SOAR to new heights
with Parkland’s SOAR Strategic Planning™
Helping businesses develop strategic plans, grow sales, improve profits, and upgrade organizational, financial and operational effectiveness.
Strategic Planning Matters Now More Than Ever
Markets are shifting faster.
Costs are rising.
Distraction is everywhere.
In this environment, clarity becomes a competitive advantage.
The Parkland Group helps leadership teams define clear, practical strategies that focus resources, accelerate growth, improve profitability, and strengthen competitive position—while building the alignment and buy-in required to execute.
Larry Explains the SOAR Growth Engine™
Scaling a business requires a disciplined, strategic approach to growth.
In this video, Larry Goddard introduces the SOAR Growth Engine™, a practical framework that outlines eight proven ways businesses can grow revenue and profitability.
Larry explains how to assess growth opportunities, prioritize what matters most, and turn strategy into execution.
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I've worked with over 500 companies,
and I've yet to find companies
that cannot improve
if they do the right things.If they identify the right strategy
and they implement the right execution,
almost every business can improve
and improved significantly.My name is Larry Goddard.
I'm the CEO of the Parkland Group,
a consulting firm based in Cleveland, Ohio, that works with companies
to improve their performance, profitability and value.The opportunities,
are driven by something which we call the growth engine, which there are actually seven
major categories of ways that a business can grow.The simplest one is riding the wave of market growth.
So if you're fortunate enough to be in a market that's growing,
the easiest way for you to grow is just ride the wave of market growth.Now, the reality is, very few businesses enjoy that luxury for very long.
Maybe they enjoy it temporarily, like in Covid.
A lot of people enjoyed that during Covid,
but it's not something that most companies experience is.The next and best way to grow is a concept for wallet share.
Wallet share is the amount of business you have with the customer
in relation to their purchase,
total purchases of those products.So, for example, if you sell a customer,
let's say xray machines
and you sell them $100,000 a year,
but you find out that they buy 500,000 a year of x ray machines.
You have a 20% wallet share because you sell them 100 out of 500.Now, surprisingly, if you talk to most middle market CEOs,
very few people actually focus on wallet share.
The first way you got to focus on wallet share is actually quantify
what your wallet share is with your top 20 or 30 customers.
I have yet to find more than 5% of companies that know what their wallet share is.Now, once you identify your wallet, it's a good news and bad news story.
For example, if you find out that your wallet share is 20% with a particular customer,
that means let's say you sell a customer $100,000 a year,
but you find out that they're buying 500,000 a year of the product.
You're selling them.
That's a great opportunity for you because now you can say to your salespeople,
let's figure out, how do we grow from 100,000 to 500,000?
But let's say you find out that you've got all 500,000 of their purchasing opportunity.
Well, that shows tremendous loyalty from the customer to you.
But it also means you have zero growth opportunities with the customer.
So that's why it's a good news bad news story.So wallet share is the second of the seven.
And there are several others.
And they all go up in degree of difficulty.
That's where the kind of the magic of our software happens.
Because by the way with each of the seven categories there are subcategories.
So that's why there literally are hundreds of potential opportunities.
And we help people identify them,
break them down into categories so they understand the categories.
They understand what the type of growth is,
you know, and then can develop the strategies to implement them.
Why Parkland and SOAR Strategic Planning™?
A proprietary system proven over 35 years, creating billions in value.
Specifically tailored to middle-market businesses.
Technology assisted to produce results in days not months.
Team based process to drive buy-in and engagement.
Authors of “SOAR to Business Success, Creating Sustainable Growth & Value”, Amazon Best-Selling book on Strategy & Growth.
“SOAR gave us an immediate return on our investment.
I wish we had done it sooner.”
Marian D., President, Rubber Manufacturing Company
The SOAR Methodology
The SOAR methodology is designed around the Four Pillars of Growth:
Sales and Margins, Organization and Culture, Accounting, Finance and Technology, and Responsiveness and Execution. These pillars form the foundation of a structured, comprehensive approach to driving business growth.
By addressing all aspects of a business—not just sales and margins but also the underlying operations, team dynamics, and financial strategies—SOAR provides a balanced and holistic path to growth.
Painting the Picture
SOAR Strategic Planning™ begins by defining a clear, compelling vision of the future—painting the picture of what the business can become. This shared view helps leaders, managers, and team members visualize where the company is headed at the end of the planning horizon—typically three to five years—and understand what success could look and feel like.
This future picture should balance ambition with realism. It may include new products or services, expanded markets or regions, new distribution channels, acquisitions, upgraded capabilities, cultural shifts, or improvements in systems and controls. Individually—and especially collectively—these opportunities should create meaningful value for the business.
Some outcomes will be easier to achieve than others. More ambitious stretches are worth exploring as well, since they often represent the greatest potential for long-term value creation.
Current and Future State
Painting the Picture Requires
A clear, honest assessment of the Current State—both strengths and limitations.
A clearly defined Future State that articulates where the business is headed and what success looks like over the planning horizon.
Defining the “How”
Defining how the business is going to evolve from its Current State to the desired Future State requires two key concepts:
1. Opportunities, which are the best ways to grow revenues, margins, and earnings. This will likely include clearly defining which products, market segments, and channels the company pursues to facilitate moving from the Current State to the Future State.
It could also include non-organic growth opportunities, like acquisitions, joint ventures, partnerships, and alliances. In addition, improvements in productivity and reductions in cost also represent growth opportunities in that they contribute to growing earnings.
2. Necessities, which are actions that facilitate successfully executing the Opportunities and help protect, preserve, and strengthen the organization.
The journey consists of selecting the most relevant Opportunities and Necessities that take the business from what would occur if market forces were left alone to impact the business to what can occur by successfully executing the plan.
