How to Grow Your Business Sustainably in the Current Market: The Drivers and Enablers of Growth
By Tony Monisse
In our client advisory board meetings, we consistently discuss a fundamental principle: sustainable growth requires careful balance between what drives growth and what enables it. This balance becomes critical in the current WA market environment.
The most recent CCIWA Business Confidence Survey shows encouraging signs—business confidence has surged as the primary barriers to growth, rising operating costs and labour shortages, have eased to their lowest levels in three years. However, two-thirds of WA businesses still report increasing costs as a barrier, and the tight labour market persists.
My experience is that when the drivers of growth significantly outweigh the enablers, businesses face substantial challenges, including operational inefficiencies, increased complexity, ineffective processes, employee stress, and cash flow pressure.
Refining Your Growth Drivers
In today’s market, consider these questions:
Strategic Sweet Spot Clarity: Are you clear on your target customer and what work to say yes to and what to say no to? With low unemployment rates, clarity becomes paramount. When business opportunities exceed your capacity to deliver quality outcomes, focus on your strategic sweet spot.
Consider Koala, the Australian mattress company that transformed how people buy beds. Rather than pursuing every furniture opportunity or expanding into general home goods, they’ve laser-focused on one specific customer: millennials and Gen Z who want hassle-free, quality mattresses delivered to their door. This strategic clarity enabled them to capture significant market share in the crowded mattress industry whilst building a business valued at hundreds of millions of dollars.
Sales Process Efficiency: Rather than pursuing more leads, can you improve conversion rates from your existing pipeline? With rising operating costs, focus on qualifying prospects better and articulating your value proposition more clearly to the right customers.
Product Development Focus: Instead of expanding your product range, are there opportunities to refine your core offering to increase value?
The goal is to make your growth drivers more selective and efficient, ensuring that every sales effort, marketing dollar, and product development hour contributes to sustainable, profitable growth rather than just increased activity.
Strengthening Your Growth Enablers
For many businesses right now, the drivers of growth outweigh the enablers. It’s the enablers that require focused strategies:
Operational Efficiency: Conduct a waste audit to identify where inefficiencies drain resources. Simplify processes and eliminate waste by implementing standard operating procedures that reduce reliance on key individuals.
Technology Investment: Can you leverage technology to increase efficiency and reduce reliance on labour costs? Many professional services firms are implementing AI-powered tools for document review and data analysis. A local legal practice reduced contract review time by 60% using AI assistance, allowing lawyers to focus on higher-value strategic advice rather than routine document processing.
Human Resources Strategy: Are you clear on your Employee Value Proposition to better attract, develop and retain staff? With WA’s labour market remaining tight, your ability to attract and retain talent directly impacts growth capacity.
Organisational Structure: Do you have the right people in the right seats? Many successful business owners become bottlenecks in their own growth because they haven’t transitioned from doing to leading.
Cash Flow Management: How can you better manage working capital to finance growth? Focus on 13-week rolling forecasts, profit and expense management, capital allocation, and financing arrangements.
The Current Market Opportunity
Despite challenges, WA businesses operate in one of the strongest economic environments in the nation. The businesses that will thrive are those that balance growth drivers with enablers whilst recognising current market characteristics: rising costs require operational efficiency, labour shortages demand better people strategies, and continued economic strength creates opportunities for those positioned to capture them.
By focusing on these fundamental questions about drivers and enablers, you’ll be better positioned to navigate current market conditions whilst building a business capable of sustainable, profitable growth.
Tony Monisse is Founder and Director of Brentnalls WA, with over 30 years’ experience helping businesses integrate strategy and financial management for sustainable growth. If you have questions about this content or would like to discuss how we can help grow your business, contact us at admin@brentnallswa.com.au or (08) 6212 7200.
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