Michael Oleksak

In these times of unprecedented economic turmoil and difficulty, those responsible for their company's financial well-being must try new ways to turn things around. 

One new way is to go directly to your key stakeholders -- your biggest and best customers, your key suppliers, your industry experts and even your employees. These are all experts playing every day in the game you're trying to win. Their perspectives are different than yours. You want to hold "strategic conversations" with them, that is, ask them to share their experience of your service to them so that you can know what you're doing well, know what you're not doing well and in general adapt your operations to take advantage of the changing landscape and its available opportunities.

In early 2008, for example, before we were told a recession had begun (even though most Americans sensed it), one client had me reach out to 25 of its customers. In so doing, it had learned of the respect their customers had for the quality of its finished product as well as its ability to acquire scarce materials. What it also learned, however, was that its customer service was uneven, that not all deliveries met its customers' deadlines. So improvements were made in responsiveness and delivery time. The result of this was higher sales and higher customer satisfaction, even with a gathering recession well underway.

How to do it?

Here's what you need to do to successfully implement such "strategic conversations":

• Identify top 15-20 key external stakeholders
• Have your CEO or COO send e-mails requesting permission to speak for 10-15 minutes as part of a planning exercise
• Identify who will be making the actual calls, either an internal person or a third party you've hired for the exercise

A third party can run this exercise. There is a better chance for honest and open responses, especially if you also offer confidentiality to the source.

Who to call?

• Person in charge of relationship at target stakeholder
• Industry expert who knows your company but also knows the market
• Supplier who has a good view of the market

These people will have a different perspective on the market than yours.  Your customers are solicited by, and transact business with, your competitors. 

What to ask? 

What should you ask? A sample of questions could include:

• What is target's outlook for the industry for the next 12 months?
• Specific sector strength they see in the industry? 
• Areas of weakness in the industry, such as who's laying off? 
• Who's having financing issues? 
• How does the target feel about the relationship with your company?
• What could be improved?
• Are there services or products offered by others that would improve our service to you?
• What's keeping you up at night?
• Is there a new product or service idea for initial feedback?
• What are trends affecting the industry?  Examples:  energy, the environment, technology
• How do these trends affect how your target is conducting its business?

What to do with the results?

• Make the easy changes quickly. Evaluate the other suggestions for internal ROI, and potential return to customer.
• Develop new marketing and sales strategies and go after segments by showing newly-discovered positive feedback and client success in those areas. Sell harder into these segments.
• Control inventory where possible
• Streamline products or services you may be offering that are no longer profitable
• Exploit the weaknesses of competing companies by taking their best employees or customers away from them. 

Upon synthesizing and analyzing your results, you may decide to share these results with managers or even all your employees. The company mentioned earlier held department-by-department meetings because they felt their results would be illuminating to all employees, not just to share the feedback about the market conditions but also as a morale builder in tough times thanks to comments about how well the company was viewed by the respondents.

The value of a "strategic conversations" exercise is that it elicits opinions straight from the source, calling on only the significant partners and customers (and sometimes your own employees) to obtain information about critical issues and get them on the radar. In a time of change, this is precisely what you must know. Thus this bounty of "fresh information" will lead to better decisions, stronger operations and overall improved results.

Michael Oleksak is a principal at Trek Consulting LLC, which helps business owners focus on the dual challenges of building and realizing the maximum value of their life's work. He can be contacted at www.trekconsulting.com.