Building Spiritual Enterprises

Proverbs 16:9 “A man’s heart plans his way, But the Lord directs his steps.”

This Scripture tells us that we can plan, but we also need to make sure that the Lord is directing our steps. 2 Peter chapter one tells us to add knowledge and virtue to our faith.

One of the simplest and most effective ways we can plan is through a SWOT analysis. In a SWOT analysis, you list your SWOT: Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats. You then ask yourself four questions:

~ How can my strengths take advantage of my opportunities? (SO Strategies)
~ How can we use my strengths to avoid my threats (ST strategies)
~ How can I overcome weaknesses by taking advantage of my opportunities (WO strategies)
~ How can I avoid threats by minimising my weaknesses (WT strategies)

A SWOT analysis becomes a spiritual SWOT analysis when you seek God and other spiritual wisdom to understand your strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats. The Spirit of God can bring confirmation and warnings to guide you.

Your strengths will include what God has spoken to you about, your vision, your giftings, your abilities, your experiences and where you already have a competitive advantage. Your weaknesses will include things you are not gifted in, pursuits that are clearly outside of your vision but are within your industry scope, and industry competencies that you need but do not have. Your opportunities include those things that the Spirit of God and your spiritual advisors have highlighted to you. Your threats include those things that the Spirit of God has warned you about.

Allow those things that the Spirit emphasizes to form the four potential strategies listed above. Now bring these potential strategies to The Lord and your key spiritual advisors to get confirmation on which the Spirit wants you to proceed with.

In the last few posts, we have discussed aspects of a “market penetration strategy” where you sell the same products and services to the same types of people. We should also consider what new products and services and which new markets the Spirit wants us to be involved with. We have been given creativity for certain arenas to make more of the Earth more like heaven.

Galatians 6:5 (The Message) “Each of you must take responsibility for doing the creative best you can with your own life.”

We should consider our calling, strengths, weaknesses and opportunities with the Spirit to be led where we He says “Yes” to us to be creative in products, services and markets.

Market development often focuses on geographic expansion (regional, national or international) or attracting other market segments. Other market segments are typically attracted by developing new product versions, using other channels of distribution or advertising in other forms of media. Often there are already initial indications of where the Spirit’s grace is operating. You may already be getting enquiries or requests from completely new market segments that are a prophetic statement of God’s will for the future. You should seek Him to see if you should put more resources into these new markets. Product development is often simply product modification. An existing product is either adapted to new ideas or developments. Product development also includes additional models, sizes and quality variations.

You may find it helpful to hear what the Spirit is saying by bringing market and product development options to Him and discern a “Yes”, “No” or “Wait”. The key in this type of strategy setting is to explore what you could be doing and bring this to God.  You may want to first ask the Spirit of God this question: “Do I need more products or services or do I need more markets? Should I keep trying to do a better job with what I have?” If the answer is more products / services, the next question may be “What else are my current customers prepared to pay for?” Put yourself in their shoes and think about their problems and priorities. If the answer is more markets, the next question could be “Who else is prepared to pay for the products and services I have? They may be in, for example, other industries, other cities, other age groups or another grouping of society.

In the last post we started to consider the issue of competition. Whatever our attitude is to our competitors, we should understand how our product or service compares to those of our competitors. 2 Peter 1:5 tells us to add “virtue” or “value” to our faith. We should be aiming to add value to our customers that our competitors are not adding, otherwise why should customers buy from us? This is also called “taking a differential position” or “using your competitive advantge”. I prefer to think of it as where I add value. The main categories that you can add value are:-
~     Price or value
~     Customer convenience
~     Customer experience
~     Notable product attributes
~     Unique service features

Where are you adding value? People find it helpful to map out their product or service offering in a process called creating a “Strategy Canvas”. This process involves identifying the factors on which companies in your industry compete and then translating these factors into measurable indicators. You then decide on how you and your competitors rate. You then map these ratings on a single page. An example of McDonalds versus one and two star restaurants is given below. (from www.summit-performance.com)  

As a result of your strategy canvas, you may wish to

• decide to increase your value add in elements where you are relatively weak
• focus on developing and promoting elements that you already add greater value in
• introduce elements that are not currently areas of competition in your industry (This is especially relevant when you discover that your competitors add greater value than you in all the present elements of competition)

For example,Yellowtail wines had no advantage over other established budget wines. So they introduced three new points of competition – easy selection, fun & adventure and easy drinking. These became features of their marketing strategy and they were very successful, establishing a significant market share very quickly. (See the strategy canvas below)

A strategy canvas can help us to understand how we are adding value and do fulfil what 2 Peter 1:5 asks us

We have been discussing the strategic options that result from how the Spirit of God leads us in our products (& services) and our customers. We consider the options of which particular strategy to achieve this “seems good to the Holy Spirit and to us” (Acts 15:28). This is how strategy becomes spiritual.

The first possibility is that the Spirit leads us to continue to have the same type of products and the same type of customers. This introduces the issue of competition. This becomes a problem “zero-sum” situation, where one person’s gain is another person’s loss. Competition isn’t, however, always zero-sum and can actually be win-win. Paul wrote book of in the Corinthians that competition has positive aspects.

1 Corinthians 9:24 Do you not know that those who run in a race all run, but one receives the prize? Run in such a way that you may obtain it.

The desire to win a race causes us to change the way we run. Solomon also made the following observation

Ecclesiastes 4:4 Then I saw that all toil and all skill in work come from one person’s envy of another.

The Hebrew word for “envy” can have either negative or positive moral connotations, depending on the context. It is not the word for “covet”. This is an observation of Solomon that competition with others can bring increased levels of excellence from us.

The other end of the competition spectrum is

Matthew 5:39…41 If any one strikes you on the right cheek, turn to him the other also…and if any one forces you to go one mile, go with him two miles.

Jesus instructed His followers not to retaliate or respond to poor actions with poor actions. If competition in your industry requires measure-for-measure retaliation, then you should seriously consider our actions. The following questions might be helpful

~         Does it help people to do their best work?
~         Are people spiritually or emotionally developed by the competition?
~         Does the competition produce hostility with your competitors?
~         Does competition help to produce a peaceful, efficient and effective result?

If you decide to compete for your competitor’s customers, you can increase your promotional efforts, initiate price cuts or take a differential position.

You can promote your products by advertising in different media, direct marketing, sales promotions, website and search engine optimisation.  A company that succeeds on price leadership either has superior resources and technical skills (such as capital investment, process engineering and low-cost distribution), products that are designed for ease of manufacture or delivery; or they have superior organisational skills (e.g. cost control, targets with incentives, supervision programs, detailed control reports, continuous improvement orientation or targets with incentives).

We will look at establishing a differential position in the next blog

Over the previous posts, we have looked at what new products (and services) and what new customers the Spirit wishes us to focus on. One possibility is that He has not asked you to to change either of these two things. We do know, however, that the Lord desires us to increase. There are numerous Scriptures that say this, just one of them is:

Psalm 115:14 ” May the Lord give you increase more and more, You and your children.”

Since we should aim for increase, in this situation our spiritual strategy is to sell more of the same goods and services to the same type of people. This is called “market penetration” Market penetration is suitable for businesses who

• Have a small share of a large industry
• Is in an industry that is not saturated with products and services.
• Is in an industry that is resistant to technological advances, so there is a minimal chance of the ground rules changing.
• Has suppliers (and staff) that can supply goods and services at both consistent, competitive prices and to required timeframes.
• Has competitive advantage is in production or distribution channels.

If market penetration is the strategy that the Spirit has given you, then you should seek Him to understand which of the following options He wants you to engage in.

1. Increasing your present customers’ usage of your products and services by:

• Increasing the size of their purchase e.g. “Would you like fries with that?”
• Increasing the rate of obsolescence. e.g. bringing out new versions of your products with updated features.
• Advertising new applications for your products. e.g. this cleaning product can not only clean nappies but it can also clean shirts.
• Give incentives to increase the use of your product. This may look like bulk discounts or a variety of loyalty programs and reward schemes.

2. Attracting people who have not previously used your product.

This is typically done through advertising, facilitating trial use through samples and price incentives.

 3. Attracting your competitors’ customers.

Christians have a variety of views about competition in business and competition generally. We will cover this in greater detail in the following post.

Proverbs 16:9 “The human mind plans the way, but the LORD directs the steps.”

After determining with the Lord what products and services we should be offering, we should then consider which customers we are called to serve. Who these customers are may have become clearer when we considered our products and services. Even if they have, we should be open to consider this further. We don’t want to unnecessarily limit ourselves to a narrow group of people, but we also do not want to waste our time being too broad in our approach so we include people who will not buy our products. It is normally only very large businesses (like our banks) that basically try to target everyone.

2 Corinthians 10:13 (NKJV) “We, however, will not boast beyond measure, but within the limits of the sphere which God appointed us—a sphere which especially includes you.”

God appoints us to a sphere of operations that includes a type of person or customer.

Galatians 2:7-8 (NKJV) “But on the contrary, when they saw that the gospel for the uncircumcised had been committed to me, as the gospel for the circumcised was to Peter (for He who worked effectively in Peter for the apostleship to the circumcised also worked effectively in me toward the Gentiles)”

Paul was appointed to the Gentiles and Peter was appointed to the Jews. We can consider who we are “appointed to” through what marketing people call “segmentation” and listen to what the Spirit witnesses about that group. Examples of customer segments are

1. Businesses or individuals
2. Social Class – Lower, Middle, Upper
3. Geographical location – local, state, country, international
4. Industry type – government (national, state, local), energy and resources, banking, NFP, educational, the arts, retail, sports etc
5. Business size – small, medium, large
6. Business values – e.g. innovative, bureaucratic, environmentally sensitive, ethics…
7. Age group/ generation
8. Gender
9. Marital status
10. How people buy – internet, bricks and mortar stores, portable shops..

We shouldn’t define a segment in all of the above points, but some will have the Spirit’s endorsement on them. We may have different segments for different products or services. You may, for example, be appointed to sell to small businesses in a certain region. To ensure that you are not trapped by limited thinking, consider what new segments of customers that the Spirit might be leading you to.

Proverbs 16:9 “The human mind plans the way, but the LORD directs the steps.”

When considering developing spiritual strategy through a “products and customers” framework, we should first ask the Lord “Should I be changing my range of products and services? We can add or take away. We can bring the options to the Lord for a “Yes” or “No”.

What are the options for us to think through? The following is an excerpt from my book “Building Spiritual Enterprises” (Which is available on Kindle for immediate download – the link is on the “Books” page of this site)

“Another way to consider opportunities is to examine where you have present or potential competency in the value chain and whether you can extend your enterprise’s reach further up or down the chain. A value chain is simply the list of all the aspects of value adding that happen from raw materials to the customer. The elements and order of the value chain are:

~ Technology – its source and sophistication, your patents, your product process and product choices
~ Product Design – function, physical characteristics, aesthetics and quality
~ Manufacturing – integration, raw materials, capacity, location, procurement, production and assembly
~ Marketing – prices, advertising, promotion, sales force, package and brand
~ Distribution – channels, integration, inventory, warehousing and transport
~ Service – warranty, dealer support, availability, speed and pricing

The preceding list is in the order in which the value chain flows. Locate the activities of your enterprise. Consider the activities at the same level in the value chain and those in the list immediately above and below where you presently operate. Listen to the Spirit of God as you consider these things. What else in the value chain does the Spirit of God arrest your spirit about? Can you add new distribution channels, promotional avenues, service support, branding and so on?”

It is important to consider whether the Lord wants you to expand the value you add to the world. For example, I deliver corporate training workshops (which is a “channel” in the “Distribution” level of the value chain) I can add more channels for the same materials (e.g. e-learning, books, e-books, public lectures..) or I could change my “product choices” in the Technology part of the chain by forming new workshops. I could also change my Marketing value by prices changes, different forms of advertising or new packaging.

The important thing is that we are aware of our choices and then make our decisions about how we are adding value with the leading of the Spirit.

Proverbs 16:9 “The human mind plans the way, but the LORD directs the steps.”

In pursuing a God-given vision to the marketplace, we can, of course, gain strategy from seeking God and hearing directly. We can also consider strategy, according to the preceding Scripture, by planning our way and then receiving the Lord’s direction. If we use planning tools to help us  expand our thinking, the latter way of developing strategy has the advantage of considering more options than we might otherwise have done. We tend to be constrained by our mindset and benefit from thinking tools that help us to think more broadly.

We can develop spiritual strategy by considering what options we have for where and who our customers are and then asking for the Lord’s direction on our plans. We can then consider what options we have for our products and services are and then seeking the Lord’s direction for which ones we pursue. Then we can consider the options for which products/services could be for which customers and then seek the Lord for which ones we should do. In this way the Spirit has led us in the choice or products and services as well as the strategy of which products/services for which customers.

This rests on our ability to discern a “Yes” and “No” from the Spirit as discussed in a previous post . It is also assisted by knowing the difference between long, medium and short term leadings, also discussed in another previous post.

Having decided on products/ services and types of customers, there are four types of strategies that result (This comes from the ”Ansoff Matrix”)

~Market Penetration: Selling more of the same goods/services to the same type of people.
~Market Development: Selling more of the same goods/services to new types of people.
~Product Development: Selling new goods and services to the same type of people.
~ Diversification: Selling new goods and services to new types of people.

In the following posts, we will look at thinking tools that help us to consider both the range of goods/services we offer as well as the range of customers we help.

The first key to spiritual strategy is to seek God for it for every year, project and major business endeavour. In the previous post we saw that the Lord had a different strategy for Israel to conquer different cities. Here’s a radical thought – maybe you should treat your business as a strategy rather than a vision. It is important to know the difference because we should hold fast to vision but we should not hold fast to strategy

Our endeavours are strategies if their purpose is to help us achieve something higher. They are vision if they contain the biggest reason for our endeavours. As an example, I have one business that is primarily a strategy – Management Training Australia – www.mtaustralia.com. Its primary purpose is to equip me and others to be better consultants and prepare us for my other two enterprises. I have one enterprise that is a vision – the one fronted by this website www.wayneback.com to help to build the value and effect of Christian business. I have a third enterprise – Organisational Development International – www.odi.net.au that is also a strategy.

We spiritually discern God’s vision and strategy according to the spiritual leadings discussed in a previous post “Being led by the spirit in business – for taking action” – We are “bound” in the Spirit for vision and “compelled” by the Spirit for strategy. We pay attention to the spiritual sensations that accompany our endeavours. If we realise that an endeavour is a strategy, then we make sure we re-assess what we are doing at regular intervals.

In developing strategy, it is helpful to have some thinking structures to think with to understand what the Holy Spirit may lead us into. Otherwise we run the risk of being unnecessarily narrow in our approach to strategy.

Proverbs 16:9 “The human mind plans the way, but the LORD directs the steps.”

Planning helps us to think more broadly and as we do so, the Lord can confirm these thoughts. In the following posts we will look as some planning questions that we can consider so that the Lord can say “Yes” or “No”.

Strategy is how we go about bringing vision to pass. Every vision can be brought about in numerous ways and it is important not to get too fixated on one particular strategy, especially when it is not working. We should not give up on vision but we should be prepared to give up on strategy. Sounds like a negative beginning to this discussion however my observation is that people can often persist with their strategy beyond its lifetime. They hold on to it as if it is vision.

God’s vision for Israel was to take the promised land and “conquer them and utterly destroy them” (Deuteronomy 7:2).

God’s strategy to take the city of Jericho was to march around it, blow trumpets and shout (Joshua 6) and doing so meant the “wall fell down flat” (Joshua 6:20).

God’s vision for Israel remained the same after the victory at Jericho, however there was no reason to believe that the strategy for the next city of Ai would be the same. Joshua did not try the same strategy, he just approached it naturally – spy it out and come up with a plan

Joshua 7:2-3 Now Joshua sent men from Jericho to Ai, which is beside Beth Aven, on the east side of Bethel, and spoke to them, saying, “Go up and spy out the country.” So the men went up and spied out Ai. And they returned to Joshua and said to him, “Do not let all the people go up, but let about two or three thousand men go up and attack Ai. Do not weary all the people there, for the people of Ai are few.

This strategy resulted in defeat. Joshua had not sought God and did not know people had kept some booty nor did he know God’s strategy to take Ai. When he sought the Lord, the Lord said

Joshua 8:2 “Lay an ambush for the city behind it.”

Joshua used this strategy for Ai and took 38,000 men with him and the strategy was successful. You would think that they learned their lesson from this however in Joshua chapter 9, The Gibeonites approached them for a covenant, pretending to be from a land far away.

Joshua 9: 4-5 “worked craftily, and went and pretended to be ambassadors. And they took old sacks on their donkeys, old wineskins torn and mended, old and patched sandals on their feet, and old garments on themselves; and all the bread of their provision was dry and moldy.”

Joshua’s strategy was to make a covenant with them which was contrary to God’s vision to “utterly destroy” them. The Scriptures clearly state

Joshua 9:14 “they did not ask counsel of the Lord.”

The first and most important aspect of spiritual strategy: Once vision is understood, seek God for strategy for every project and endeavour, and do not be surprised if it is different to the other projects you have done.