Why Conduct a Business Assessment?
This is article is part of a series of monthly articles produced by Harbour Results for PMA’s MetalForming Business Edge e-newsletter. Click here to view the full collection of articles.
I know we have talked about business assessments in the past, however, as the manufacturing industry continues to face headwinds, we felt this is an important tool for leaders to leverage. Conducting a business assessment can offer many benefits – identify strengths and weaknesses, improving efficiency, enhance strategic planning and mitigating risks – however there are some other benefits many don’t consider:
Facilitating Change Management: Organizations often undergo change due to internal or external factors such as mergers, acquisitions, restructuring, or market disruptions. Business assessments provide a baseline for evaluating the impact of change initiatives and guiding the transition process effectively.
Ensuring Compliance and Governance: Regulatory compliance, ethical standards, and corporate governance are essential for maintaining legal and ethical integrity. Business assessments help ensure that your company adheres to applicable laws, regulations, and industry standards, reducing the risk of legal and reputational consequences.
Optimizing Resource Allocation: Assessments enable you to evaluate resource allocation across different functions, projects, or initiatives. By identifying areas of overallocation or underutilization, you can reallocate resources strategically to maximize efficiency and achieve organizational objectives.
Fostering Innovation and Continuous Improvement: Assessments create a culture of learning, innovation, and continuous improvement within your organization. By encouraging feedback, experimentation, and knowledge sharing, you can drive innovation and adaptability in response to evolving market dynamics.
Building Stakeholder Confidence: Transparent and evidence-based assessments demonstrate your commitment to accountability, performance excellence, and stakeholder value. They build trust and confidence among investors, customers, employees, and other stakeholders, enhancing your reputation and credibility in the marketplace.
The PMA Strategic Assessment Program (SAP) is an affordable way for PMA members to assess their business. And, as of May 1, Harbour Results – who operates SAP – is now part of Wipfli. This is important to those considering an assessment because the additional resources – technology, software selection, risk advisory, M&A, data analytics and visualization along with tax and audit and more – allow for a more detailed assessment of the business and enhances the recommendations for business improvement. Harbour Results team combined with Wipfli’s data and business solutions group practice delivers additional value to manufacturers.
SAP will now include up to three Wipfli consultants who will work with you to conduct interviews, review processes, and analyze existing data to help you understand the status of your business.
The assessment will continue to look at all functions of the business, technical and non-technical. For example, the work environment and its impact on employee retention, engagement, and attraction. Do you have a proactive problem-solving culture where you ask for and people provide input, or do you dictate what everyone needs to do?
Nine Areas to Focus On
When the Wipfli team conducts an assessment, including the PMA SAP, we focus on nine areas:
Engineering
Finance & Administration
Operations
Materials
Quality
Program Management
Management
Sales & Marketing
Human Resources
If you haven’t participated in PMA’s SAP assessment, we strongly encourage you to consider leveraging this tool to improve your competitiveness and strengthen every aspect of your business.
If you’re interested in PMA’s SAP, an exclusive offer to PMA members, contact Laurie Harbour at laurie.harbour@wipfli.com.