Catsurveys is an award winning, multidisciplinary surveying business that provides a range of complex data solutions used across infrastructure markets.
Staying ahead of the game, relevant and visible are all crucial ingredients of Catsurveys’ success. Not wishing to become complacent, their senior management team asked Jo to help them interrogate and explore their strategy, investigate whether their image and brand supported the kind of business they wanted to become, explore how they wanted to approach their journey into the future, and think about how Catsurveys were going to develop as an organisation.
Being an SME, one of the key things they were very aware of, was not having a huge amount of time, a lot of their time was spent doing the day job, and what needed to be done for the business to survive. Help to focus attention on the right areas and be really productive with their time was a vital factor in any support they were to receive.
After outlining the challenge with Jo, they had a good discussion about what they were trying to do as a business, how their thinking was being shaped at that time and how they were developing their strategy.
Simon Jefferson, Head of Commercial & Business Development at Catsurveys recalls “Jo was very keen and very exciting to get involved and provide us with some help and guidance. Jo proposed a very structured programme of work over the course of a few months. Firstly, doing some discovery with the business, to really delve into what we did, what we’re about, what was important to us and how our brand was important to us. Jo suggested looking at how our strategy was going to evolve and how that might impact our brand or any changes we might want to make. Next, Jo recommended focusing in on our key markets, our key customers, thinking about how that might play into our brand perception, and what we might want to do in the future. She also engaged with our customer base to get direct feedback on how our image and our brand was perceived as an organisation.”
Janos Dobsi, MD at Catsurveys was equally impressed with the methods Jo applied to get to know their business, “When we started working with Jo, she arranged interviews with a number of people within the business, so fair play to her, she started with learning about who we were. She didn’t come in with an off-the-shelf idea or product, she took her time with quite a few of us, one-to-one, learning about us, about the technology, the data, and the sectors we operate within. Throughout the workshop and our discussions, she started building a picture and really challenging us! I just thought that was a really smart way of doing it.”
Jo brought everything together into a series of recommendations for the business, covering a wide range of activity, including a different way to approach their communications strategy, a focus on communicating with customers and thinking differently about the mediums in which to communicate. Ultimately, the main piece of advice Jo had for Catsurveys was that their brand was working, so don’t move away as you’ll probably create a lot of work for very little benefit. Key messages were for the business to think how they could be more disciplined in how they communicate, and more focused on what they are communicating – with, who and when. Jo encouraged them to think more broadly about how they engage with customers, but also about how they utilise their own time and understand the opportunities everyone within the business has to engage with customers and to be brand ambassadors.
Reflecting on their experience working with Jo, Simon concluded, “I think what Jo’s really good at is the way she takes people through whatever journey they’re on, she does things in a very engaging way, a very people-orientated way and a way that gets their buy-in and their trust. If I had to sum up how Jo works in three words, I’s say genuine, energetic and engaging, those words really do resonate with me.”
Commenting on what makes Jo shine as a world-class business innovation and growth consultant, Simon described how Jo’s has “cut across all industries, not pigeon-holed herself into just working in a certain sector with certain clients, she works across SMEs all the way up to massive corporates and in all sectors, and I think that gives her a real benefit in having that ability to understand new customers and new markets very quickly because she can draw upon a really diverse range of experience herself.” Furthermore, he added “It was very obvious during this process, especially when we were doing more of the exploratory work at the beginning with the wider business, that people were very impressed by the way she just understood what we were talking about very quickly, there was no need for long explanations about certain clients and activities, it was just very much hit the ground running, with no necessity to stop and explain, which was fantastic in this environment.”
Janos’ key takeaway message from this experience was to make sure the business was getting maximum opportunities from everything they do. He added, “That’s what were now doing, so we’ve got a road map in front of us and lot of great ideas from Jo and will take it step by step and make sure we’re getting the maximum out of it before we move on to the next idea.”Summing up their experience, Janos reflected “Jo showed me a lot simpler and more efficient way for us going forward – so that’s a real testament to her and something I’m really grateful for. Ultimately, I think the greatest thing about working with Jo is that she becomes a member of your team. She comes in, she learns about you, about how you operate, about how you behave, and makes it clear that by doing this work, we’re doing it together, working as the same team to get to the solution.”
