MANAGEMENT OCTOBER 2019
ON THE
FRONT LINE
What manufacturing
leaders can learn from their
military counterparts
BY EMMA DUTTON MBE, CO-FOUNDER AND MD, APPLIED INFLUENCE GROUP
Developing a strategy for your business
can sometimes feel like an unwanted
step in the journey to achieving your
goals. Strategies take up time and eff ort,
but they are the most effi cient and
eff ective way of ensuring you achieve
your business objectives. Strategies help give your
business a better sense of direction and can even
help increase market share and profi tability to a
level that far outweighs the initial outlay of time
and resources.
There are tough times ahead for the
manufacturing industry, with the ongoing
uncertainty of the economy due to Brexit and the
decrease of global demand for factory output.
This calls for tougher strategies to help the
manufacturing industry cope with new challenges.
Any objectives you set as a business must be
accompanied by a step-by-step strategy to ensure
you achieve your goals methodically. Strategy
can help provide a way to review and repeat your
business plans; this is something you may not fi nd
if just acting on experience and instinct. Although
making non-strategic progress may seem easy and
simple at the time, it is largely unconscious and
imprecise. Therefore, it is harder to repeat and
recreate business achievement as there is no guide
to how the goals were accomplished.
Mastering a strategy
Every business model, including in the
manufacturing industry, should include a strategy
to help achieve the goals it has set out. The style
of this strategy will vary depending on the people
involved. The military has mastered the application
of strategy to help simplify and overcome complex
situations. This type of strategy
has been developed through trial
and error to create an adaptable
model. This model has been
tested in extreme environments
with the highest of stakes –
people’s lives. Many businesses
are now using strategies from
the military to combat their
toughest challenges.
One of the main reasons
for employing strategies is
to increase the effi ciency of
your business. Without a plan
in place, the success of your
business relies on instinct – and
sometimes, blind luck. If you
don’t have a clearly defi ned plan
to achieve your objectives and
no solutions ready to overcome
any challenges in reserve, the
business is more susceptible to
faltering when obstacles arise.
But where do you begin
when creating your business
strategy? There are three
basic overarching steps to
constructing a strategy:
Setting goals – this gives
everyone involved a sense
of direction and focus. It’s
important to ensure all team
members are working towards
the same set of goals with
continued engagement and
review from all involved.
Developing steps to help
reach your goals – asking
yourself what the needs are in
order to achieve the business
objectives you have set.
Implementation to make
it all happen – understand the
whole process and how it should
be executed in your complex
organisational structure. This
is not a simple step but making
sure all steps are done in
sequence can help ensure your
strategy is being accomplished
eff ectively.
Have a clear understanding
The main aim of military strategy
is to have a clear understanding
of the situation at hand as well as
making the best use of time and
resources. Military intelligence
personnel coordinate their
strategies to be useful in
high-pressure situations with
short timescales such as out
on the battlefi eld. This sets an
example for businesses in the
kozlik_mozlik /stock.adobe.com
Three
simple steps can help
create a bullet-proof
business strategy
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