Very easy way to get started with that.

Improving your Success Formula

Now to get your teams on board and to have them start analyzing what they could do to bring down that error rate or bring up the percent first-time-right: there’s a worksheet we have developed. It’s called the Cash Acceleration Success Formulas.

Download the worksheet “Cash Acceleration Success Formulas” below:

Cash Acceleration


Reviews from Workshop Participants:

InRule

“Expert facilitation and insight into how to move the group.”

Chis Berg, Director of Digital Acceleration, InRule
Chis Berg
Director of Digital Acceleration, InRule, Chicago, IL

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About Midstage Institute

We focus our practice on midstage startup companies that need to remain agile, and where what used to work for the smaller startup just isn’t as effective anymore.

 

We ensure founders and leadership teams win, with our over 40 years experience in venture-backed tech startups. We are Silicon Valley veterans with the scars and wins to prove it. We don’t use an inflexible off-the shelf methodology, we adapt best practices to you, your market, your company, and your leadership team.

 

We always:

  • Focus on right sized best practices to get to the next level
  • Focus on the 20% of effort that will yield you 80% of the benefits
  • Teach Perfection is the enemy, better is your partner and ally
  • Align with your business needs so you can thrive