Small and medium size companies have often difficulties to define their own strategy: they sometimes renounce to have one or they simply copy-paste the strategy of somebody else. The result is a short-term focused management that will not allow the company to catch the best opportunities of growth and profitability that might be in the interest of its managers and owners.
Strategic Consultancy
ICT supports customers in high precision mechanichs industry in defining both the company vision and the best strategy to reach such a vision. Our action consists mainly of 5 different steps:
- Analysis of main hystorical businesss performances and definition of few KPIs (Key Performance Indicators) that shall be used to define targets and to monitor the future company results;
- Definition of company vision;
- SWOT analysis, i.e. the identification of company Strengths on which to leverage the strategy, of the Weaknesses to take special care of during the strategy implementation, of the Opportunities to catch and take advantage of and of the Threats that my jeopardize the company plans;
- Qualitative description of directions that company wants to go for in terms of:
– company sales purpose;
– company values;
– products portfolio;
– market segments and geographical approach;
– brand recognition;
– operations;
– digital marketing;
– technology needs;
– organization and training. - For each chapter of above step d), preparation of a complete list of operative actions (with due date and responsibilities) to be programmed in the fixed time span of strategy implementation.
Through the pluriennal professional experience of our team of consultants and professionals, ICT can provide value adding solutions in many of the strategic areas mentioned above, like company organization, lean operations, IT/ERP, products application (just to mention few ones).
Upon request of customer, ICT can support also in the monitoring and implementation phases of the actions plan defined at above step e). For instance ICT can assist in company expansions plans of acquisition or partnership in new markets and/or geographical areas (see Business Broker and M&A) as well as in market research and survey and in innovation, R&D and new technologies introduction.
Some few definitions:
Company Vision. It is a statement indicating what the company wants to become, what the organization would like to achieve or accomplish in the midium or long term future. It is intended to serve as a clear guide for chosing current and future courses of action.
Company Strategy. It is a high level plan to reach the company vision. Because the resources to achieve the vision are typically limited, strategy is important to set the most effective goals, determining actions to achieve them and mobilizing the resources to execute the actions. Prof. Richard Rumelt wrote in 2011 that good strategy has an underlying structure that he called Kernel and that consists of 3 parts: 1) a diagnosis that defines or explains the nature of the challenge; 2) a guiding policy for dealing with challenge; 3) coherent actions designed to carry out the guiding policy.
SWOT analysis. It is a structured planning method that evaluates the strengthes, the weaknesses, the opportunities and the threats of an organization, a project or a business venture. It is an important tool to be used in the diagnosis phase of company strategy definition.
Company Mission. It is a statement of a company’s purpose, identifying the scope of its operations and the guiding policy provided by the leaders to the whole organization. It communicates a shared understanding of the organization’s intended direction.
Company Values. They are the principles that constitute the company culture, inspiring behaviours and influencing actions of the whole organization.