This program, specifically for business owners, delivers dozens of bottom-line insights about the real world of succession and exit.

Succession planning isn’t just about the owner ‘getting out’ at the end. It’s also the ongoing process of developing and preparing capable people throughout the business, including at the top, for new responsibilities as the business grows. To use a sports analogy, it’s about building talent and creating ‘bench strength’ as part of building a profitable, sustainable and saleable business.

Exit Planning is determining the timing and the strategy for the business owner to make a graceful and profitable exit from the business…and to adjust to the life changes that come with that.

When you have clients for whom this is important subject will be helpful, we’ll be delighted to chat about ‘possibilities’.

Managing any business today is tough…and getting tougher.  We’re all faced with more demanding customers, more and stronger competition, increased complexity and shrinking margins. Mediocrity is no longer an option.  On top of that, great staff are hard to find and keep…and that problem won’t go away any time soon.

Through Keynotes, Workshops, Management ‘Boot Camps’ and 1-on-1 Coaching, Donald has helped thousands of businesses to create compelling customer value, clarity of purpose and long-term profitability.

Simply put, Donald works with business owners and managers who want to create extraordinary outcomes in these 5 key areas:

• Create compelling customer value and experiences that will ‘grab’ their target customers, clearly differentiate them from their competitors, make them ‘famous’…and grow their bottom line.
• Market and promote their business more effectively in a crowded and cynical market place.  There’s no point in being the best if you’re also the best kept secret.
• Attract, lead and retain a dedicated, top-performing team.  We must become ‘talent magnets’.
• Manage more effectively to improve profitability now and for the long term…and to,
• Create a clear Vision for the future of their business, a specific Action Plan to get them there and a culture of accountability to make sure they do.

There’s huge confusion in business today about what a “Vision” is, what it isn’t…and whether it even makes sense to have one.  Businesses spend months and thousands of dollars on consultants or “Management Retreats” to come up with a vague, ‘feel good’ Vision that says little, and achieves nothing.

Every industry is changing and new business models are taking over.  It’s tough to get where we’re going if we don’t know where we’re going.  Simply put, our Vision should be a clear, specific and measurable statement of what we commit to become to be a more profitable market leader in 3 to 5 years.  It will consist of 6 points, on one piece of paper and will be easily updated every year to keep us in the lead.

Its purpose is to inform, focus, challenge and inspire us as leaders, and everyone on our team, by creating clarity about these 5 things:

1. The compelling customer value and experience that we commit to deliver,
2. What we commit to become,
3. Specifically how we’ll get there,
4. The extraordinary bottom line that we commit to generate…and,
5. How we commit to behave along the way.

That level of clarity simply doesn’t exist in most businesses today…and it’s killing them.  Our Vision will also be our most effective recruitment tool, when hiring and developing key team members.

Donald’s breakthrough work on business Vision has helped 1000s of companies throughout the world improve clarity, commitment and profitability.

Whether you sell to consumers or to other businesses, customers are more demanding, less forgiving, more confused, more time-compressed and more cynical than ever before.  They want your best service and your best price…and they want it now.  On top of that, you have way too many competitors, you all look pretty much alike…and some of you aren’t going to make it!

So, to succeed we must stand out.  We must create compelling value and experiences that make powerful connections with our target customers.  Simply put, we must be extraordinary.  Mediocrity is no longer an option.

Then, we must communicate our value in a way that ‘grabs’ our target customers, clearly differentiates us from our competitors and makes us ‘famous’.  There’s no point in being the best if we’re also the best kept secret.  And we have to do all of that on a tight budget, so that we grow our bottom line.

Creating loyal and profitable customers for life is not that complicated.  In fact, you’ll be amazed at how simple and do-able it actually is.  In this bottom-line marketing session Donald delivers his clear and compelling insights into why people buy, why they don’t buy…and what they really want when they do buy.

He debunks tired myths about loyalty, price, advertising and value and then replaces them with powerful insights and management tools that will help you create a compelling competitive advantage, more effective marketing and a better bottom line.

Donald’s profound understanding of human behavior, delivered with humor and a strong dose of reality, will inform, challenge and energize you.

Whether your business is large or small, not having the right people in every position carries a huge bottom-line cost in lost business, inefficiency, missed opportunity and frustration!

The talent crunch is real, and will last for decades.  In less than 10 years time, we’ll see many businesses fail because they’re unable to find the talent they need.

Sadly, many business owners and managers have convinced themselves that, “You just can’t get good people anymore!”  They’re in denial and they’ve given up!  The truth is that the best people have to work for somebody…it’s just that we have to deserve them.

We become what we hire…so we need to attract and hire extraordinary talent, not just ‘bodies’.  Then, we must train, inspire and empower them to WOW our customers, achieve world-class operating efficiency and grow our bottom line.

Everyone on our team must be clear about our customer promise, our direction and our values.  They must be committed to specific outcomes, be held accountable for their performance and rewarded for their success.  Then, non-performance must be dealt    with promptly and firmly.  Lack of accountability and failure to deal with non-performance are two of the biggest problems in many businesses today.  So, we must all manage smarter.

Donald’s 8 steps to attracting, leading and keeping a top-performing team deliver a clear, specific and effective process that will help make you a world-class recruiter, a world-class boss…and a world-class business.

Managing any business today is tough…and getting tougher.  We’re all faced with moredemanding customers, more and stronger competition, increased complexity and shrinking margins.  On top of that, great staff are hard to find and keep…and that problem won’t go away any time soon.

To thrive in good times or bad, first we must create extraordinary customer value and experiences that will ‘grab’ our target customers, clearly differentiate us from our competitors, make us ‘famous’ and grow our bottom line. Then, we must market, sell and promote like never before in this crowded, confused and cynical marketplace.

Next, we must create a clear Vision for the future of our business and a business model that will get us there. Then, we must develop a top-performing team and world-class operating efficiency.  Without these four things, we cannot grow our business.

Finally, we must understand the math of profitability and control expenses carefully.

Performance must be measured, acknowledged and rewarded…and non-performance must be dealt with promptly.  Lack of clarity and failure to deal with non-performance are two of the biggest challenges facing many businesses today.  So, we must all manage smarter.

Most business owners and managers spend 90% of their time working “in” their business and not enough time working “on” it.  Donald delivers the ‘straight goods’ on how to proactively and effectively manage your marketing, your team, your future and your bottom line…and he makes it fun!

From humble beginnings in 1905 as a tiny leather goods company, Cooper Canada grew and evolved to become a world-leading maker of sports equipment and a Canadian Brand icon, employing over 2800 people.

As the company reinvented itself, partners were bought out, the company went public, then went global and was unionized.  It built a dedicated, world-class team, opened an offshore factory, bought competitors, imported and exported and dominated its markets.  Add to all of that the unique challenges of running a family business, and life gets interesting.

Finally, as both the market and the industry underwent fundamental changes and realignment, Cooper Canada was sold.  Today, the company no longer exists…leaving important business lessons behind.

Now, with 20 years of experience as an international business speaker and coach, Donald shares those lessons with brilliant clarity, wisdom and humor as he helps business owners and managers throughout the world create compelling customer value, clarity of purpose and long-term profitability.  He has worked with 100s of family businesses and entrepreneurs to deal with business, personal and family challenges.

Duration: One Day
Target Audiences: Business Owners and their Management Teams

A full-day, interactive “Boot Camp” that has the power to fundamentally transform any business, large or small. This program provides a complete set of step-by-step Implementation Templates to facilitate effective action and can include a series of follow up coaching and facilitating telephone coaching sessions to ensure success.

Every year, hundreds of business owners approach us about having Donald work with them, and their team, for just one day, to help them rethink, refocus and re-energize their business to create these six key outcomes…

• Deal with the realities of a shifting market or global competitiveness.
• Create a compelling competitive advantage,
• Market and promote more effectively on a tight budget,
• Attract, lead and retain a dedicated and top-performing team, Improve long-term profitability… and to,
• Create a clear direction for the future of their business…and a specific Action Plan to get them there.

This one-day, transformational management “Boot Camp” will jumpstart your business, make you a much more effective manager, help you visualize and create an extraordinary future…and grow your bottom line. Now, here’s more info on why this program is so important and what it will do for you…

The challenge every business faces…and our commitment to bottom-line outcomes:

As leaders, our first job is to create clarity about the compelling customer value we commit to deliver, the future that we commit to create, how we’ll get there and the values that will guide us along the way. Frankly, most businesses don’t have that kind of clarity…and it’s killing them!

Our second job is to create the right business model and a top-performing team. Without these, we cannot grow our business. Next, we must understand the math of profitability and generate a healthy bottom line.

Then, we must create and deliver extraordinary customer value and experiences that will ‘grab’ our target customers, clearly differentiate us, make us ‘famous’ and grow our bottom line. Then, we must market, sell and promote like never before in what is clearly a crowded, confused and cynical marketplace.

Finally, we must implement flawlessly. Performance must be measured, acknowledged and rewarded…and non-performance must be dealt with promptly. Failure to deal with non-performance is one of the biggest challenges facing many businesses today. So, we must all manage smarter.

To achieve all of this, especially in challenging economic times, we must be passionate, focused, innovative, courageous and proactive. In short, we must be extraordinary! Mediocrity is no longer an option.

Throughout this one-day program you and your team will learn specific, clear insights about marketing, management and profitability that will give you the “unfair competitive advantage” that you need to succeed in today’s competitive environment. At the end of the day you will have in place a step-by-step process to proactively sell more, manage smarter and grow your bottom line.

Over Donald’s 18 years of working with business owners and managers he has found that most of them spend the majority of their time working “IN” their business and not enough time proactively working “ON” their business. Why?…because it’s so easy to retreat to the familiar. It’s so easy to do the things that we’ve done for years and know we’re good at.

On the other hand, working “on” our business, that all-important process of proactively visualizing, planning and implementing an extraordinary customer experience and a more profitable future, is much more intimidating territory. The proposition of creating an effective team seems more difficult than just doing it all ourselves. Getting comfortable with ‘the numbers’ and using them to proactively achieve better margins and a healthy bottom line seems like a daunting task…so we retreat to the familiar and work “in” our business.

Based on Donald’s real-life experience as a world-class manufacturer and an award-winning retailer, this program delivers the breakthrough insights and implementation “tools” that will make working “on” your business doable, effective, profitable and fun. And, to keep you on the right track, each attendee will receive Donald’s free, monthly Management E-Newsletter that delivers reminders, tips, templates and processes to help keep you focused on the important job of proactive and effective management.

What clients say about Donald’s ability to inform, focus, challenge and inspire

Here are just a few comments from attendees…

• “Donald’s management ‘Boot Camp’ has delivered the best take-away value of any program that we’ve attended. He delivers effective tools that will have a profound impact on any business.”
• “Every business owner needs to spend a few hours with Donald Cooper. It changes everything.”
• “Awesome insights; edgy, engaging humour; passion and humanity…the whole package.”
• “Donald, this Boot Camp session could save my business. Thank you”.
• “As a small business owner, I attended Donald’s Management Boot Camp and by applying what I learned, I’ve grown my business by over 50%. I have achieved the Readers Choice Award for the favourite local business in my category and am now living the life that I only once dreamed of.”