short-term uncertainty

The Strategy and Mindset You Need for Short-Range Uncertainty

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This is Part 2 of our two-part series about planning for uncertainty. In this blog article, I talk about short-term uncertainty. Check out the first part on long-range uncertainty here. 

This is the second part of our two-part series on strategizing for uncertainty. Last time, we covered long-range uncertainty. This time, we’re going to talk about how to act in the face of near-term uncertainty, and especially about the way that mindset can translate into strategic action. 

The truth is that most of the issues that we find with long-range uncertainty start out as near-term uncertainty, or worse, as near-term crises. The pandemic was a near-term uncertainty (remember those two weeks of lockdown?) that has irreversibly changed and shaped the world we live in today. Massive turnover starts with one person, and dipping sales can start with one PR scandal.

The good news is that the strongest and most sustainable businesses can handle near-term crises—even ones that they couldn’t have planned for. This is because they have the right mindset that translates to the right strategy and the right communication. Let’s break this down to help you weather the next near-term uncertainty that awaits you. 

Get Real About Your Goals

Let’s rewind to March 1, 2020, and pretend I asked you about your goals. Maybe you would have told me that you wanted to be the #1 car sales company, for example. You were planning on hitting record sales and expanding your personnel. To top it off, you had an unbelievable PR campaign planned. If you were on your strategy game, you would be able to tell me what your goals were and the steps that supported each of those goals. 

Fast forward to April 15, 2020. What are your goals now? Or in May? Or June? If your goals were the same as they were in March, you’d have your head buried in the sand. Right?

I make this point for two reasons. First, the most resilient companies revisit what they’re trying to accomplish in the face of major events. A car sales company that survived the pandemic might have revised its goals: I need to keep my car lines operating, keep my people employed, and keep my teams engaged. In other words, priorities had to shift in order to better serve the longer-term goal (e.g., survive the lockdown and work towards being #1 at some future point down the line). 

Some companies made this mindset shift faster and more effectively than others. Making this shift doesn’t mean your ultimate purpose changes, but it does mean that what it takes to achieve that purpose might need to be reassessed. 

From Mindset to Strategy

Mindset has become a bit of a buzzword these days, but for good reason. Sometimes mental blocks, that we don’t even realize we have, get in the way of establishing sound strategies that can withstand the rough-and-tumble of the economy and world today. I want to share a few of my favorite reminders for the mindset that translates into real action. 

Operating in the Gray

This is a mantra of one of my favorite CEOs. I love it because it is true and it works. 

Life is lived in the gray area. When we face a new quarter, a new team, or a new challenge, there are always unknowns. We don’t know how things will turn out, but we have past data, and we need to try something. We can take a small step and assess little by little. 

Here’s one way to put this into action: If you know it’s time to increase brand awareness, you might take a big bet for a short time. We call this a fail-fast mentality. 

Say you decide to invest 80% of your marketing budget into LinkedIn and see what happens. The trick is to make it time-bound (e.g., invest for 6 months) and be practical about what you can expect within that boundary (e.g., grow your followers by 500). The only way to move out of the gray and into technicolor is to try something and see what happens.

Set Up Choice Sets

Anyone who has ever known a toddler knows that it is a fundamental truth of human nature that we do better with choice sets rather than infinite choices. You can decide to grow 10%, increase profitability by 5%, increase your customer base, build your talent, or overhaul your brand, but you probably can’t do all of these. They might all go together, but you have to prioritize your investment priorities. 

Perhaps your company hasn’t been profitable and you need to be more profitable before making other investments. You might need to look at costs and pricing before deciding to bring in other customers, or else you’d be bringing them in at a lower profit. 

Look at your goals, assess them, and figure out how the pieces fit together (or hire a pro to help you get an objective look at what your most strategic moves are). Then figure out which choices to make now and which to save for later after a few more of the pieces have fallen into place. By the way, this advice works both when you’re in crisis and when it’s business-as-usual.

Just Do It 

This is true when it comes to long- and near-term uncertainty. Not knowing what the future holds can lead us into what is sometimes called analysis paralysis—wanting to maximize our actions can result in us not acting at all. Or, being perfectionists and wanting to keep our options open means that we end up doing nothing and closing off all of our options. Neither of these is ideal. 

At some point, you need to call in the support systems you need to act. As Bréne Brown says, we need to get vulnerable and learn to rise. The way we develop confidence is by actually doing things. Not through observing, studying, or reading another blog—we develop confidence just by doing it. And then we’ve done it, and we have the momentum to move on to the next order of business. We may not have done it the most perfect way, or the way we thought it would be done. And yet, it’s done—we can assess, gather data, and use the results to better inform our next move.

Communication

The importance of communication in a moment of crisis or uncertainty cannot be understated. Solid communication with stakeholders—employees, leaders, investors, customers, and partners—is key to finding the support you need to stay afloat. At worst, flubbing communication in a crisis can leave your customers feeling confused or even deceived. 

How can you make sure you have solid communication in a crisis?

  • Communication has legs: What you say can and will travel. A solid strategy or an external communications team can help you ensure that your communications reflect your purpose, your commitments, your priorities, and your plans. They can also help you ensure that you strike the right tone when discussing your knowns and your unknowns. 
  • Be aware of your stakeholders: Know who you’re talking to in each communication. The message you give to your stakeholders might confuse your team members. Likewise, you might communicate a different level of complexity in one forum rather than another. Be consistent while also knowing who you’re talking to. And of course, make sure everyone who needs to hear from you does—don’t forget about your business partners and community supporters.
  • Moving forward: Even amidst uncertainty or crisis, let your customers know what there is to look forward to. Know your goals for the near term while keeping your eye on the prize. Stay bold and steady in your long-term purpose. 

Concluding: Progress vs. Perfection

This last piece is something I work on daily. Dealing with near-term uncertainty is a game of tricking yourself (if you’re a perfectionist) into making progress. It’s always going to be imperfect, whether you’re dealing with a crisis or not. And sure, as leaders we want to make the best choices. We want data, but we live in a world where there is infinite data. 

Sometimes we get caught in a trap of thinking, “if I only had one more piece of information, I’d feel so much better.” There are diminishing returns, though. You get that 80% solution, but you want more. And chasing that last 20% can keep you from making the decisions that will help you come out on top once the near-term crisis is over. 

Ultimately, dealing with near-term uncertainty comes down to two pieces of advice: 

  • Strategize and plan ahead, as always and as much as you can. 
  • Get comfortable with being uncomfortable. 

Also, know your own blind spots—the mindset traps you fall into as a leader that keep you from making progress. Figure out the mantras, the advisors, and the reminders you need to help you move your team forward through any crisis, any uncertainty, or any gray area.

Are you still trying to figure out how to make sure you’re rock-solid when the next challenge comes? Our team of experts can help you make sure you have a strategy that works for the near term and the long term—don’t hesitate to reach out to us for a consult. 

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long-term uncertainty

The Strategy and Mindset You Need for Long-Range Uncertainty

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This is Part 1 of our two-part series about planning for uncertainty. In this blog article, I talk about long-term uncertainty. Stay tuned for the next installment of the series where I discuss planning for short-term uncertainty.

Uncertainty is a part of doing business. We simply don’t operate in a world of perfect information in economics, in business, or in life for that matter. Sometimes the unknowns are known unknowns (e.g., the price volatility of raw materials in a product), and sometimes the unknowns are true unknowns. The true unknowns are the big ones like climate, geopolitical circumstances, and health crises. Even having a C-Suite leader out sick for a week can throw a wrench into the best-laid plans. 

McKinsey has a framework for thinking about uncertainty, and here there are four different levels: (1) a predictable future, (2) alternate futures, (3) a range of futures, and (4) true ambiguity.

With our clients, we like to focus on two different kinds of uncertainty: long-term uncertainty and short-term uncertainty. The strategies we suggest account for what kind of uncertainty we face within this framework. Often, the first part of the work is getting leaders to make time to think about these issues at all. 

There are different reasons businesses and leaders often avoid thinking about uncertainty—it’s unpleasant, there are no easy answers, and it takes time away from the day-to-day aspects of doing business. Yet, building a bold and sustainable business means asking the hard questions and laying out the contingency plans you hope you never have to use. 

In this blog series, we’ll go over some of our top tips—for strategy and mindset—for approaching long-term and short-term uncertainty. 

Let’s start with long-term uncertainty: how should we think about uncertainty? And how should we plan for it? Here, we’ll walk through a few examples of long-term uncertainty to give you a map for the right kinds of questions to ask and the general mindset to have when approaching different kinds of long-range uncertainty.

First Principles 

When you’re asking difficult questions in your business, it can be helpful to ground into the things that you know and that you have control over. These are your first principles. The idea of first principles comes from ancient philosophy—what are the bedrock beliefs and ideas that we build everything else upon?

If you don’t have a value proposition, it’s an important part of long-term planning. What are you here to do? What are your goals and purposes in the business? Having a clear idea of who you are, what you stand for, and what your business does best can help you ground your future planning. Having this written into the DNA of your company and how you communicate about your company gives you something to work with if it becomes time to pivot. 

Long-Term Uncertainty: Case Studies

Long-term uncertainty concerns those uncertainties that might stretch a long time into the future without knowing when or how they will resolve. These are the things that pose big existential questions to your firm, or at least bring up existential questions, while you’re busy figuring out what to do. Here, we’ll walk through how we like to think about some case studies in long-term uncertainty.

Recession

At the time of writing, it feels like economists have been forecasting an imminent recession for the last five years. It can be hard when we’re all waiting for the other shoe to drop. In general, responding to market conditions, doing market research, and doing regular brand assessments are great ways to make sure you’re staying competitive in any environment. 

But let’s say a recession is announced. What do you do? The first question is: What is the best path forward from a long-term growth perspective? Depending on how your company’s finances were panning out in the recent past, one might decide to sell, IPO, take on additional investments, or bootstrap. There’s uncertainty attached to all of these options, and they’re going to depend highly upon several factors. 

What doesn’t change across different kinds of companies and different levels of performance is the importance of being in it for the long game. You don’t just want to think about the next five months, but about what moves will serve if different conditions pan out over the next two, five, ten, or 20 years. 

Personnel 

Your people are your greatest asset—hopefully, you know this already. And you also probably know that life happens. Yet, when the CEO or CFO walks out the door, or your best graphic artist steps out for a family emergency, it can throw you for a loop. 

Planning for this is tricky. In general, I don’t encourage redundancy. That’s a surefire way to create a tighter budget that—most of the time—won’t make sense. Instead, I encourage awareness of what everyone is working on. It’s important to know what everyone is doing; yet, it’s also important to be humble about job creep. Even if you’re the boss, you might not realize just how far your Database Manager has strayed from their original job description. It’s good to be aware of this both for understanding how all of the pieces fit together and for understanding who is responsible for what. 

Grasping the strengths and weaknesses of your team can ensure that you can figure out where other folks can step in and take on an entire job, or some parts of it. In some cases, people will be applying skills they’re already using on your team. In other cases, you might get the opportunity to help your team with professional development by teaching them new skills or discovering untapped talent. 

Ultimately, having a pulse on your team, avoiding silos, and understanding how everything fits together allows you to best direct your team towards a common goal.

Climate Change

This is a big one and a difficult one. There are more floods, more heat waves, and more wildfires than there used to be. How do we plan for this in our companies? I’ll walk through a few different lines of questioning that can begin to guide your game plan.

Location-specific climate change: Does it make sense to build a HQ in New Orleans? Or should we move back to northern Louisiana? What climate needs does your facility have (e.g., are there a lot of computers?)? What are the risks to your infrastructure? Do hotter summers or colder winters pose a risk to materials you might be transporting? Is water scarcity something that you need to be thinking about?

Disaster Preparedness: If the worst happens, are you insured against flood damage, wildfires, or whatever is most likely to affect your area? What kind of resources do you need to make sure you can support your employees if a disaster happens at work, or even in the general area? What will you need to reach out to employees? Will operations continue, and if so, how?

Communication: How will you communicate with your employees and customers if something happens? How will you communicate with key stakeholders and investors? How important will it be to communicate quickly? Do you have emergency contacts with important partners or plans that can be quickly enacted across different locations if coordination is necessary?

Global strife: It’s crucial to think about how disasters and climate issues will affect populations globally. Map out where your supply chains are so you can quantify the potential risks to materials, investments, economics, and of course, the human toll. 

Climate change presents some of the biggest unknowns we have—there are predictions, but we never know in what state or town disaster might strike. Ultimately, we are all on one planet. Animals are adapting (see: all the beach closures due to sharks!), and we have to make sure we do the same. 

Gap Assessment

When it comes to long-term strategy, some unknowns are—thankfully—a little closer to the business-as-usual that we know and love than climate change. For example, you might set a goal to increase brand awareness in 2024. This is long-term uncertainty because it has the potential to change the course of your business, and because if you’re doing a brand pivot you have no idea how it might be received by customers. What might your strategy be in this case? 

By the end of 2023, take stock of where your brand is. What does the market look like, and how do you want your brand to be perceived within your market? What does this mean in terms of customer perception, digital awareness, website hits, inbound inquiries, social media followers, and so on? Figure out what your most important metrics are and begin with the baseline info that you do know. 

By the beginning of 2024, you want to figure out how to get data for the metrics you don’t know and figure out which metrics you most want to target in 2024. You can’t target too many at a time or else you won’t know what worked or why. If you want more inbound calls, you might do more LinkedIn advertising or more website content regularly. If you want more website hits, you might invest in an SEO overhaul. 

Finally, throughout 2024, you would want to keep sight of what you’re trying to accomplish. What outcomes do you want, and what do you have today? Once you set SMART goals, you can put plans together and reassess quarterly to see how things are evolving and continue reassessing to get you to where you want to be in the market.

The 20 Mile Analogy

So much long-term planning is about deciding that you’re in it for the long game. That decision means you adopt a certain mindset and a certain willingness to dive deeply and boldly into uncomfortable and difficult questions. 

Jim Collins has an incredible analogy for this process in his book Great By Choice. Imagine you and others are about to embark on a 3,000-mile foot race from San Diego, CA to the tip of Maine. One person decides to push as hard as they can and travel 40 miles the first day, then they are exhausted and need to rest. In fact, they need to rest the next day too. You, on the other hand, set out to do 20 miles a day, every day, no matter what. Whether the 20 miles takes you 12 hours or four hours, it doesn’t matter. 

You might be able to guess who wins the race. The runner that was sprinting and recovering didn’t win. When you plan and can keep steady progress and stay on track with your plans, you give yourself space to maneuver. Any marathon runner knows that one mile can feel different from day to day. But if you set yourself on a plan, you at least won’t be trying to achieve 40 miles in a day, but just 20.

As with business goals, long-term planning requires breaking large goals into smaller goals. That climate change conversation across your entire company probably won’t happen in a day—and that’s okay. More broadly speaking, making sure that you have a steady and sustainable business plan means that you won’t be as swayed by waves of uncertainty.

There are no perfect choices. In a crisis, we can’t afford to be perfectionists. Looking at reality and moving beyond the “what-ifs” allow us to take small actions and make the necessary plans that can buoy us through a hard period. Take your steps, measure your progress, and eventually, you might realize you’ve already gone 120 miles.

Concluding Thoughts

Long-range strategy planning is hard, but it can work. With the right mindset shifts and a willingness to ask hard questions, you can create a sustainable business plan that addresses business-as-usual alongside potential long-term challenges. The steadier you are on the day-to-day, the steadier you will be during a crisis. 

Finally, action begets action. Taking the first small step means that you can then look back, 20 paces later, and see how far your team has gone. This, in turn, inspires more action and ensures that we’re not waiting for life to happen to us. Creating bold, sustainable, and competitive companies today means going beyond the status quo. Ask the hard questions. Take the uncertain step. Look into the future with unflinching eyes.

Keep an eye out for the next part of this blog series on strategizing for short-term uncertainty. And if you want any assistance with this from a team of experts, don’t hesitate to reach out to us for a consult.

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best communications practices

A New Look at “Chaos is Our Brand” in Light of the Coronavirus Crisis

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When Audacia Strategies CEO, Katy Herr, originally taped this interview with Dan Doran, CEO of Quantive, for his podcast The Deal—Unscripted, we had no idea just how relevant it would be now during the current crisis. A year later, we are living a case study in crisis communication and thought it was a good time to revisit some of the takeaways about best communications practices from that conversation.

1. Don’t Wait to Create a Strategy for Best Communications Practices

This recommendation applies as much to a wide-spread crisis situation like the Coronavirus pandemic as it does to a big company transition like a merger or acquisition. It never pays to procrastinate on creating a communications strategy.

If you find yourself without a clear strategy, you’re likely feeling the pain acutely in this moment. As far as we know, no one has invented a time machine, but there are some things you can do to develop a stop gap strategy:

  • Stay calm and present as you weigh your options.
  • Figure out who needs to hear from you, when.
  • Develop straightforward messaging that doesn’t promise more than you can deliver.
  • Make sure you have a designated team with assigned roles to streamline communications.

For more ideas, check out 5 Lessons from our Crisis Communications Playbook. 

Many of our clients contact us when they’re facing one of two situations: times of crisis or times of transformation—hence our unofficial tagline: “chaos is our brand.” This makes a lot of sense, but too often what we find is that if an organization hesitates to develop best communications practices and a communications strategy early enough, things can go off the rails quickly. 

At the risk of sounding too sales-y and mindful of the many hardships experienced during this time, here are a few of the benefits of using an outside communications firm:

  • An outside set of eyes gives you transaction experience, critical perspective, and unbiased advice when communicating your message to the outside world.
  • An outside firm is in a good position to place your organization in a broader context (i.e., the competitive set, the market, and your financial stakeholders), while you focus on running day-to-day internal operations.
  • An outside firm isn’t influenced by the “groupthink” or silo-ed communications that can be an obstacle to projecting the strongest public image.

Whether or not your organization ultimately decides to enlist the help of a firm like Audacia Strategies during this crisis or the next one, the most important thing you can do is start strategizing ASAP.

2. Think About Who Your Stakeholders Are 

In this moment of uncertainty, you are right to worry about accidentally leaving stakeholders off of your list of communications. One of the first rules of communications is to control the narrative. But if you hesitate to reach out to stakeholders or skimp on the stakeholder analysis, this is precisely the risk you take.

Remember that at its core communications is about storytelling. What is the best story you can tell to a particular set of stakeholders? Suppose the governor in your state has decided your industry is among those allowed to reopen, but you disagree with the reopen policy for your business. Your best bet is to be honest with your employees, customers, and investors. State your case and speak your truth.

Depending on whether you are a publicly or privately held company, stakeholders could include any or all of the following sets:

  • Employees
  • Customers
  • Financial stakeholders: 
    • Public debt holders and ratings agencies
    • Private equity companies and banks
    • Investors or shareholders
  • Community partners
  • Contributors (for non-profit organizations)
  • Business partners and service providers
  • Strategic partners
  • Government regulators and political community (local, state and federal) 
  • Media and industry influencers

3. Understand the Difference Between Marketing and Communications

This is especially important now when best communications practices may require a very light touch. If you think you can “get by” using your internal marketing department to craft crisis communications, you may want to reconsider. 

Marketing and strategic communications are different tools. Whereas marketing primarily focuses on telling the story of how your product or service will help your target customers, strategic communications partners can knit together the entirety of the business story to give investors and other stakeholders a comprehensive picture. As the experts in helping clients weather chaos, we have developed best practices over many transactions, crises, and change events.

Now is the time to ask big picture questions about how your market may respond to this crisis, how resources should be optimally redirected, and how investors, customers and employees should be engaged throughout. This is a great time to consider what has changed for your customers and employees and what you can offer as we begin to feel our way through life post-lockdown.

4. M&A Tips and Tricks

As we hopefully begin to see COVID-19 infection rates peak over the next several weeks and markets start to stabilize, many predict that M&A (mergers and acquisitions) will start to pick up in certain industries. This is, of course, assuming lawmakers on Capitol Hill don’t place a moratorium on big mergers—a conversation we’ll be monitoring closely.

There are still a lot of unknowns here, but if a merger is in your future, we work with corporate development teams, in-house financial teams, lawyers, and investment bankers helping them think through the market and storytelling from an M&A perspective. At its core, M&A is about risk, the ability to manage risk, and telling the story of how the acquisition fits into your broader business strategy and culture.

For example, if you’ve been working on a deal that has been in the preparation stages for months, should you call it off or push forward to completion? One thing is for sure: for companies that have built a healthy balance sheet during the economic boom of the past ten years, declining valuations create opportunities to pursue deals that create long-term value. While we can’t help you decide whether to hold or fold, we can help you communicate your decision.

Finally, we’ll leave you with some pitfalls and opportunities to consider when it comes to best communications practices during a merger or acquisition: 

M&A Pitfalls:

  • Companies that overpay: We have another blog post dedicated to this topic. Suffice it to say, if you overpay for an acquisition, it can create credibility issues with your investors, your Board of Directors, your employees…the list goes on. Negotiations can get emotional quickly but consider that the business strategy will have to support the valuation.
  • Cultural fit failure: We’ve seen it happen: a small start-up firm develops an amazing technology and gets bought by a huge firm looking to prove it’s innovative and “hip.” Then, within a year, all the original start up employees are gone. Avoid this kind of cultural disconnect by having an air-tight integration strategy from the beginning. Make sure you are walking your walk, so you can deliver on what you’re promising. (Pssst! Hot tip: Audacia Strategies has a new service rolling out to help avoid just this problem. Make sure you’re signed up to be among the first to get the details!)

M&A Opportunities:

  • Integration is key: The best M&A success stories are those where the merging leadership teams think about integration all the way along. When companies have a successful communications strategy that includes communicating the big vision well for both internal and external audiences, the proof is in the stakeholders’ response.
  • Customers see opportunities: Ideally, when two companies merge, customers say “this is exactly what I needed.” Rather than seeking out two solutions, for example, the customer gets one-stop-shopping from the new hybrid. It’s your job to help communicate this feeling across your stakeholder groups.
  • Employees see opportunities: And if you can also pull off a merger where employees in both companies see the transformation as good for their own careers, you’ve developed a winning communications strategy. Often employees of the smaller firm may feel anxious about being acquired. But if you can honestly demonstrate opportunities for career mobility, earnings potential, and other benefits of working for a larger company, it will go a long way toward easing transition tensions.

The above is only a sampling of the insights and best communications practices gained from Dan and Katy’s conversation. You can watch and listen to the 30-minute interview in its entirety, here. 

As everyone keeps saying, this crisis is unprecedented. Still, there is something to be said for working with a team that faces down chaos and keeps walking through the fire. We are here to help you figure out your next step and keep you moving forward. If you want to talk, we’re ready to strategize about your best next steps. 

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timing corporate communications

How to Think About Timing Big Announcements in the Age of Uncertainty (3 Questions You MUST Ask!)

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I first shared my thoughts about timing corporate communications back in December of 2016. The world looked very different then. We were still in the midst of the longest economic bull run in history. We were still shaking hands, going into the office, and not thinking twice about getting on a plane.

Yes, the corporate world looks very different today as we navigate the choppy waters of COVID-19. But best practices for when and how to make big announcements remain largely the same.

While it’s important to get the messaging right, when and how you say it matters as much—if not more than—what you say. So, let’s consider the big questions to ask before you drop a big announcement. 

1. Is your announcement subject to regulatory restrictions?

Markets may be a bit topsy-turvy at the moment, but you can assume that the existing federal regulatory rules of your industry still apply. There are rules regarding what you can communicate, to whom, when, and how. So make sure you brush up on the SEC disclosure requirements and the law relevant to your industry concerning timing corporate communications.

Also, make sure you stay up-to-date on the latest developments affecting your industry and any SEC statements about how they’re responding to the pandemic. This is especially crucial for firms subject to rules governed by The Division of Trading and Markets. 

Example: Material Announcements

Speaking of regulatory restrictions, Regulation Fair Disclosure (Reg FD) requires all publicly traded companies to release material information to all investors at the same time. Ideally, leadership would communicate the changes during a scheduled conference call with investors or a town hall meeting. Staying in touch with investors is critical.

In addition, to stay clear of Reg FD violations, remind directors, officers, and other corporate insiders that they should refrain from trading in the company’s securities until any risks that would be material to investors have been disclosed. The unknowns of COVID-19 put us in a fluid situation, so it’s even more important to stay vigilant here.

However, as always, if word of a material event or material information is inadvertently leaked to some investors or analysts (i.e., an “unintentional selective disclosure”), as soon as a senior company official learns of the disclosure, she is required to disclose the information publicly. Companies must make the announcement either (a) within 24 hours or (b) by the start of the next day’s trading on the New York Stock Exchange.

2. What are your competitors doing?

I know that you’re juggling a gazillion balls. But one of those balls has to be keeping an eye on the competition. I’m not asking you to be obsessed with your competitors—that’s not likely to be helpful either. Still, how much of a splash your announcement makes, whether positive or negative, at least partially depends on the behavior of your competition. So do pay attention.

If you have good news to share, you want to time the announcement carefully to capture as many likes, comments, and eyeballs as you can. With bad news, you want to be as transparent and complete as possible in your initial communications to avoid continually referencing the issue and detracting from your broader corporate strategy. 

Example: Product or Service Launch

Let’s say you have pivoted and are ready to roll out a new offering that will address an emerging need in your market. Sure, you are excited about the product or service. But if you rush to make the announcement without a solid strategy, you risk being overshadowed.

For example, suppose you suspect your competition might be working on a similar offering. Should you rush to beat them to market? While you might manage to steal their thunder by announcing early, you also need to think through the consequences of such a play. Could you lose credibility by putting out a product or service that hasn’t been thoroughly tested? Do you have a plan for dealing with a shouting match should your competitor start one?

While there’s no crystal ball to predict what opportunities are on the horizon, waiting a bit to make that big announcement can pay off. This is doubly true if your industry is experiencing extra volatility during this time.

In addition, if waiting to announce gives you time to gather crucial information about what your customer needs, this will ultimately result in a more successful launch. The benefits to rushing corporate communications here are few, while the costs can absolutely be a reputation killer.

3. Does your corporate communications policy respect your staff?

Communicating in a way that expresses empathy toward employees is key. Again, this isn’t just about the language of your messaging. It’s about timing corporate communications too. Some announcements affect your internal staff more than shareholders or the general public. Your employees and staff don’t deserve to hear bad news from external sources or through the rumor mill.

Example: Corporate Restructuring

When making an announcement like a corporate restructuring, it’s important not to take your staff for granted. Relationships internal to your company are as important, or even more important, than external partnerships if you want to come out of this reorganization with your corporate culture intact. If you focus on the interests of one group to the detriment of others being affected, you risk looking callous and insensitive.

So, follow this general rule: put as much thought into announcing corporate restructuring as you would into announcing a corporate acquisition. If layoffs are part of the strategy, be as transparent as you can about how you came to decisions about whom to let go and what this means for the company as well as individuals.

As with any external message, be mindful of how your internal announcement will affect your audience. Don’t let emotions get in the way. If you are the head of a division, the corporate restructuring might be bad news for you as well. But when you make the announcement to your team, be considerate of their feelings in hearing the news for the first time.

Having the right overall strategy for timing corporate communications takes a blend of planning, finding the right words, and practicing authentic human engagement. At Audacia Strategies, we have helped companies like yours find the right timing strategy for big announcements. Schedule a consultation to discuss your specific needs.

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business communications

The 7 Deadly Sins of Business Communications: How to Stay Out of the Marketing Rat Race

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For brands—as with celebrities, politicians, and CEOs—scandals and PR nightmares, like the Airbnb scam that recently came to light, are nearly impossible to hide from today’s connected consumers. As a result, the best approach to business communications is operating with transparency and trust.

This poses a challenge for marketers: how to navigate the trends, meet customers where they are, and ensure the messages being communicated are genuine and in alignment with their brand’s core values. The challenge is all the more difficult when we consider marketing as an all-out arms race where brands compete to showcase their products and services. 

Yes, it’s easy to get caught up in the rat race (with apologies for the mixed metaphor). So, let’s talk about how to stay out of it. The rewards will be waiting for you. When firms make an effort to avoid the seven deadly sins of business communications below, they often find customers do the marketing for them.

1. Pride – Lack of consideration for or understanding of your audience

We all know people who make everything all about themselves. When pride reveals itself in an individual, we distance ourselves from the individual. When pride reveals itself in a business, we tune out completely. 

To avoid the sin of pride in business communications, show your audience that you are listening. Do your research. This is Communications 101. But I get it. When you’re under pressure to respond to a crisis or you need to get your marketing campaign up and running yesterday, it’s tempting to believe that you know best. 

PRO TIP: Remember, the failure to hear your audience could easily spell failure for your firm.

2. Envy – Trying to ‘copy and paste’ another organization’s communications strategy or message because, hey, it worked for them

Whenever we’re developing a communications strategy, it’s natural to draw inspiration from other organizations. But remember that your organization, your stakeholders, and your situation are unique. If you simply borrow from what you see competitors doing, you risk missing out on the authentic connection.

And with all the data available to anyone with a website and a little ingenuity, there’s really no excuse for firms not to attempt some form of targeting and personalization. Of course, you’ll want to use caution here. Personalization can go too far. Make sure you don’t cross the line trading authenticity for ultra-creepy.

PRO TIP: Instead of ‘copy and paste’, try ‘customization and personalization’. 

3. Gluttony – Sometimes too much is just…too much

Strong business communications are direct and to the point. When executives, whether speaking to the internal team or speaking to the public, use extra words, include too many buzzwords, or belabor a point, they take the focus away from the core message. 

PRO TIP: Trim the fat by offering communications coaching or training for those in core leadership positions.

4. Sloth – There are few shortcuts in life (despite the astounding number of promised life “hacks” all over social media)

It’s hard work to step into the shoes of your audience (customers, employees, investors, etc.), to think about what matters to them, and to honestly consider how your message will resonate. But there’s really no getting around doing the hard stuff. 

Also, just because you put a lot of time and effort into building out customer personas, doesn’t mean your ideal customer will stay the same for decades. You need to constantly re-evaluate your message and tweak it for each audience, circumstance, or business goal.

PRO TIP: Good communicators make business communications look easy. But there’s nothing easy about effectively communicating with a variety of audiences.

5. Lust – It’s easy to fall in love with the buzzword of the week, the fancy communications tools, or new social media channels

It’s easy to become enchanted with shiny new things because we’re always looking for ways to take our companies to the next level. Indeed, I’ve referred to some business communications buzzwords (e.g., authenticity, customization, personalization) in this very article. And they can all be useful in some form or fashion, but without the scaffolding of a bigger strategy, they are simply distractions or crutches.

The next time you feel yourself lusting after the latest and greatest, pause and ask yourself: what’s in it for my audience? And, will it help me better engage with my audience? If the answers are ‘nothing’ and ‘no’, you may be leaning on lust to keep from doing the hard work of communicating (see above: Sloth).

PRO TIP: Forget about lust. Fall in love with buzzwords, fancy communications tools, and new social media channels only if you can clearly see how they help you better engage with your audience.

6. Anger – We’ve got a lot of conflict in our communication channels these days

While there is something to be said for playing to the emotions of our audiences to invoke feelings of urgency, anger is not always the most effective way to motivate action or provoke conversation. Generally, anger is more of a monologue than a dialogue and when every communication is perceived as angry, it all sounds the same. Conversation, engagement, and attention work better for long term progress.

Non-profit organizations may especially want to take note here. You can establish a sense of urgency, while opening the door to a path where you can move forward together. It’s important to display your passion for issues and causes you care about, but passion without direction results in lost opportunities. 

PRO TIP: Beware of anger, the sugar high of business communications. It might give you a quick hit, but it will evaporate quickly.

7. Greed – It’s okay to make an ask! But ask yourself who will benefit

It’s perfectly okay and even encouraged for every communication to include a call to action—heck, we all need a good call to action, particularly in business. But when the ask is aligned to the benefit of a few (or perceived to be for the benefit of a few) the conversation falls flat.

Additionally, remember that not every CTA needs to be “buy my stuff.” When you think about generating leads, try thinking in terms of how you can help your customers, rather than how you can get more people to click on your link.

All the SEO and marketing tricks you can buy won’t replace the success that comes from following these three steps:

  • Do what you say you’re going to do
  • When you say you’re going to do it
  • Exactly how you said you would do it

PRO TIP: Business is the ultimate team sport. If the ask doesn’t also provide a “win” or a meaningful trade (of knowledge, services, etc.), then it’s hard to elicit champions for your cause.

As your company grows and you become more successful, business communications will become more complicated. Don’t let success cloud your vision of what’s truly important in your business: your customers and your employees.

If you notice any of these seven deadly sins creeping around your business practices, it might be time for a change. Audacia Strategies is ready to step in. We won’t give you absolution or assign you penance for your sins, but we can put your business communications back on the path to transparency and trust. Let’s Talk!

Photo credit: https://www.canva.com/robertkneschke/

crisis management strategy

Your Crisis Management Strategy When You Need to Walk Through the Fire…and Keep Walking

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Your company can’t seem to make money, your executives are constantly in the news for the wrong reasons, and your plane still isn’t flying. Yeah. It’s been a rough few weeks/months/years. 

Recently, I talked about what to do at the onset of a crisis, but what happens if you can’t immediately get a handle on the crisis? What is your crisis management strategy for living through the day-to-day of a crisis that seems to go on forever? The initial response with employees and customers requires getting to the ground truth quickly and relaying as many of the facts as you can, while taking action. 

Some of these same elements continue to be relevant in dealing with the fallout of a long term crisis. But what’s crucial for an effective crisis management strategy is being perceived as a company that is moving forward and not one hoping that maybe after enough time passes, everyone will forgive or at least FORGET. When facing damage from a crisis that just will not die, you need a plan for resolution and rebuilding.

Putting Out the Fire vs. Leading Through the Fire

One of the most challenging tests of a great leader is how they deal with a crisis. To pass this test, it takes two skills: knowing how to put out fires and knowing how to lead through fire. 

Every executive has to deal with surprises and being in business likely means you’ll have to put out some fires eventually. Especially as your company expands, those fires will seem bigger, or at least the potential for fires gets bigger. When it comes to putting out the fire of a PR crisis, the name of the game is regaining control. 

For example, you may remember that back in 2016, after the shooting in San Bernardino, the FBI demanded that Apple build a “backdoor” giving the authorities the ability to circumvent Apple’s data encryption and unlock any iPhone. In response, Apple’s CEO, Tim Cook, effectively took control of the story writing this letter: ”A Message to Our Customers.” Tim Cook knows how to put out fires.

However, there are times when you cannot expect to turn things around so quickly or the fires you thought you put out actually continue to smolder. In these cases, leaders must develop a crisis management strategy for continuing to lead even through the crisis. 

Here are some tips for moving forward through the fire: 

1. Continue to focus on transparency and the truth.

While it can be tempting to say whatever you believe will finally put an end to this crisis, resist the urge to “whitewash” the truth. Keep in mind that following your gut and making quick, impulsive decisions is not a valid crisis management strategy and won’t likely get you through this crisis any faster. Impulsive decisions often result in a further loss of power.

Instead, you’ve got to slow down. It will be uncomfortable to tell the truth and only the truth. The media, your employees, your stakeholders, and your customers will likely push for more information. This is difficult to deal with, especially day in and day out. But if you haven’t worked out all the details, do not speculate. Remember that you are engaged in a game of chess here—not rock, paper, scissors. 

2. Work with your team to identify how the firm is preparing to resolve the crisis and (hopefully) prevent another in the future. 

One way to relieve the discomfort of having to stick to the facts, when you don’t have many facts to offer, is to take action so that you have more to talk about. Of course, I’m not suggesting you take any random action that comes to mind. Again, impulsive decisions are almost never the right move.

Instead, work closely with your team to come up with new policies and processes that help your company is ready to move forward. If new training would prevent a similar problem in the future, take steps to implement new training programs as part of your crisis management strategy, for instance. Also, consider what would improve both internal and external communications in the future.

For example, Stanford University recently changed their leave of absence policy for students facing a mental health crisis in the wake of a class action lawsuit alleging discrimination. In her message to students, Vice Provost for Student Affairs, Susie Brubaker-Cole, said, “my colleagues and I have learned from our conversations with you, and our campus community is stronger because of your advocacy.” She went on to say, “together, we are making significant progress, and this new policy is a critical component.”

3. Do NOT stop communicating, either internally or externally. 

No matter what crisis management strategy you ultimately choose, remember to continue communicating as much as possible. Hiding away and hoping you can weather the storm without facing questions from your employees or the public will only cause more problems. 

Instead, keep your leadership visible and ready to answer questions. Have top leaders communicate internally through regular town hall meetings, Zoom meetings, pre-recorded videos, manager talking points, or even just walking through the cafeteria. 

By the way, communicating does not mean you have to take every accusation “on the chin,” but certainly continue to address the issue(s) with employees via your identified channels. Also, be sure to proactively offer appropriate updates to customers, regulators, investors, etc.

Communicate, both internally and externally:

  • What’s the latest 
  • What has changed 
  • What remains the same

Remind your leadership team not to say anything to employees that they wouldn’t say outside the company. This can be controversial, but it’s a reality. Memos leak. Video and audio can be shared. Be transparent and be prepared for what that means inside and outside the company.

4. Focus on sharing your strategy—value proposition. 

This final point is perhaps the most important aspect of any crisis management strategy: go back to the heart and soul of your company wherever possible. It’s a good idea to look at this crisis from a 360-degree angle. Remind your customers why you do what you do and emphasize that you are looking at this issue as only a blip on the radar. 

The point is not to dazzle or distract from the crisis, but to provide context about what your firm does, why, and how you remain committed to that strategy/mission. Ideally, any new processes, policies, actions are in support of continuing to advance the vision of your organization. With surgical precision, you are removing an imperfection and you will be stronger following this recovery. 

Keep this message close at hand, no matter how bleak things look. And always know that every crisis comes to an end eventually. I know that cliches sound so empty when you’re standing in the middle of the chaos and I know you’ve heard them all, but maybe you can take comfort in the words of one great American entrepreneur, Henry Ford, “Failure is only the opportunity to begin again, this time more intelligently.” 

If you’re standing in the middle of a crisis right now, don’t go it alone. Find your tribe. Gather your advocates. And build your crisis management team. Fear might leave you feeling paralyzed at the moment, but you can trust the experts at Audacia Strategies. We’ll help you find the right crisis management strategy. Chaos is our brand, so you can bet we know how to walk through the fire. Contact us and let’s get to work!

photo by Authentic Images

crisis response strategy

The 5 G’s for Walking Through Fire Without Getting Burned–Your Internal Crisis Response Strategy

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We’ve all had those days. You know, the days where you are forced to pull your IPO and your CEO gets fired, or Congress launches an official investigation into your safety procedures, or your company is the target of whistleblower claims. 

No? You’ve never experienced a business crisis like this? Then, you’re one of the lucky ones. But keep reading because even if it’s not to the scale of the situations above, you may someday find yourself in a sticky business credibility situation. 

We’ve talked before about preparing a crisis response strategy from a PR perspective. Now I’d like to take a look at what to do inside a business. How do you handle your response with employees and customers?

How to Respond to a Business Crisis

When a challenge to your firm’s reputation arises, it’s important that you meet the challenge with a crisis response strategy not only for rebuilding your brand’s outward facing reputation, but also for addressing the crisis internally. You can’t expect your team or customers to read between the lines of your external messaging. Plus, you owe it to them to communicate beyond the “party line.”

As always, I recommend creating your crisis response strategy well before you find yourself walking into the chaos of a crisis. Consider the following 5 G’s as you build your framework:

1. Get to ground truth.

When a crisis happens, it’s important to keep two things in mind: you need to respond promptly and you need to respond truthfully. Surviving the crisis is all about how you balance these two factors. There can be a tendency to sacrifice truth for the sake of speed and vice versa. Ideally, you will avoid both pitfalls.

DO NOT SPECULATE. Your internal crisis response strategy should be informed by what you know, but you cannot wait to respond until you have absolutely all of the facts in front of you. So what can you do? Be transparent about what you know, where you are in the process and what you are doing. It’s important to acknowledge the credibility challenges (all of them), allow any legal processes to proceed, and identify and explain the steps you are taking.

2. Gather your team.

Even if you are the only person in your particular department, you will need a team. Whether you’re in finance, legal, communications, HR—as the saying goes, “look for the helpers.” Remember, it takes time to gather your team. So plan ahead and notify the relevant parties that you may call on them and what roles they will play in the crisis response strategy.

Once you’ve gathered your team, listen to them. It can be tempting to be reactive, but try to get a well rounded perspective before making any big decisions. Otherwise, you run the risk of overpromising in the hopes that you can make the whole thing go away. 

Instead, get a baseline. Get perspective. And give context.

  • Did your numbers tank this quarter? Focus on the data, not drama. Look at firm-wide numbers, the market, and get a line on how competitors are faring. You need a clear baseline before you can respond realistically.
  • Is there a government investigation? Get to ground truth (see above). Work closely with your legal department, but also encourage as much transparency as possible. The appearance of concealing or stonewalling is not a good look either inside or outside the firm.
  • Is someone accused of misconduct? Again, get to ground truth (see above). Also, consider re-emphasizing policies, values, and company culture within the firm (assuming they are not the cause of the misconduct).

3. Give employees the support they need.

Employees are most likely to end up on the frontlines during a crisis. They will be communicating with customers, other employees, regulators, etc. Do not leave them “swinging in the wind” as they try to clean up the mess they didn’t create.

Arm them with the facts and engage them in an ongoing and transparent conversation about what the firm is doing to repair or recover its reputation. Use the channels appropriate for your organization—email, text, newsletter, video, Slack, person-to-person meetings, etc. 

Meet employees where they are—during a crisis they should not have to search for answers. Part of your crisis response strategy should include resources for employees on the frontlines. Communicate with employees early and often.

  • Whenever possible keep the touch personal. For example, answer questions during a town hall, Zoom meeting, or video conference.
  • Create manager talking points ahead of time and distribute them as soon as you’re ready after a crisis hits.
  • Don’t say anything to employees that you wouldn’t say outside the company. This can be controversial, but it’s reality. Memos leak. Video and audio recordings can be shared. Screenshots can end up in the wrong hands. Be transparent and be prepared for what that means inside and outside the company.

4. Go on the offensive with customers. 

If the crisis impacts customers directly or has been/will be in the press, go on the offensive and own the issue. Rather than trying to totally control the crisis, though, let your mindset be one of getting your version of the facts out first. Again, make sure you explain to employees what your crisis response strategy looks like with regard to customers. 

Keep in mind, this doesn’t mean sugarcoating anything. Be transparent about next steps and honest about the potential impact (if any) on clients. Also, be sure that your customer communications are consistent with employee communications. As you consider these messages, your tone may differ, but the overall message should be consistent. The same goes for investors.

5. Grant trust. 

Follow the above 4 G’s and this last G should come naturally. When you create your crisis response strategy ahead of time, you’ll have the luxury of being able to fallback on your process. In the midst of a crisis situation, when it feels like everything is burning all around you, don’t underestimate the power of being able to trust in your people to execute on your process. 

How can you be so confident? Well, the confidence comes from having a strategy, knowing your audience, and believing in the human response to truth-telling. There’s a lot to be said for a company that owns up to mistakes and expertly pivots when crises arise. 

Whether you’re facing a small-scale crisis or a crisis of epic proportions like those recently faced by WeWork, Boeing, or GE, it’s helpful to remember other leaders have walked through the fire of chaos themselves. As Abraham Lincoln—no stranger to facing a crisis—once said, “I am a firm believer in the people. If given the truth, they can be depended upon to meet any national crisis. The great point is to bring them the real facts.”

At Audacia Strategies, we’re no strangers to facing a crisis either. We’ve walked with our clients through the fire using the 5 G’s and we can help your firm develop the crisis response strategy that works for you as well. Schedule a consultation so we can talk about your needs.

Photo credit: Rawpixel

failure communications

How To Do Failure Communications Right—3 Communications Lessons Learned About What To Do When We Fall

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We naturally spend a lot of time thinking about what a successful communications strategy looks like. This a good thing. Communicating your company’s message and values is crucial for standing out amongst your closest competitors. But have you also thought about a failure communications strategy?

<INSERT> Awkward silence.

failureRight. Let’s get uncomfortable today. Let’s talk failure. If you’re rolling your eyes now because you think you know what’s coming, keep reading. This isn’t going to be the “Failure is an amazing teacher!” pablum that we’ve all grown so tired of hearing. No. This is real talk about what to do when the sh*t hits the fan, when we disappoint ourselves and others, or when we just fall flat on our faces.

Rothy’s and How to Do Failure Communications Right

I recently received an email from shoe startup, Rothy’s, that stopped me in my tracks (Yes, Rothy’s is a favorite brand of mine. But don’t worry, this is not an endorsement or a sales pitch. It’s just an example of an excellent communications strategy). 

For months, Rothy’s had been teasing its latest shoe, a summertime slide with a vegan leather sole. The day before the shoe was supposed to launch, Rothy’s told its customers that the shoe’s launch was off. Apparently, scaling from prototype to production resulted in quality issues that couldn’t be fixed in time for the summer season.

The email they sent wasn’t a sale announcement or a giveaway begging customers not to leave. The subject line was: “Ouch.” The first line included the words “truthful and transparent.” It was an apology. But not the kind of lackluster corporate apology you might expect from a CEO who is clearly following instructions provided by legal. It was the kind of apology that left me feeling a greater respect for Rothy’s and its leadership.

What Rothy’s apology got right:

  • They took responsibility both for the mistake and for the decision to cancel the launch of a new product
  • They explained why they made the decision to cancel the launch
  • The reason they gave was all about looking out for the customer
  • They referred to their company values (i.e., “we pride ourselves on making the right decision—even when it’s really hard”) and their quality standards (i.e., “we will only launch product when every piece is perfect”)
  • They acknowledged how disappointing this decision is, but reiterated their confidence in making this difficult decision

They sent this email the day before the launch. 

Think about that—consider the time and money invested in design, marketing, production. Consider the sales expectations already baked into the firm’s annual plans. Think about the discussions that were likely happening behind the scenes to make the decision to pull the launch just hours before it was scheduled. Yet, they went through with the apology because leadership believed it was right.

3 Lessons Learned From Rothy’s Apology

If you stay in business long enough, failure is inevitable. Every seasoned business leader has “war stories.” Failure hurts. It hurts to consider the financial impact. It hurts to consider the customer impact and the blow to your brand (or personal) credibility. And, let’s be honest. It’s an ego blow. 

What sets apart those who master the art of turning lemons into lemonade from those who just leave customers with a sour taste? Let’s look at 3 lessons we can learn from Rothy’s literal failure to launch.

1. Failure can humanize your brand.

Failure sucks—there’s no getting around that—and doing the right thing can be incredibly painful. But as you work through the failure, acknowledging the pain humanizes your brand and aligns your goals with your customers’ expectations. 

When you fail, make it right if you can. But when you can’t, acknowledge the human aspects of disappointment and talk openly about how you will do better going forward. Trust your customers enough to put it all out there.

2. Transparency works.

Whether you’re communicating with customers, investors, or media, prioritize simple honesty. We don’t have to martyr ourselves or get too far into the weeds of how and why we failed. But we should be honest about the situation and what we’re doing about it. At the end of the day, this is all anyone can expect after a crisis. You can’t turn back time as much as you might wish you could.

3. Live your values. 

Failure is the greatest test of your values as a company. This really is where the “rubber meets the road.” After Facebook admitted to selling our data, one of the biggest criticisms was really a question about the company’s values. The “apology” ad reminding us of how much we all love Facebook felt like a sham after everything that came out. 

Communicating about failure, when done right, gives us a chance to remind others about our values, why they are important, and how they provide a better experience. That’s what I liked the most about Rothy’s communication. They acknowledged the failure right up front and they explained their highly personal calculus behind pulling the launch: that the poor quality shoe would be a bigger hit to their brand credibility than not launching the shoe at all. 

It was a fantastic example of transparency, honesty about business decisions, and a real example of living your corporate values. I’m sure that behind the scenes at Rothy’s HQ there are some heavy discussions taking place to understand why they failed on this product launch. But, they lived to fight another day and made their customers feel prioritized. 

Rothy’s launch fail is an excellent example of making lemonade out of lemons. You can perfect your brand’s lemonade recipe with these other blog articles:

And you can always work with a pro like Audacia Strategies to establish your failure communications or crisis communications strategy. We can also help create a strategy for successful communications, of course! Contact us today to talk about your unique needs.

Image by rawpixel from Pixabay

working with a communications specialist

Audacia’s Guide to Working With a Communications Specialist—Fabulous Business Transformations Begins With Smart Preparation

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You have a glimmer of a change in your mind…a transformation. Perhaps you’re considering an acquisition, a new product launch, a fundraising round, or implementing a new, game-changing internal system. You’re excited, but you’re also practical. You know big, bold moves that lead to transformation require time, energy, and money.

What can you do today to set yourself up for success down the road? You need the A-team onboard to make this work and that means you need some external expertise—lawyers, financial specialists, technology specialists, and yes, even (or dare I say, especially) communications specialists.

Business TransformationsAnd if you’re extra ready to be wildly successful, you will want to be as prepared as the professionals you’ve gathered. So, here’s everything you need to know when working with a communications specialist.

Where to begin and how to set yourself up for success?

1. Find the right consultant early in your process.

Often, finding the right external talent takes time and effort up front. But keep in mind that you don’t need to save this task until crunch time. Just as you prospect for clients, you should always be prospecting for external talent. This way, when you’re ready to make that big move, you won’t lose momentum searching for the right consultant.

Have a conversation before you think it’s time. Most consultants are more than willing to sign a non-disclosure agreement (NDA) to ensure that you can have a candid conversation about your goals and expectations without the risk of giving away anything precious (And if consultants aren’t willing to sign an NDA, you should run).

In addition, starting the conversation and integrating the team early in your planning process allows you the benefit of their expertise as you build your strategy.  Working with a communications specialist early on can help you shape your plan to be even more likely to deliver the ROI that we all seek.

2. Ask for recommendations.

Prospecting for consultants can extend to prospecting for other business partners and strategists. Who has your consultant worked with before and are they willing to speak with you? I LOVE connecting my clients. Success stories sound best coming directly from happy clients and word-of-mouth is a great way to find those hidden gems who can really propel your business forward. Plus, you never know when clients might find some business opportunity together in their conversations. So, spread the love!

3. Consider company culture.

It’s also smart to consider company culture—yours and theirs. Diversity of thought and experience is critical, but if your organizational culture and theirs are 180-degrees different, chances are that you will have a hard time communicating effectively and that will make your interactions less efficient. Look for any clues about how working with a communications specialist could support or clash with your company culture and strategize accordingly.

4. Be ready for an in-depth conversation.

A good consultant asks lots of questions and really listens to your answers so that they can provide their best counsel. As advisors, our role is to hear you and help to accomplish your Big Idea. And, a good advisor will ask a lot of follow-on questions to get to the heart of a challenge.

For working with a communications specialist to be worth your while, it’s important that you can answer your expert’s questions to the best of your ability. So, you absolutely will want to treat every conversation like you’re entering the Shark Tank. Okay, it probably won’t be that bad, but be ready to have your assumptions challenged.

Remember, you can ask questions too. Do they have examples of their work available? A blog? Do they post on LinkedIn to share their knowledge? These are good places to start getting to know your consultant.

Also, don’t be surprised if that first conversation or two results in your consultant saying, “I don’t think that our firm is right for you at this time but you should really speak with ABC Consulting because they’ll knock this out of the park. I’m happy to make an introduction.” Don’t take it personally. This is how professionals do business.

5. Be ready to talk $$$.

Yes, I’m going there. Have a budget in mind. Be ready to discuss that budget. Budget guessing games waste everyone’s time. Communicate your budget requirements and expectations upfront. With budget guidance, a consultancy will offer you a plan that will get you to your desired outcome in the most efficient way, while staying within the budget you have. It will also save you from wasting time talking to the wrong consultants.

By the way, this means more than finding the cheapest vendor. An inexperienced consultancy who is cheaper, but takes a longer time to reach your goal and requires more time to get up to speed on your company or market, may be more costly in the end. It might make better sense to hire an experienced consultant who can reach your goal more quickly, but with higher bill rates.

6. But don’t fall into the trap of thinking only about money.

On a personal note, I find that some clients spend a lot of time thinking about the finances of a transformative event, but very little time thinking about how they’re going to communicate this event to customers, shareholders, employees, etc.

It’s easy to get swept up in the new idea and believe that everyone will think it’s a great idea too. But the reality is that change is change. Not everyone is going to be onboard. So, the sooner you start to think about how to communicate this Big Idea beyond the conference room walls, the better.

7. Focus on the outcome, not the time needed to deliver it.

No, this isn’t consultant-speak for “let me charge you more.” This is straight-talk. I want you to be successful as much as you want to be successful and I really don’t want you to feel like every minute you spend talking to me will cost you money. By focusing on the business outcome, rather than on the hours, you’re holding the consulting firm accountable for the results within the timeline and the budget that you have.

8. Set realistic expectations for working together.

Working with a consulting firm is not a one-way street. Do not expect that your consultant will hit the ground running on Day One and come back to you when the project is over. The best way to get as much as possible from your advisors is through collaboration where both parties are taking an active role.

You will want to think of your consultant team as an extension of your team. Invite your consultant to be present on-site, get into the weeds with you, and get integrated within your team. That’s the only way they can get a deep understanding of the challenges you’re facing and, ultimately, identify the best solution. Without making such allowances, working with a communications specialist will be frustrating for everyone involved.

If 2019 holds a glimmer of change for your firm, make sure your team is set up for wild success. We’ve consulted on transformations from product launches to CEO transitions and everything in between. Would you like to know how working with a communications specialist could propel your work forward in New Year? Schedule a discovery session and let’s discuss!

Photo credit: primagefactory

successful M&A deal

Let’s Make a…Successful M&A Deal! 5 Keys to Landing A Deal You’re Proud Of

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Deciding to embark on a merger or acquisition (M&A) is one of the biggest transformations during the lifecycle of any business. Thinking in terms of resources alone, your money, time, and credibility are all on the line here. To land a successful M&A deal, you’ve got to be on top of your game.

If you focus too hard on all that’s at stake, though, you may not be in a position to make the best deal. In other words, don’t miss the forest for the trees—go in with your eyes wide open. Although it can be nerve-wracking to jump into an M&A deal, keeping the below 5 key points in mind should help you get through the process with your nerves firmly intact.

But first…let’s consider what not to do

Pushing through a successful M&A deal like acquiring a competitor or joining forces with a powerful peer is invigorating. But what’s invigorating on the day you sign on the dotted line can quickly deteriorate into something akin to buyers’ remorse if you haven’t thought things through.

Here are just a handful of the mistakes we’ve seen get in the way of a successful M&A deal:

  • Companies WAY overpaying for what they’re buying
  • Leaders forgetting that cultural fit between companies matters just as much (if not more) than securing cutting edge technology or getting a contract
  • Too little too late: companies being slow to consider market shifts and jumping in too late to address their gaps with M&A
  • Not considering the bigger corporate story—big, expensive “surprises” that don’t obviously fit are a tough sell and put you on the defensive with investors, customers, etc.
  • Failing to communicate with all shareholders. Remember, those little shops can band together to become an activist consortium

To avoid adding to this list, consider engaging a team who can lead you through any necessary course corrections. At Audacia Strategies, our core competencies revolve around helping clients consider their bigger corporate story and communicating with shareholders when making big, bold moves like this. You can also make sure everyone checks her ego a the door, by considering the following:

5 Keys to a Successful M&A Deal

1. Deal Fever Is Real.

You and your team have spent late nights, long weekends, blood, sweat, and tears pursuing this deal. You have done all that great valuation work to come up with a fair acquisition price. And now, you’re at the negotiating table (you can almost hear “Eye of the Tiger” playing in the background). And, you’re bidding against other firms… and the price is going up, and up, and up. It’s very easy to get caught up thinking, “I’ll show them. We’re going to win this thing at all costs.” It happens All.The.Time.

Successful M&A DealThe reality is while it’s good practice to come to the negotiating table with a valuation range that you’re willing to pay, it doesn’t pay to start warping your analysis just to “win.” This is how companies end up with massive write-downs a few years after a deal when they can’t achieve the value they needed to make the price they overpaid work.

It may be obvious, but even large companies are susceptible to deal fever. Want an example? See also:

Why does this happen and how can you control for it? Well, the short story is: all business deals are closed by human beings and the decisions human beings make are often influenced by emotional and psychological factors. Executives on both the buy side and the sell side can get caught up in their perception of the company and the management, for example. So, if you feel tensions running high and fear that you or your team are losing touch with your real goals, don’t be afraid to step back from the negotiating table to catch your breath or even walk away from the deal entirely.

Ask yourself:

  • What are the stories we’re telling ourselves?
  • How can we challenge these stories to get to the real story?

And remember Dan Doran’s advice: “Value is analyzed. Price is negotiated.” It’s crucial that you build your own valuation model, one that you’re completely comfortable with and can explain to stakeholders if (or when) challenges arise. One of the worst things you can do is rely on a target’s (very pretty, but very likely) biased projections. Do your own research. Do the work.

2. Due Diligence Is A Lot Like Going To The Dentist.

It is not glamorous, but it is necessary. Due diligence can be the difference between a successful M&A deal and one that feels like getting a root canal. To make this work for you, go beyond the financials (after making sure they work and are coherent, of course!) to really understand the logic behind the deal on every level. You need to consider carefully the reality of your team’s ability to create (or “unlock”) value in bringing two (or more) firms together.

3. Customers Matter.

Once you have your head wrapped around the business valuation and the inner workings of this new mash-up of a business being born, you’ve got to think about relationships external to the organization. Get into the weeds about how strong the current customer relationships are and how they affect the bottom line.

Ask these questions:

  • How much of current revenue depends on repeat customers vs acquiring new customers?
  • What is the cost of acquiring a new customer?
  • How strong is the current business pipeline?

4. Get Real About Your Competition.

You definitely want to take a look at where your target stands when it comes to market share, revenues, and profit, but also dig more deeply. Keep in mind, you are proposing a potential shake-up of the market here. Even if they’re tough to predict, consider all the ways in which this bombshell of a deal is going to have significant ripple effects outward.

Ask these questions:

  • Where in the value chain is your target excelling? Failing?
  • What changes can you realistically make to capitalize on strengths or cut the dead weight?
  • How do they stack up against their peers?
  • How do you expect competitors to react to a combined firm?
  • Will you have the wherewithal to combat a price war for example?

5. The Problem With “Synergies.”

I can’t really remember if Professor Mariann Jelinek shared this pearl of wisdom with us on the first day of my strategy class at The College of William and Mary, but she definitely shared it early and often: “When someone says ‘synergy,’ hold onto your wallet.” Throughout my MBA program and even to this day, I think no truer words have ever been spoken.

As a buzzword, synergy is overused and honestly, a red flag in most cases. Like pretty wallpaper covering an ugly stain, “these teams have a lot of synergy” is a pretty-sounding way of saying very little. As easy as it is for deal participants to get caught up in the possibilities and truly, badly, deeply underestimate the time it will take to achieve whatever they’re dreaming of, it’s equally as easy to overestimate the value of both cost and revenue synergies.

In the rush to eliminate redundancies and expand market share, a lot of details can get overlooked about what the new procedure will look like. Slow down and think things through at each stage.

Ask yourself:

  • How are we going to make more money by putting two firms together?
  • Do we have a crackerjack post-acquisition integration team ready to put our plan into action?
  • Do we have a good sense of what might go wrong in this integration? What’s our worst-case scenario?

Yes, there is a lot at stake when you’re spearheading what could easily be the biggest deal in your company’s history. But you can handle it. You’ve done the work and now you’ve got these 5 keys in your pocket. So you’re ready to seal that successful M&A deal.

Have questions? Want to talk through your deal with an experienced team? Audacia Strategies is here for you. We’ve helped businesses successfully navigate M&A deals and other big transformations. And we’re fun to work with! Contact us at info@audaciastrategies.com or give us a call at 202-521-7917 to schedule a consultation.

Photo credit: kzenon