At the time we worked in the corporate world . . . .Some years ago, in our corporate lives, we were tasked with developing and implementing a “next generation” services strategy for the commercial transport sector. Handed a considerable budget, we set about identifying and hiring a global strategy firm to assist in modelling the market’s future, assessing trends in the competitive landscape, and evaluating strategic alternatives for our business.
Several months, and around $1 million later, we had our strategy beautifully designed in a highly sophisticated 120-slide deck, which impressed our Senior Executive Team and greatly increased our star rating.
What we didn’t have was a properly costed, pragmatic implementation plan, taking into account our IT constraints, our sales and support capability or our need for internal communication and engagement.
The new service was launched with much pizzazz, and within twelve months the project was terminated and the product withdrawn from the market.
But why?
Dangerous company
Strategy consultancies do what it says on the tin. They think strategically, operate at a high level, and look at the longer term and the broader scope. At those things they are extremely effective – and they should be. It’s their job, after all.
And let’s be brutally honest. In many, many cases business development and marketing executives will already know the strategy they want to pursue. They use a “big name” consultancy to validate their thinking and convince their shareholders to invest in their vision – expensively. Tell us that isn’t true…….
The thing is this: they don’t know much about commercial refuelling in Europe. They know very little about the complexities of fuel card issuing, acceptance and cross-acceptance. They don’t really understand the constraints and intricacies of fuel card management systems. How added value services revolve around a fuel card proposition, and the ways in which tolls and VAT services can be cross-engineered into a commercial fuel offer, are not their bread and butter.
Paying for learning
Given the above, it should come as no surprise that the first phase of any major consultancy project tends to involve the consulting firm grappling to understand the commercial refuelling market structure.
Why should you pay for that? The first three months of the project we described earlier saw us blow around 40% of our budget sending the consultancy’s junior analysts around Europe trying to understand the fuel card issuing model and its associated channel economics.
Quire simply, that doesn’t make sense. Why not work, instead, with a specialist group which already intimately knows and understands those very same fuel market structures and economics? It saves time, and it saves money. Even if the badge on the slide deck may not carry the same kudos….
What’s more – we’ll let you into a secret: often they’ll subcontract that early work to a specialist consulting firm like, ahem, us.
Getting a head start
Very rarely is time not of the essence. We can’t remember a high-profile project whose stakeholders said “take your time – just let us know when you’re ready”.
In that context, why allocate a considerable percentage of your available time and budget to helping a consulting firm understand your business? If you yourself don’t understand your business, that may well be a valid use of time and money – but the likelihood is that you both a) do understand your business and b) already have an idea what you want to do with it. So, Phase 1 of a project is critical: hit the ground running.
You “hit the ground running” by working with a partner – like CFS – whose team are from the sector and already have a firm grip on the way our very specialised segment works. A team which already understands retail and commercial fuels, card issuing, transaction processing and added value services economics and can, from Day 1, get on with making things happen.
Avoiding “scope creep”
One of the things strategy consulting firms do is broaden and lengthen the scope of any project they get involved with. A standard slide, usually towards the end of a review deck, is “Recommendations for Further Work”. It’s important to add complexity, to identify a long list of risks. It’s unlikely that they will simply work to your brief. They can’t – it doesn’t generate sufficient fees.
That’s why a crystal clear brief focused on implementation serves your budget best. And why it very possibly makes sense to work with a team of specialists, like CFS, who are willing to work to that very tight brief and have the knowledge to focus on implementation. We’re just saying….
People make projects work
When you work together with a firm, like CFS, highly specialised in fuel and fleet markets – you’ll work exclusively with its partners. Seasoned experts who have launched, bought, sold, run, turned around and repositioned fuel and fleet products, services and companies over three decades.
We don’t subcontract our work, and we don’t hire desk researchers or analysts. We rely on our own knowledge, experience and on our unique range of industry contacts. Alongside your vision.
We save time. We save money. We focus on implementation. And we get things done.
In Conclusion
It makes sense to work with industry experts – specialists, like CFS, in Europe’s commercial fuel and fleet business.
So if you would like CFS to work with you in planning and executing a strategy to maximise your business opportunities in the “new normal”, then get in touch with us by email to mst@cfs-europe.cc or visit our website at www.cfs-europe.cc
Look out for our next Insight Feature on “The New Mobility” in a few days’ time, when we’ll be looking at how b2b mobility is set to change over the coming months and years…..
