Highest & Best Good

We’re in the middle of reviewing all Stonegate’s marketing materials--content, look, and type. So far it’s a process more of asking the right questions than getting any solid answers which feels a little frustrating, a little exciting.

My biggest roadblock has been our differentiator. Each time that one of us thinks “this is it!” our marketing consultant--doing her excellent job—asks ”so what?” One of the staff answered out of her growing frustration, “Unless I step into each of our competitors’ companies and learn about their people, their skills, and why they are doing what they do, I don’t have an answer beyond your 3rd ‘so what.’ And then it hit me like a ton of bricks.

We don’t need to differentiate ourselves from the competition in terms of how well we perform our work. Everyone says they’re the best, have the newest, have proprietary processes, are unique, so on and so on. To a prospect looking for a company like ours to hire, s/he can’t weed out the great from the good from the bad. And frankly, all companies have both successful and unsuccessful projects.

In our field, the real differentiator becomes “interpretation.” Although I can’t speak to how well my competition performs for their clients, and wouldn’t dare to do so, I can guess at how they arrive at their solutions by looking at their client list.

Let me step back for a minute. Our field has many highly experienced, highly educated, very smart people providing service. And in truth, the tools we employ and the skillsets we offer, even the products we provide, are not radically different from each other when looked at from the 30K level. The point is we all do our work to the best of our ability (you hope) to help our clients.

We all:
· take in some form of data (through observation, interviews, financial statements, surveys, research, performance metrics, marketing, salespeople, and so on)
· interpret that input
· provide something (for example, a report, advice, actions plans, implementation partnership).

The way we interpret the data or input (as well as how we collect it), is directly related to who we serve; whose highest and best good are we looking out for.

Here's a simple example using the Balance Sheet. Am I looking at the activity ratios to help managers improve operating performance to increase their cash flow? Am I looking at how to clean up the balance sheet so an owner can generate new working capital or sell? Or am I looking at it for an equity investor who wants to determine whether or not this company can increase the value of their portfolio?

Interpretation, as I see it, is critical because it guides what needs to be done next. And that’s the “so what” that enables a prospect to decide between all the wonderful options out there.