Being in charge?
Running a business can be a dizzying combination of great joy and great pain.
OutsiderMD is a management advisory group with a singular purpose: to help business owners and executives overcome the many challenges of being in charge.
We help you grow your business, prepare it for investment or sale, get your teams working more productively, and rework your sales process to hit your targets more consistently.
We help you decide where you want the business to go and help you get there. Generally, our work pays for itself.
If you think of yourself as an elite athlete who wants to get to the next level of performance, OutsiderMD provides confidential executive coaching and mentoring – to help you refine the executive skills that make running a business more sane and pleasurable.
If you're an entrepreneur, thinking of starting your own business, we're able to help you put the right foundations in place from the start.
OutsiderMD is valuable to clients because of our experience in running small and medium businesses and service in senior executive roles in large corporates. But waaaay more important is the way we think.
We understand our clients will know their industries and their offerings – our job is to bring an outside perspective that leads to true change in how they run their business, and a few outside-the-box techniques to facilitate better decision making.
Some of what we think may come across as simple. It probably is. In our experience, it's often the fundamentals, lost in the swirl of everyday commerce, that need attention.
Spend a few minutes to see how we think, and call, text or email for a coffee and a quick chat.
Need an experienced ear?
Executive coaching
The best athletes in the world use coaches. Their games are evaluated, dissected, and rebuilt – to better withstand the next level of competition.
Executives are no different. The good ones are always working on improving their skills.
OutsiderMD offers executives a range of valuable coaching services, ranging from phone availability (a kind of ad hoc "sounding board"), to strategic redesign, leadership team development, and finding and keeping your best talent.
We even look after the personal side: finding a better balance between your business and your "other" life.
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Growing pains?
Rewire for growth
Is your business stuck?
A key customer stops buying. The strategy’s not quite right. Your best person leaves. Things aren’t getting done. Your business isn't growing...
Dealing with any of these can be a lonely endeavour.
OutsiderMD works with executives to figure out what’s working in the business, what’s not, and how to quickly change what’s in between.
We help make the business easier for you to run, and that makes it easier to grow and scale.
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Time for investment or sale?
Prepare for a better valuation
Executives, especially in small businesses, often wait until it’s very late to think about capital investment or selling the business. As a result, they lose useful leverage – in valuation, positioning and finding the right kind of buyers.
How can OutsiderMD help?
We work with you to explore what’s currently valuable about your business, and how to enhance that value. We also identify what might be depressing your business’ current value and work with you to rectify that.
When it's time, time is critical.
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Are your people pulling their weight?
Fix
employee productivity
We talk to many executives who, although commercially optimistic, are really frustrated with their businesses.
Recognise any of these?
Things misfire when you’re not around,
Key people leave, often without warning,
Meetings don’t accomplish what they should,
Things aren't getting done fast enough, and
Who’s actually accountable for what, by when?
Sometimes your under-performers are under-performing for easy-to-fix reasons. And your top performers just might need a little more thought and attention.
OutsiderMD specialises in a broad range of employee services, ranging from improving your work culture, to helping employees become more productive and accountable, running more effective meetings, and holding easier "difficult" conversations...
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Sales not killing it?
Re-engineer Sales
Nothing feels better than closing the big sale. Nothing can feel worse than wondering where the next sale is coming from...
No business can grow without a reliable revenue stream and a selling system that consistently meets business forecasts.
OutsiderMD helps you ensure you’ve got the right selling processes in place, the right digital strategy, the right collateral, the right marketing channels, and the right pitch.
And because this can be a "sensitive" area in small businesses, we do it quietly and collaboratively.
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What our clients think
How we've helped others...
Every business is only as good as its clients think.
Because we are truly outsiders, and provide external, professional independent advice, OutsiderMD is able to work across a wide range of business sizes and industries.
We expect our clients to know their businesses and set their targets. We simply help them get from here to there.
And if you'd like to speak to any of our clients directly, we'll put you in touch. Have a listen to what they say.
“I had the pleasure of working with Mickey Clark for 5 weeks when we commissioned a Strategic Review of an Intranet redesign project. Mickey impressed us from the outset with his logical, analytical and personable attitude and we immediately felt comfortable with his approach to understanding the project and our requirements.
Our project was a complex one and Mickey absorbed a large volume of information in a very short time — he was able to articulate a number of gaps in our project approach, and submitted a final report with well-articulated recommendations that we could easily prioritise.
I would welcome the opportunity to work with Mickey again, due to his high level of expertise and the valuable insights he provides.”
“Gentle wisdom coupled with vast experience. That is what first comes to mind when I think back. We first engaged Mickey to work with us on improving, transforming, and implementing processes and systems which would make ours a stronger company.
Perhaps of most value to me personally was the coaching and mentoring I received on how to be a better business owner and executive. I learned a great deal about what successful business leaders and executives do (and don’t do). Important to me, he always advised me in a calm and gentle manner, which made the whole experience for me, enjoyable and non-confrontational.
I always felt that Mickey truly had my (and my company’s) best interests at heart, and while his observations sometimes forced me to take a good hard look at myself, his style was gentle, non-judgemental, and insightful. I think this was born of his many years experience as a business owner and corporate executive.
I have no hesitation in recommending Mickey to anyone who is looking for either personal/executive coaching and mentoring, or advice and support on how to grow a business.”
“In the time we have known him, Mickey has helped our business in a number of ways.
He has helped us better manage our profitability and revenues through tighter and more timely attention; he has assisted us in adopting a new weekly Sales Process and is currently assisting us in redefining our Product and Service pricing, as well as our contractual Terms and Conditions.
In past months, he has created a structured monthly Operations Meeting, a structured weekly update meeting, and a set of guidelines for our younger managers. He has helped us create an Internal Projects Tracking system, which we use to control resources, priorities and dates for a broad variety of projects.
Importantly, Mickey has counselled me in my Managing Director responsibilities, has offered a broad range of advice regarding technical software issues and has taken a keen interest in helping us better manage our key personnel in the company.”
Time to change your business?
