Align Strategic Partners

No business is able to grow in a vacuum. Identifying and cultivating relationships with strategic companies who will support your growth initiatives is critical. Three principles characterize the most effective partnership strategies – context, planning, and execution:

Context means understanding your own organization and its offerings in relation to the market they live in. What kind of company are we? What value do we deliver? Whom do we compete against? How are we unique? A simple positioning project can bring great clarity of thinking and purpose, yet it's amazing how unclear the answers to these questions often are. If you don't understand your own company, don't expect success in partnering.

Planning partnerships is imperative. Stephen Covey's second habit "Begin with the end in mind" is based on ancient wisdom from Aristotle that's often ignored. Once armed with a clear understanding of your market positioning, you're ready to think about partnering and what you want to accomplish. What is your vision for growing the value of your company? If you clearly understand where you're going, business partnerships will get you there faster.

Execution of partnerships requires effort and resources. Why expend time and effort in creating a business relationship only to let it die from lack of care? A partnership needs focus in order to produce expected benefits. Increasing the odds of success requires architecting self-sustaining elements into the partnership from the beginning, and that can only be done successfully through clarity of purpose and a clear vision for growth.

Marketplace issues, whether threats or opportunities, commonly drive partnership decisions. For each issue, consider three factors that determine your desire and ability to grow through partnering:

• Timing: What is the timing associated with this threat or opportunity? Is it immediate or long-term?
• Potential Impact: What is the potential impact of some threat or opportunity that is currently presenting itself? Is it high or low?
• Ability to Respond: What is my current ability to respond? Is it strong or weak?

To learn how to have optimal partner alignment, contact us at bob@2020outlook.com.

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