Growth in Turbulent Times

Corporate SouthAfrica’s response to the March 2020 lockdown as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic resulted in reactive, crisis management measures to generate and preserve balance sheet liquidity and protect their cash positions

Recognising that the world is constantly changing is a first key step, but insight doesn’t create change. To lead through change requires leaders to actively engage, think, explore, learn and ultimately adapt how they do things to ensure their organisations make the changes required to survive and thrive.

In 2014 Monitor Deloitte defined the concept of an “Advantaged Portfolio” (source: Armstrong, Goodman, McTavish – The Crux of Corporate Strategy. Building an Advantaged Portfolio).

At Deloitte, we have developed Dynamic Strategy, which helps organisations and businesses to identify the drivers and uncertainties of a turbulent future, anticipating the impact of plausible and divergent scenarios on an organisation’s strategy and navigating that future by adapting the strategy to an ever-changing environment.

As organisations shape their growth strategy, it is important to embed a level of transparency and challenge into organic and inorganic growth to avoid pitfalls and costly mistakes.

Companies already derive revenues from their core business. It is no big step to look at opportunities adjacent to their core business – less risk through leveraging current strengths.

Embedding ESG (economic, social, governance) goals into business strategy has been shown to have a positive impact on returns and shareholder sentiment.