sleicest-consulting is a specialist consultancy service for organisations interested in improving their business resilience and business flexibility. The business drivers relating to the need for improvement might be; to the enable market and product growth that they are outlining in their long term plan, to enable modernisation of their digital technology. Or perhaps to counter to their future sustainability. Such threats might be caused by any combination of the following things; extreme weather events, artificial intelligence, country trade wars, supply chain disruption, cyber disruption, decarbonisation legislation, market resistance to fee rises, or the rising cost of risk mitigations. There may also be reputational threats linked to long term association with certain suppliers or strategic alliance partners.
So, first things first. What is meant by the term ‘business flexibility’? Four key aspects are; adaptability, agility (pivoting), resilience and options management.
At the next level down, what is meant by the term ‘business resilience’? Four key aspects are; protection, durability (wear and tear), human determination (grit) and healing rate (to bounce back).
Whether an organization’s business strategy relies on growth (organic or inorganic) or value improvement (offering progressively better services for existing customers say), business resilience is both a vital input and output of the business strategy.
Business resilience as an input to business strategy includes:
– developing policies relating to financial reserves levels held,
– developing a plan to handle inflation volatility, or volatility in the labour market,
– developing talent acquisition and talent retention strategies,
– developing plans to handle supply chain disruption, financial credit crunch, or government-imposed changes, to deal with an emergency like a civil war, trade war, or pandemic outbreak.
It follows that the business strategy (a concentration on vertical integration, global dominance, buying out competitors, developing operating excellence, emphasising product innovation or customer intimacy say), ought to deliver not just growth, or product & service innovation. But business resilience too.
The protection aspect of resilience alone is big business. Ask the big lending firms (lines of credit), alarm system providers, data security companies, contract law advisors, project management and staff training companies. Ask the top football clubs paying large transfer fees to secure highly-skilled goal keepers.
High profile organisations like; Kodak, Enron, Barings Bank and the UK charity Kids Company, are amongst the cautionary tales of failed business resilience. Meanwhile, the organisations who have operated successfully for hundreds of years such as; Twinings, Cambridge University Press, Du Pont and Harper Collins are amongst the proven, ‘safe harbours’ of business resilience.
Traditionally, various members of the senior executive team have overseen different aspects of business resilience. The CFO typically oversees treasury & investments resilience, cashflow management, long term financial plans and internal controls. The COO typically oversees customer relations, risk registers, physical security and business continuity plans. The CIO/CTO typically oversees data and digital systems security and storage. The Chief People Officer typically oversees recruitment, talent management and workforce resilience, along with various line managers. But are there gaps? Is there a cohesive resilience framework? Is business resilience explicitly being reviewed for different future scenarios? Who assesses at funder, supplier and customer resilience and considers how their resilience might bolster inhouse business resilience?
About sleicest-consulting
Simon is an MBA-qualified, management consultant and chartered accountant. He has amassed 15 years of CFO/FD experience, 4 years of Non Executive Board experience and 35 years of finance experience in 2 countries. Sectorwise, this includes; Not for Profit sector (HEI regulator, fundraising charity and professional membership body organisations, ranging in size from £8M to £110M annual income). It also includes finance experience in retail banking, telco and several manufacturing companies.
Simon has worked at C-suite level in 3 UK professional membership bodies. In the health sector alone, Simon has 8 years client experience; including a UK health regulator, HEI faculty of medicine, health advocacy charity, health empowerment charity (impartial systematic reviews) and health membership body.
The last 10 years of Simon’s experience have included working for 9 client organisations of varying size, in change management roles – typically lasting considerably longer than the average consulting assignment in the consulting sector.
Simon has a comprehensive range of management experience spanning; strategy, structure, systems, processes and team cultural change in multiple functions (finance, HR, IT, facilities, procurement, project office, risk reporting and governance support).
Simon has overseen financial reporting set-ups for major multi-year programmes, multiple member fee rises, finance policy changes, tenders, contract negotiations, risk reviews and some deep-dive investigations into key project partners as well. As a guest presenter, Simon recently presented a conference session to a UK CFO audience (private and non private sector attendees) on how to balance growth with control, as the organisation increases in complexity.
The sleicest-consulting business frameworks are original and offer fresh approaches to familiar and novel problems alike.
The core values and features of sleicest-consulting;
– build an enduring relationship with the client.
– provide services that are customized. collaborative and solution-orientated.
– bring rounded and fresh thinking to each client assignment.
By arrangement, some business consulting services include the following:
- Business flexibility and business resiliency audits – starting with a 20 minute, self-completing questionnaire for your business.
- Options Portfolio construction and links to Scenario Planning, Risk Registers and BCP
- Development of business resilience measures and benchmarking.
- Linking business flexibility and business resilience back the core business strategy.
Contact Details
Simon Leicester, Lead Consultant and Director of sleicest-consulting.
sleicest@hotmail.com
contact phone number: 07375 379979