The Strategy Skills Podcast: Management Consulting | Strategy, Operations & Implementation | Critical Thinking

This is the 24th podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. In an update meeting with the CFO of EE who sits on the board of EI, he mentioned that McKinsey has been appointed by EE to conduct a “visioning refresher” workshop to help the EE board think through their options. The CFO stressed that the work does not overlap with our own since McKinsey is focused on EE’s broader issues and the investment in EI is just one thing they will briefly discuss. McKinsey is doing a lot of work at EE so this is not really all that surprising. In this podcast, I discuss the likely impact on our study, how a boutique firm should respond and how a boutique firm should not respond. The problem is that most boutique firms panic and overreact. The presence of an ego and a lack of realistic thinking forces most boutiques to behave irrationally, which ends up hurting them. A reaction is needed but certainly not in the way most companies would react.   SIGN UP FOR C

This is the 23rd podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. The first cut of the EVA analyses is done. In this podcast we discuss why EVA was selected as the performance metric and how it will be used. We compare the current EVA performance and the likely EVA performance if the businesses with EI met their planned budgets and targets for the year. We discuss why we are not using the budgets, how we will adjust them and the dangers of taking this step. The adjustments to the budgets are a pivotal step to prove our business case and should be handled very delicately or we will be accused of bias. This podcast demonstrates why a combination of soft-skills, business judgment and rational thinking are needed in combination to convince clients to changes their minds.  Brilliant rational logic alone will alienate the client.   SIGN UP FOR COMPLEMENTARY TRAINING: www.firmsconsulting.com COME HANG OUT WITH US: Facebook / Twitter / LinkedIn

This is the 22nd podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. As power outages escalate across the region, EI remains focused on growing internationally. It is crucial to remember that these podcasts reflect the team's strategy and thinking that we have not yet fully communicated to EI. That will happen over the next few weeks. So while you have heard lots about the need to focus on EE’s core business, EI is yet to come around to that thinking. In fact, EI is firmly focused right now on its original mandate. The challenge we face is in guiding the CEO to hold off on making large and irreversible capital investments until we present our plans. EI has several promising ventures on the table which require a decision. Those ventures move EI away from where we think it needs to focus in the future. We have to, unfortunately, pre-empt our carefully laid plans and discuss our initial thinking with the CEO. In this podcast, we discuss how we ran that mee

This is the 21st podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. Many readers have written in asking how we manage the fatigue of running such an intense study while managing all the numerous Firmsconsulting initiatives. In this podcast I briefly touch on the practical tools I use to manage my time, set priorities and manage my diary to ensure I keep the trains running on time. I also discuss the myth of loving what you do. While that is important, it does not insulate one from the trauma of dealing with abrasive situations. I manage this in a different way. Finally, I discuss the problem with reading magazines and articles on learning how to de-stress. Best practice, as you will learn, is not going to work for you.   COME HANG OUT WITH US: Facebook / Twitter / LinkedIn   SIGN UP FOR COMPLEMENTARY TRAINING: www.firmsconsulting.com

This is the 20th podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. In the Steering Committee meeting this morning we were directly challenged by a member of the committee. This podcast discusses the nature of the challenge and how we responded. The client raised a concern about our skills and also raised a potential conflict of interest we had not considered. We unpack the challenge and the thought-process we applied in managing this situation. Ultimately, we also explain why and how alumni of McKinsey and BCG who create boutique firms end up limiting their prospects for growth. Finally, we will discuss the differences in which conflict can be managed by engaging crowds and individuals. The trick is to engage only one of these groups and for a very unique reason.   COME HANG OUT WITH US: Facebook / Twitter / LinkedIn   SIGN UP FOR COMPLEMENTARY TRAINING: www.firmsconsulting.com

This is the 19th podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. As the transformation recommendations are implemented, the implementation will cost billions of dollars to execute. The implementation cost is also known as the capital requirements. Understanding the size of the cost and drivers of the cost is critical. This podcasts discusses the 6-step process the divestment team will use to calculate the cost of the transformation. We will also discuss the key assumptions made and principles we are applying. Finally, we will address the questions the team will answer and the questions they will not answer. This podcast will discuss the level of modelling used in corporate strategy studies and the difference between the models used in investment banking.   COME HANG OUT WITH US: Facebook / Twitter / LinkedIn   www.firmsconsulting.com

This is the 18th podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. In this podcast we discuss the approach and philosophy used by the study leadership stream as they guide and mentor corporate leaders at the client. We discuss the 4 pillars on which our leadership philosophy is built and use practical examples to demonstrate how we help clients adopt these principles. The four pillars are: Sincere authenticity matters. Embrace, not hide, leadership flaws. Forget about image. Focus on results. This approach is about helping corporate leaders be successful in the short term. If you would like to learn more about this leadership work, please read this article.   COME HANG OUT WITH US: Facebook / Twitter / LinkedIn   www.firmsconsulting.com

This is the seventeenth podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. This podcast discusses how to communicate recommendations which are radical in nature. If the recommendations are presented too early, they are hypotheses with little data backing them and they can be easily challenged. If the recommendations are presented at the end, it shocks the client and there likely will be little agreement from the client. The solution is to present early but to present them as hypotheses. That seems easy, but this podcast explains the mistakes in communication made when most consultants present complex hypotheses very early, and how to fix them. You will learn that communication, your choice of words and the way you emphasize them can dramatically alter the way the client interprets what you are saying. In fact, the emphasis will radically alter the meaning. COME HANG OUT WITH US: Facebook / Twitter / LinkedIn   www.firmsconsulting.com

This is the sixteenth podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. In this critical podcast, we focus on two things. First, we discuss the reason why corporate strategy studies rely so heavily on executive workshops. We explain why simply handing the perfect strategy to the client will never yield results, even if the client accepts it without any challenges. The workshop process plays a crucial role that cannot be easily replicated anywhere else in the study. That is the reason to hold the workshop. Second, we discuss the components of the corporate strategy analyses and how we use each part: 1 - Case studies2 - Market analyses3 - Customer value chain analyses4 - Client value chain analyses Finally, we discuss how all of these come together in the scenario planning. COME HANG OUT WITH US: Facebook / Twitter / LinkedIn   www.firmsconsulting.com

This is the fifteenth podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. In an earlier podcast I discussed our bold hypotheses which involved shutting down and selling all of the international businesses. Since that initial hypothesis developed in week 1, and after thinking about it for the last 2 weeks, we have changed our views. In terms of the number of initiatives, the majority of the international businesses will be shut down or sold. However, in terms of dollar value, the majority of international businesses will remain. If that sounds contradictory, this podcast explains how we decided which businesses to keep and the impact it will have on the funding of the transformation study. COME HANG OUT WITH US: Facebook / Twitter / LinkedIn www.firmsconsulting.com

This is the fourteenth podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. This podcast defines governance versus project management and explains the 6 governance levels on the study. We further break the 6 governance levels into those with a short to medium term focus and those with a long term focus. The six governance levels are: EI - BoardEI - CEO and EXCOEI - OPCOEI - Steerco. EE - BoardEE - CEO We explain further why in transformation studies the Steerco is one of the most important governance structures, trumpeting that of OPCO, even through Steerco members report to OPCO members.   COME HANG OUT WITH US: Facebook / Twitter / LinkedIn   www.firmsconsulting.com

This is the thirteenth podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. In this podcast we discuss how the client came to be the primary bidder for a telecom license which is far from their core business. We also discuss the process we used to decide if the client should keep the license, sell it or do something else. We developed 4 scenarios for the client. We also explain why immediately exiting this non-core investment hurts the client more than keeping the license. That is a counter intuitive recommendation which has to do with the value of real options. Although, this may seem surprising, many power companies consider telecoms to be a natural adjacency due to the physical overlap of infrastructure. www.firmsconsulting.com

This is the next podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. The client has invested heavily in trying to develop the next generation nuclear technology for sale to foreign companies. In this podcast we discuss our decision making process on whether or not the nuclear investment should be kept, expanded, modified, reduced or eliminated. We discuss the 5 major scenarios open to the client for handling the nuclear investment and the financial impact of each scenario, as well as the anticipated impact on the client’s pending capital raising roadshow to raise money for its power build program. The bottom-line is that all options are costly. www.firmsconsulting.com

This is the next podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. This podcast covers three topics, but the primary topic is gender equality on consulting studies: women in consulting. We are, of course, a major proponent on gender equality but my observations is that sometimes female managers only want the “good” things that equality brings while avoiding the “bad” things and passing that work onto male colleagues. Equality, unfortunately, means accepting and working with both the good and bad things. This podcast discusses this concept and how to manage things. We discuss the week 3 of the study where 9am to 1pm of every single day is dedicated to training for the client. We explain why so much time is dedicated to training and our unusual approach to sharing everything with the client. We basically transfer everything we have to the client. Literally everything. We finally discuss many of the “surprises” we are uncovering which have the potential

This is the next podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. In an earlier podcast, we discussed the logic of the corporate strategy recommendations. It will surprise you to realize just how little detailed analyses support that recommendation. There is a deep and clear logic. Yet, the analyses needed to prove that logic is surprisingly light. In this podcast, we discuss this paradox of corporate strategy. Strategy studies have a reputation for having lots of analyses. This reputation comes both from a misunderstanding of strategy and from watching other types of strategy studies, like pricing, business unit strategies etc., which require heavy analyses. What many consider corporate strategy analyses is actually the analyses done for the business units etc., once the corporate strategy is done. They are different and should not be confused. Corporate strategy is essentially a bet on a market and there is no analytic tool in the world anywhere at

This is the next podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. Building leaders in broken companies is very difficult. In an earlier podcast, we discussed a change at Firmsconsulting in the way we are managing large corporate strategy transformation-type studies. Essentially, we now have a dedicated partner working with executive clients to help them with leadership and CEO-transitions issues. The work is absolutely fascinating: it sits at the intersection of leadership, motivation, happiness and clinical psychology. I am personally learning from watching this partner in action. This is, therefore, a very interesting podcast and we are going to discuss the following. We are going to predict what is going to happen to the Empire International (EI) executive leadership team based on our experience of running similar studies. Next we are going to briefly explain the leadership challenge at Empire International. Then we are going to look at the unique

This is the next podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. Implementation of our recommendations will likely be very difficult and this is a critical concern. The company is under stress, constantly in the press and any changes must take place without disrupting daily operations. It is a recipe for a disaster. We discuss a Marvin Bower anecdote about implementation and explain why most implementation literature about motivating employees to change their behaviour and accept the new strategy fails in the real world. We also explain the 1960s John F. Kennedy strategy and positioning we plan to use to get the employees to understand, accept and rise to the challenge of fixing the problem despite pending salary, benefits and perk cuts. This is a critical podcast because it teaches you what to do when motivating employees is simply not possible during a turnaround. Michael Boricki www.firmsconsulting.com

This is the next podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. In this study we are hypothesizing that the core of the company has shifted and the company therefore needs to change to profit from the core business. This is common problem for many companies. Yet, dealing with it is very difficult. When a company is built for a core that has changed, history teaches us that they will suffer and likely fail. Think of Yahoo, HP etc. Think of Google right now as the internet shifts from desktops to mobile and from mobile to apps. All businesses perfectly designed for a core business that no longer exists fail if they don’t pivot to a new model. We are basically trying to help this client undertake a change which is very difficult to execute. That makes the study both exciting and daunting. If you want to understand this concept of profiting from the core in more detail, we recommend one seminal book and HBR article to read. We discuss the challenges of

This is the next podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. The start of week 2 is dominated by the top-down financial analyses results. This is also when all the 6 streams officially kick-of: corporate strategy, business unit strategy, business case, organizational design, management skills analyses and value based management. In this podcast we provide quotes and feedback from the focus interviews with the CEOs of the individual companies within Empire International, and the feedback from the labour union updates. The general synopses is that EI is a much bigger and unwieldy business than we had initially assumed. The company is a collection of many, many tiny, medium, larger and very large separate companies who do not operate as one unit. They all do their own things and trip over each other. Crucially, the top-down financial analyses is close to completion and we can present the financial snapshot of the company. It is not pretty and there

This is the next podcast for the power sector corporate strategy study we will soon release as part of our Executive Program. This podcast wraps up a tough first week of the study. We wanted to wrap-up the week by explaining the differences between a transformation corporate strategy study and a general corporate strategy study. We are going to use the movie Alien to explain this difference. Like the movie, we are basically trying to hunt down a problem we cannot see, we do not know where it is, we do not know how it is changing and we cannot know which tools to use. We basically need to be very adaptable. That is why transformation studies are so difficult. They are the toughest type of corporate strategy studies. We solve this problem by using an advance team of a partner and one associate to meet with executives to collect more information about the problem and feed it back to the team so we can better prepare. They have 1 week to find the information. This podcast also discusses some of the feedback from