Strategy Consulting Services for Emerging and Middle Market Businesses

Does your company have a coherent strategy that makes sense?

Is your company moving in the right direction?

Is everyone working together to achieve the same goals?

Is your company maintaining or gaining market share?

If you answered "NO" to any of these questions, perhaps it's time to talk about strategy.

A great strategic plan is invaluable; a mediocre or poor strategic plan is worthless at best. The keys to designing and executing a winning strategy are to:

• Base the plan on facts --- not fantasies, rosy assumptions, or groupthink. Accurate, detailed, current market research is an essential input to any strategic plan.
• Consider a wide range of alternatives, even if some at first seem too far-fetched, or come from unexpected sources (the administrative assistant in marketing, or the most junior member of the strategic planning committee.)
• Build alignment and buy-in with managers, staff and stakeholders through effective communication, management and monitoring.
• Set goals that are specific in time and extent. For example, “achieve a 15% market share in Europe within 15 months”.

We believe the best approach is to keep your options open, so we adapt our process to fit your specific circumstances, rather than rigidly adhere to one fixed strategic planning process or methodology.

We'll work with you to develop a comprehensive strategic plan to guide the growth of your business, now and in years to come. The most advantageous growth strategies will be determined through a rigorous, collaborative thought process that -

1. Evaluates the core competencies of your business in relation to the current and future market realities,
2. Outlines strategies that will
1. Use your competencies to best advantage,
2. Differentiate your business in ways that are meaningful to customers, and
3. Enable you to profitably grow and gain market share.

Critical Strategy Questions

We'll work with you to summarize and articulate the strategic plan in a set of clear, succinct documents that address these critical questions:

• What is your business model? What are your major revenue streams, products and services?
• Which markets offer the greatest opportunities? Which markets have the greatest risks?
• Who are your present and potential competitors?
• What barriers to entry exist (or can be created) to build a wide moat that protects your business from present and future competitive incursions?
• Who are your present and prospective customers and what critical unmet needs will motivate purchase decisions?
• What is your customer value proposition? (A credible promise of value, delivered to customers in ways that distinguish your company from anyone else in your line of business)
• How should you position your company’s products and services within the markets you serve? Will you be the low cost leader, the premium service provider, or something else?
• How will you gain new customers? What marketing and sales channels can be developed to best advantage?
• What are the emerging market trends and how can you position your product/ service portfolio to take advantage of these trends moving forward?
• What strategic resources (including alliances with other businesses) can reduce your cost of operations and give you the edge?
• What are your projected milestones that must be achieved as you grow your business?

We Fit Your Budget, Not Ours

Since every business situation is different, we tailor our strategy consulting engagement to fit your budget and timeframe. A full-fledged strategic planning engagement can take two to three months to complete. This timeframe allows ample time for research, brainstorming, analysis, and documentation, and is appropriate for most middle market companies. However, we can also work on a tighter budget and timeframe by collapsing the process down to several one-or two-day workshops, combined with research beforehand and analysis and documentation afterwards. The whole process can take as little as three to four weeks.

Execution is Key

A finely tuned strategic plan is useless if you can't execute. For that reason, we don't stop at developing a plan. We can also help your company execute the strategy, providing you with the resources you need to translate the plan into effective action. In practice this means monthly or quarterly reviews, introductions to vendors, marketing partners, alliance partners, advisors, or specialist consultants. We can even join your organization in an interim management capacity if that is needed.