Management Consulting & Strategy
FABCP's philosophy is to critically and impartially evaluate each business to understand its unique structure and tenets to provide precise solutions to deliver savings and improvements. We believe that it requires initiative, commitment and creativity. Successful managers and directors do not come in castings, because one size does not fit all, because markets are in motion. Our consultants are as adaptable as the circumstances demand.
This area is made up of three main sections: strategy formulation and implementation, new business and project delivery, (business planning up to 5 years ahead) in the course of ordinary activitities. That means a revised up to date plan on ongoing concern for current activities. All planning types come with embedded budgets and marketing subplans.
Al three areas share several commonalities, namely managing stages in the business' lifespan, allocating resources to achieve explicit outcomes, (objectives) and being accountable to directors, managers and proprietors.
The differences can be classified by the layer of management directly accountable, the hierarchy of the task in relation to its location in the business as a whole, (strategic or operational), the business' maturity in the business life cycle, the line of business, (general management or applied to an individual line of service/product, or to tackle a problem) and the length of time from implementation to completion. Sophisticated strategy is crucial when decisions must consider factors in the industry, not just the firm and its customers alone.
The FABCP consultant will work to detect, identify and measure performance indicators, which pinpoint to outperforming as well as underperforming areas that can indicate problems and inefficiencies in some of the following functions:
Restructuring for growth/change management
Resources
Recruitment
Training
Investment
Finance and accounting systems
Marketing, (price, product, place, advertising)
IT facilities/information flow
Stock and product lines
Procurement/supply chain and distribution
Outsourcing
Customer service
Internal procedures/operations and policies
Project, new business and business planning in the course of ordinary activities are explained in the Project Delivery section.
For medium and large enterprises or those expanding in need of expert advice and professional managers, we can offer an integrated service either: as an external consultant, as a financial controller and strategic planner and/or by joining in their board as a non executive director. Again, this guidance can be in a general sense or linked to any particular line of service/product. In the latter, our management function is usually implemented in the context of a project.
At first, strategy appears to be a very complex subject, but it is simply down to a misconception. In the general sense, in times of uncertainty or at cross roads, FABCP can provide guidance to identifying clear objectives and advice on how to keep finances under control, reshape the business and what resources you will require to remain competitive.
But strategy exist in various layers of activity, for many of our clients we refer to operational strategies: identifying, shorlisting and selecting procedures to make processes more efficient, effective and economic, while carrying out the relevant assessment to evaluate the impact such operations may have on finances, cash flows, training, investment, sales and input resources. A second purpose is identifying the potential customers and competitors' performance to assess the viability of the business segment. Over optimism and ignoring this risk often leads to failure, or sometimes success but by the hard way, through costly ineffective experiments.
Strategy, marketing and sales are all part of the same downwards and feed back process. That is why it is important to be clear about it, to have a well thought sales technique supported by a responsive and resourceful strategy and marketing that can deliver what was promised and expected.
Objectives are the itemisation of strategy. It is important to know where you want to go, and how to get there.
For more information on how FABCP implements action plans and detailed contents continue reading the Project Delivery section and the Examples page to see practical applications.