Advisory

Our advisory and consulting practice focuses on helping our clients solve their most critical and significant business challenges. Advisory places emphasis on guiding our clients in the right direction and providing the plans, frameworks, and tools needed to execute the right solutions for their business. We cut through organizational complexities and provide reflective solutions which are implementable and promote sustainable results. From the development of 5 year strategic plans, to redesigning organizational structures and processes, to building the right performance management infrastructure, our advisory practice cuts across four main segments. These segments represent the four main limbs of the organizational organism:

  • Strategy
  • Operations
  • Organization
  • People and Culture

As we are in the business of execution, the consulting that is provided is always done through the lens of execution. This leads to very detailed roadmaps and solutions which can be easily handed over to our clients for implementation. We use a pragmatic approach and ensure that provided solutions are aligned to the organization’s resources and capabilities. This mismatch between strategies and organizational resources and capabilities often leads to failure at execution.

It is known fact that many consulting solutions which organizations invest in are never implemented. A significant part of this problem is that solutions are not always designed through the lens of execution. The right solutions need to be aligned to the organization’s resources and capabilities and be designed for seamless handover

Advisory Projects

We have undertaken a wide array of advisory and consulting projects which span our core industries and functions which include strategy, operations, organization, and people & culture

Strategy and Visioning

Strategy and Visioning:
Prominent family business agrees on the future direction of its conglomerate

Family businesses are the lifeblood of the GCC economy, representing 75% of the private sector economy. Many of these businesses have thrived over the years due to favorable economic conditions and visionary leadership. However, generational transitions, compounded organizational growth, and stiffer competition, makes the need for an aligned vision and strategic plan imperative for family organizations.

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A prominent Saudi Arabian family business with a track record of close to a century, had reached a turning point in its company history. With inconsistent performance and generational transitions looming, the organization had to act fast and develop a plan for its future. Being a conglomerate made of close to 15 different business units, a key step was to first analyze the portfolio of businesses and make decisions related to divestiture and investment. In addition, to harmonize family interests a family governance structure and constitution was decided on to better align family and business matters. Finally, after years of success running the business entrepreneurially through visionary leadership, the business decided upon professionalizing the firm by undertaking several initiatives related to corporate governance, performance management, and policies & procedures.

To ensure alignment and sustainability the approach to the project involved tremendous engagement from the family itself who were involved in a series of workshops and engagement sessions. In addition key customers and external stakeholders were involved, along with rigorous internal and external analysis of the business.

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Organizational Design

Organizational Design:
Leading industrial services provider develops organizational structure to aligned to its strategy

Depending on your journey your mode of transport is always chosen. To chart rugged terrain and mountainous roads on land requires a different mode of transport than sailing the rough seas. An organizational structure is often the vehicle which will enable the company to execute its strategy. Thus strategy and structure must be aligned heavily to ensure effective strategy execution and proper organizational functioning.

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A leading industrial services contractor based in the gulf was facing a series of organizational problems related to structure. Firstly a new strategy had been deployed for the group and secondly the structure had not been changed for many years and needed an update based on the growth of the organization and changes in the business environment.

A three pronged gap analysis was done for the group, which would drive the design of the new organizational structure. Firstly, there was a deep dive comparison between the new strategy and current structure, which revealed several functions which needed to be rationalized and added. A second level analysis involved mapping the value chain and core processes of the organization to reveal misalignments between processes and structure. Finally, a benchmarking analysis was undertaken to compare other practices of similar organizations, and relevant insights were captured that affected the final organizational design. In addition, management layer and span of control analysis was also undertaken, as well as workload analysis to determine optimal staffing levels.

With rigorous analysis as the backbone to the proposed design solutions, a series of workshops were undertaken to fine tune designs and most importantly gain senior management buy-in to sustain the change.

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Performance Culture

Performance Culture:
Government entity sets to transform the organization through sharp focus on performance

One of the key levers for successful strategy execution is building a performance management framework which is linked to the strategy. Often times, strategy and performance work in isolation leading to misalignment of objectives between corporate, business units, and individuals. Building this bridge through an effective performance management system ensures strategy is measured and monitored on a continual basis, hence improving its execution.

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A large government entity in the GCC, decided it was time to put a sharper focus on performance and ensure a better culture of accountability. To do this, the entity started by first articulating its strategy clearly by setting SMART goals and objectives. Once the corporate strategic objectives were set, performance measures, targets, and initiatives were developed aligned to the strategy. With the corporate performance framework designed, a cascading of the strategy and performance was undertaken ensuring all business units were accountable to objectives, measures, and actions aligned to the corporate strategy. Furthermore, individuals performance scorecards were developed and aligned to business unit objectives and targets.

With the objectives, KPIs, targets and initiatives set, a performance governance framework was developed to ensure that performance would continuously be monitored, reviewed, and improved. To really engrain this performance culture, leadership made it very clear that performance reviews were mandatory across units and accountability of the performance would be taken seriously and linked to the rewards and compensation system.

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