Economist Guide to Managing Growth

Successful and ambitious organisations recognise the 'growth imperative' but are often insufficiently aware of what might threaten continued success. Growth means change. What worked last year won't necessarily work next year - an organisation that wants to manage growth successfully will need to change things that aren't yet broken. Growth, and the change it brings, affects every aspect of the business - people management, marketing, customer and client management, financial management, organisational design, performance management and measurement.

Growth gives rise to problems for businesses of all size. A young business run by its entrepreneurial founders is quite likely not to pay enough attention to the robustness of an organisation's structure and systems. Different divisions in a big business will evolve at different speeds and be at different stages of their evolution, each with their own particular issues to address - plus the need to be satisfactorily reconciled with each other.

This guide explores the different aspects of growth and outlines strategies and tactics that will enable businesses to address the issues they face and move forward to a bigger and even more successful future.

Auteur
Rupert Merson teaches new venture development and managing growth at London Business School. Formerly a partner of BDO Stoy Hayward, where he advised businesses around the world, he now runs his own consultancy advising firms on how to manage growth. His most recent book, on corporate governance, is Rules are Not Enough (Profile).