The need for key staff to have commercial skills is paramount, as the public sector is increasingly opened up as a commercial market, in which organisations compete against each other and the private sector for contracts. Generating additional income and being commercially aware is vital for this to be a success, and is what many public sector organisations are looking to do.
This programme will help you:
See commercial awareness as not just another skill-set, but as a different mind-set
Use a variety of tried-and-tested commercial, analytical decision-making techniques and tools
Define your commercial objectives
Develop a strategic focus
Start looking at service clients as market segments
Analyse, in a competitive context, your service offering
Plan a commercial strategy, prepare for its implementation and see it through to execution
1 What is commercial thinking?
Understand what it means to be a commercial thinker
Identifying commercial opportunities often involves not only a different skill set but also a different mindset; looking at the services that you provide
2 Defining strategic commercial objectives
Defining your key commercial objectives
Prioritising your strategic objectives
Two key strategic planning tools:Resource and Competency MatrixPESTLE
How to apply these tools to your particular situation
3 Developing a strategic focus
Decision-making on how to compete in the markets identified by your strategic objectives requires a strategic focus
Developing strategic focus
A tool for helping you to make those decisions: using the Ansoff Matrix
4 Defining customer targets
How to think more commercially by understanding who all your customers are and how they differ from each other
how to apply the principles to your areas to identify the type of customers you have and their key characteristics - Customer segmentation
Who are your customers? How do their needs vary? - Scenarios
5 The competitive market place
Understanding the competitive forces at play
Different types of competition
Analysing your competitive environment using Porter's 5 Forces model
6 Meeting stakeholder expectations
Two simple models to help you identify the key stakeholders who could influence your commercial environment
How to use your stakeholders to help you achieve your commercial objectives
7 Implementation - systems, structures and processes
Effective commercial activity involves working with others to implement ideas and strategies
What do you need to have in place before you implement your commercial strategy?
How to health-check your organisation prior to implementation using the McKinsey 7S framework
8 Implementation - people and culture
A good commercial strategy only works if the people involved buy in to the ideas and if the culture of the organisation is conducive to the effective implementation
How the latest thinking in behavioural economics can help you develop your culture and people to work commercially
9 Tools and checklists
Be more commercial within your sphere of influence using a commercial checklist to help you
Using the checklist as a benchmark against the most commercially aware organisations
Using the checklist as a health check - both corporately and individually