BUSINESS STRATEGY
Right Business Plan, Right Team
Even the Best Business Plans Need the Right Team to Succeed
The Role of the Team in Business Planning
In any business scenario, managers have a variety of plans to choose from, such as detailed traditional business plans outlining strategic plans and operational tactics or specific ones like turnaround and go-to-market plans. Reflecting on my time as a Knowledge Exchange Manager, I was tasked with creating a turnaround business plan for an acquisition of certain technology and innovation capabilities that were developed in Japan. I spent a lot of time creating the perfect business plan to put new systems into the organisation, put new technology in the shopfloor, propose changes to the marketing and sales strategy and reconfigure the financial reporting.
Once I had that perfect business plan in place, I thought, “OK, now I just have to execute this plan.” Once I got started, I realised that I did not have the right team in place to execute on that plan. The managers who oversaw the various functional areas — everything from operations, to finance, to marketing — did not have the experience, the skillset or even the motivation to get the job done. As a result, it was incredibly frustrating for me because I realised that I was not going to reach the milestones that I had put in my beautiful plan. I felt that I had failed on executing this business plan that I had carefully crafted and thought a lot about.
This experience taught me a very valuable lesson, which is simply: If you do not have the right team in place, no matter how good your business plan is, it is going to fail. I kind of looked back and thought, “Why didn’t I have this key insight that people are the most critical tool that you have in your belt as a manager and a strategist?”
Strategy and Implementation Go Beyond Ideas
A key lesson I have learnt over the years of working within organisations that operate at the forefront of technology and research is that: When I am thinking on my own about opportunities or working in a team — when I think about a strategy to go after a new market or even to innovate in a specific market, one of the assumptions I will make is that my idea is unique — because I tend to get very excited, or even when I have data that supports my position and I have done a lot of research and spend a lot of time and energy. What I have learnt, however, it probably is not unique. Hence, when I go down this path, I must take one additional step: I assume that whatever I figured out, somebody else has figured out who’s a competitor.
What experienced strategists, managers or CEOs often do is scenario planning for how to go to market and what specific implementation steps are going to be. It really becomes a function of, “Fantastic, we have a strategy. It is well researched. But how do we make sure we implement so that if somebody else has come up with the same idea, we do not lose, but we are able to win a good market share that we thought we were going to have a chance to win at the outset?”
Defining Success Accurately
My most memorable moment was straight out of university — it was my first job. I was sitting in a review of a marketing plan that had been agreed a few months before I had arrived, and the guys around the table — the brand managers and the marketing manager — were all there agreeing to look at the results, and had we arrived at where we all thought we were going to be after the programme had been implemented.
What struck me was that, as the brand managers went through their results, the results were quite different — in fact, very different — from what the marketing manager had thought was going to be the result. It really struck me that as the marketing manager dug deeper as to why that was the case, it was not because the guys wanted to do something different — it was that their definitions of what was success at the end, or would be success at the beginning, was different. Their interpretations of what a success would be was quite different.
As a brand new business development manager out of the university, the biggest thing I learnt was make sure at the very beginning that when you are doing the analysis to define what success will be. Make sure to sit down with the managers you are meant to be working with and let everybody understand what it is that definition of success should be.
The biggest lesson for me and certainly something that has been a kind of cornerstone of my career, which is: When in doubt, check and look at the information, because it can be critical when it comes to getting people to agree or not agree.
Beyond the Obvious Financial Risks
Risk management is an intersection between finance and general management, it is vital to understand and mitigate. This was exemplified in a business school case study about a student travel company. It is a simple business model but with significant risks, especially because they deal with currency exchange issues, taking American students to Europe. Their income is in dollars, while expenses are in euros and sterling, making them vulnerable to currency exchange rate fluctuations.
During the analysis of the case, I initially focused on forward contracts as a risk mitigation strategy. However, I soon realised that managing only for the expected scenario was flawed. The greater risk was not just the currency exchange rate but potential drops in student enrollment due to global events, which could be devastating. This case taught me several important lessons about risk management: first, that risks are inherent in every project; second, no strategy can completely eliminate risk, only manage it; and third, it’s essential to plan for the worst-case scenarios, not just the expected or best-case outcomes. This mindset is crucial in risk management across all types of projects.
These lessons have been cornerstones in my career, emphasising that a well-crafted business plan requires the right team for successful execution, the necessity of unique yet competitive ideas, the importance of a shared definition of success and a comprehensive approach to risk management.
