The Company:
Howcroft Group which is an independent supplier of maintenance, repair and overhaul consumables in 3 main categories- Chains, Bearings and Belts. The mentoring session was attend by Allan Howcroft the founder and ceo of the Howcrft Group
The Issues:
Mainly how to communicate better with our staff but also we needed to understand our customers better and from a business development perspective exactly who are ideal targets
Entrepreneur in Residence:
Graham Honeyman CBE, ex CEO of Forgemasters, one of Sheffield’s biggest companies with sales of approx £100 m, Graham has been CEO since the MBO in 2005.
Mentoring advice given:
Communications
The key to better communication with our staff is to make sure we communicate regularly, preferably every week at a fixed time.
And that we use the same format all the time. So have weekly and monthly staff meetings and/or weekly email updates
Also weekly meetings of the executive Directors
Other Issues
Do a survey of your existing customers asking them what they like and don’t like about Howcroft Group. This we have done and the feedback from our customers has been very useful for planning our future strategy
What was the best piece of advice you were given?:
Increase the regularity and completeness of updates to the staff
Survey our existing customers as above
What did you do when you returned back to your business?:
See the above
What changes have you made since the mentoring session?:
We have introduced regular updates and we now with all the staff when they can raise any issues they want to discuss
What have been the benefits to your business of this mentoring session?
Staff morale has improved a lot, productivity has gone up by approx 12% in the last 6 months
What growth has the business seen?: (with figures if acceptable or if not with percentage growth.)
The business has grown throughout the pandemic with sales to our financial year end of 31st March 2021 up by 15.8 % compared to the previous year.
14/06/21
