Be the Elephant

In Be the Elephant, marketing guru and best-selling author Steve Kaplan offers a detailed playbook for successfully growing businesses of all sorts and sizes, while exploring the ways a growing business can go astray. A business must grow or risk shrinking; however unplanned growth can also be risky. Growth may accelerate but falter if processes are not in place to handle the increase. Detailed business models using real figures to support projections, incorporate research, and discount optimism are essential to successful growth. Owners must analyze numbers for the present business to successfully understand costs, revenue streams, assumptions, competition, and cash flow and make sure it is healthy before deciding to expand. In addition, business owners must ask many tough and detailed questions about exactly how and when to expand, keep present customers and company culture, and avoid mistakes.