Resilient Growth

Drive customer focus, product innovation and market/revenue growth

Resilient organisations thrive in the face of adversity by leveraging the competitive advantage of their core strengths, ensuring that future growth is meaningful and sustainable over time.

Sustainable growth comes from maintaining the core strengths of the organisation, while realigning them with changing customer needs to maintain their continuing relevance. Resilience in the face of adversity can often be a case of having the conviction to resist being distracted from what we do best, what we might call it our ‘core purpose’.

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Growth starts with you.

Three questions before you begin

Overview

The path to sustainable growth

comes from maintaining the core strengths of the organisation, while realigning them with changing customer needs to maintain their continuing relevance. Resilience in the face of adversity can often be a case of having the conviction to resist being distracted from what we do best, what we might call it our ‘core purpose’.

This goes deeper than the products and services we offer (which might have become less relevant following recent events); it means focussing on what sets our organisation apart from others that do similar things, giving us a competitive advantage in the minds of our customers. It then means following closely and listening carefully to their changing needs, responding quickly while maintaining the distinctive advantages that will continue to differentiate us.

The trusted rapport that develops between the resilient organisation and its customers is what underpins its future growth, it provides the confidence it needs to invest in new products and services that will continue to align with their changing needs. This alert and responsive approach is central to resilience and will be increasingly important given the inevitability of future change. They thrive by developing and maintaining the agility to embrace the winds of change, quickly reorienting to capitalise on new opportunities they create, rather than being blown onto the rocks by them. When unprepared organisations stumble, resilient ones will be ready to step-in and prosper.

True resilience then, means having a sustainable, long-term business model that can flex and respond to change enabling the organisation to remain relevant to the fast evolving needs of today's and tomorrow’s customers. They are sure foundations for genuine and enduring growth.

The path to growth begins with three questions, we invite you to explore on the following tabs:

1. Who are you?

2. What makes you?

3. How do you grow?

Who are you?

What business are you in?

Sustainable growth in resilient organisations relies on a clear understanding of current and potential strengths, aligned with current and future opportunities. At the heart of these lie the essential core strengths should be what differentiates the organization in the minds of its customers. There also needs to an appreciation of where exactly the organisation plays in the value chain, this will determine where it can deliver, and earn, the greatest value, as well as suggesting how it might grow within or beyond this point in the chain. The external forces affecting their operation must then be considered these can be anything from competitor innovations and market opportunities to dealing with the implications of a full-scale global pandemic (and anything in between).

What can you do better than anyone else?

It is important to step back and be honest about where the organisation adds the most value for its customers. This will demand genuine customer insight and understanding. Where is the sweet spot? What makes customers come back for more? The answer to this can be essentially rational (performance advantage, pricing, faster or more reliable supply, etc.) or emotional (brand appeal, personal chemistry, long-term loyalty, etc.) or, most likely, a combination of the two.

Our consulting teams have the breadth of understanding and big picture perspective to help clients clearly identify what makes their offerings special and different from anyone else’s. We can also offer in depth qualitative and quantitative customer research solutions—asking the right questions to help find the most resilient and sustainable solutions.

Should you grow by focussing or extending your position in the value chain?

If the organisation has a reputation for, say, outstanding customer care and responsive service, would it make sense to diversify into an area where these qualities could not be maintained? Should the organisation grow organically while maintaining its specialist focus or should a complementary M&A opportunity be sought? Similarly, it might have strong interpersonal relationships with customers, but little understanding, or interest in, data driven customer profiling technologies. Should it invest in building these capabilities itself or find a cloud based solution provided by an external specialist?

These are typical of the kinds of future growth options that we regularly help clients evaluate. Our network of specialist partners can also offer a range of practical solutions to help bring any future growth strategy to life.

How will the dynamics of the marketplace affect your future trajectory?

It has been said that change is the only constant we can bank on. Competitors, markets, society, politics and, of course, pandemics, all risk destabilising any organisation that lacks the resilience needed to stay focussed on its core strengths while maintaining the responsive agility needed to attend to changing customer needs and remain as relevant as ever.

Our market insights and extensive monitoring and research offerings can diffuse the anxiety of the unknown to enable our clients to take stock of any threat and develop greater resilience.

What makes you?

How can your unique capabilities be leveraged to grow a more resilient business?

Having determined the unique capabilities of the organisation, based on its core strengths and focal point in the value chain, a future growth strategy can be developed that reinforces organisational resilience while mitigating against any potential vulnerabilities (which could be anything from the security of material supply to the security of online data).

The transferability, scalability of the organisation’s core strengths will also determine the extent to which lends itself to being extended into new markets, geographies, sectors or applications. How much scope might there be, for example, to extend and grow these core strengths by vertical integration? How long will they remain relevant as markets evolve? How should they be updated in the light of rapidly changing technology? Should additional strengths be sought?

Deloitte has the strategic and operational capabilities, as well as the joined-up thinking to help explore the challenges presented by different growth opportunities from an end-to-end, multi-disciplinary perspective.

"Determining what makes the organisation unique is to define the territory it can own, grow and defend with resilience."

How do you grow?

What is the route to achieving your growth ambitions?

Having determined the future growth trajectory, it is time to put the thinking into practice and start planning the journey. How will we get there? Can we get an expert opinion on the route before we set-off? What are the key milestones along the way and what roadside support might we need?

Phase 1: Defining the journey

In this phase the organisation knows it needs to reinvent itself to grow but remains in a quandary about how exactly it should be redefined and what it should aspire to become. They’ve seen the guidebooks, imagined the options but can’t yet decide on the final destination.

Three women in front of wall of stickers brainstorming

Phase 2: Validating the route

The organisation has a relatively clear view of what it wants to become but just needs the confidence of validating its chosen route with an experienced expert before setting off. Is this going the quickest way to get there? Will it enable us to avoid the most obvious pitfalls and obstacles? Is there a more efficient, economical (or environmentally friendly) way to get there?

Phase 3: Navigating the road

The journey is under way, the organisation has a clear view of the road ahead, but they are going to have to stop and check the map occasionally, as well as checking they are still on the right road. They might even have to navigate a few unexpected bumps and detours along the way and seek additional help if the conditions turn nasty.

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Resilient Growth