Brandon Hall, Ph.D. Lead Researcher, CEO, brandon-hall.com

“In the 5 years that I have been working with SCORE, my business has gone from being a ‘mega-stressful’ situation to a smooth running operation,” says Dr. Brandon Hall, CEO of Brandon Hall Research. His firm provides independent expert advice including published reports and consultation on e-learning tools for corporate, government and academic institutions. Hall continues “I was a content expert in e-learning systems when I started my company in 1992, and I had to learn how to run a business. This is where SCORE has helped me immeasurably.”

Hall has been meeting with his SCORE counselor, John Edwards, every two weeks for the past five years. Initially, the main focus was on how to accelerate revenue growth while stabilizing profitability which had been very erratic. With the help of SCORE, Hall began implementing business processes and procedures to improve the efficiency and predictability of operations. SCORE assisted him in the implementation of QuickBooks as an aid to the preparation of: annual revenue and expense budgets; reports to monitor performance against budget; P and L statements by service or product; cash flow projections; and, variance analyses on monthly and annual bases.

Hall credits SCORE with helping him strengthen his management team and key employees. “Three years ago John Edwards helped me implement a goal setting program. Employee goals are set quarterly and we are now tying a quarterly bonus to performance against these goals and company profitability.” In addition, to further strengthen the goal setting process, Hall is starting formal annual performance reviews for all of his people. “All employees know what’s expected of them and they get regular feedback. The result has been more independent and motivated people and a strong, stable team,” says Hall.