Transforming Businesses with AI-Driven Business Strategies
Leveraging a triad of strategy execution excellence, organizational change management, and project portfolio management maturity enhancement.
About Acumen Plus
What do we do?
At Acumen Plus, we deliver Advisory, Assessment, and Assurance services that encompass the interconnected areas of strategy execution, project portfolio management, and organizational change management. We aim to implement a ‘best of breed’ approach, integrating applicable best practices tailored to the client's domain, scale of engagement, and their readiness for change. Our focus is on facilitating agility, productivity, and value by leveraging relevant AI enablements.
We also are broadbasing into financial technology offerings soon.
Our Vision
To be a trusted advisor to leading organizations by synthesizing strategy execution, project portfolio management, and organizational change management for improved business performance.
Our Mission
We synthesize the people, process, and structure dimensions to enhance organizational change management, improve project portfolio management, and drive effective strategy execution for better business results.
Our Approach
We commence with reviewing the existing strategy definition, including the organization’s vision, mission, and strategic objectives. Utilizing our proprietary smelevate model, we assess how mature the organization is in its strategy execution across multiple dimensions. Our aim is to assist the client in understanding the gaps in their organizational change management and how to elevate their strategy execution maturity. Particularly, we examine the following aspects for maturity enhancement:
> What level of support does project portfolio management offer for strategy execution?
> How robust are the client’s management information systems in supporting decision-making processes?
> How effective is the client’s organizational change management model in aiding people for strategy execution?
In addition to our assessment, we provide an improvement roadmap that guides the client in advancing to higher maturity levels of strategy execution, leading to better business results.
Our Strategy Execution Maturity model – smelevate®:
We ascertain how mature an organization is in its strategy execution by considering diverse parameters. Here is a brief overview of these parameters and the maturity assessment model, which offers a ‘dipstick’ analysis of the organization's current status and what it requires for improved strategy execution. We leverage AI models as applicable throughout the maturity assessment.
Parameters concerning the assessment of organizational strategy execution maturity include:
1. Strategy formulation and articulation: How well is the organizational strategy (including vision, mission, and strategic objectives) crafted? Do they respond to changing external conditions? How effectively are they communicated to senior, middle, and line management?
2. Leadership commitment: How committed are top and senior leaders to achieving the organizational goals? Are these goals consistently prioritized in strategy review meetings? Are senior management aware that achieving strategic goals depends on various factors, including people, processes, technology, and culture? How consistently are the value systems communicated and upheld? Are deviations from these values acted upon? Is leadership receptive to adapting to advancements in AI and technology?
3. Organizational culture and workforce planning: What key organizational metaphor drives the culture? Can middle and line management provide feedback when the strategy is faltering? How effectively are these feedback mechanisms acted upon? Are staff empowered to make decisions within their designated limits? Does the organization promote knowledge management, innovation, and responsive action on feedback? What is the level of trust and transparency? How are feedback loops enhanced and implemented? How effective is the workforce planning and competency development undertaken to achieve strategic goals?
4. Project portfolio management support: How strong is project portfolio management (PPM) support for strategy execution? Is the project portfolio aligned with business portfolio priorities in its definition and execution? How effective are the processes, tools, and information systems supporting PPM? How well are PPM capacity and capability nurtured? How closely does the linkage between strategy formulation and implementation relate to the benefits realized and budgets allocated for change? How adaptable is the project portfolio to changes in strategy?
5. Financial and information technology support: How well do financial and information technology systems support strategic objectives? Are these systems designed to highlight what is working and what isn’t with specific data and KPIs?
6. Governance, risk, and compliance management: How strong are the organizational governance systems? Can they detect abnormal performance deviations, fraud, and similar issues early on? What is the robustness of the organizational risk management systems? Are the organizational systems compliant with regulatory and industry standards?
7. Product/service offerings: How innovative is the organization in introducing new products/services to the market? Are these offerings adapted to emerging market and technology trends? Can the organization pivot quickly to deliver newer products/services?
8. Marketing and sales: Does the marketing and sales strategy align with the overall organizational strategy? Is there a clear customer segmentation, and have their needs been identified? Are solutions co-designed to meet the specific requirements of key customers?
9. Delivery excellence: How effectively are customer feedbacks addressed? Are product/service supply chains and delivery processes optimized to ensure value? Is there a corporate culture aimed at minimizing waste and enhancing efficiency?
We evaluate the maturity level based on the characteristics of our proprietary model, tailored for the target companies.
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Interlinkage of Strategy Execution with Project Portfolio Implementation
A major reason organizations struggle is the need to improve in converting strategy into actionable change initiatives, stringing them together in a project portfolio, and executing them to realize benefits and achieve strategic objectives.
The smelevate model consists of six broad, sequential steps, with appropriate feedback loops:
1. Discern: Here, we understand the organizational strategy, its vision, mission, and overarching strategic goals. We assess the value systems, current performance levels, value gaps, challenges faced, and expectations from senior management. AI-assisted support is leveraged where appropriate.
2. Decompose: During this phase, we collaborate with senior management to break down the overall value gap into mutually exclusive and collectively exhaustive value streams, each with distinct targets. These value streams can inform strategic themes, particularly if the organization employs a Balanced Scorecard or similar approach. Engaging business leaders ensures their buy-in for the established targets, employing stakeholder engagement and facilitation as key techniques throughout.
3. Design: Here, we identify the strategic initiatives (projects and programs) needed for each value stream across various perspectives. This includes processes, business organizational structure, technology interventions, information needs, knowledge management, and cultural change requirements. Existing initiatives are factored in to ensure synergies with proposed changes. The overall project portfolio (and sub-portfolios if necessary) is developed in this crucial step, keeping in mind current project portfolio management maturity, the support from the Enterprise Project Management Office (EPMO), business imperatives, and funding/resource constraints, often requiring multiple iterations.
4. Deploy: In this phase, the actual change initiatives are launched. Our proprietary project management models, alongside industry-standard methodologies (such as Agile), can be used to direct these initiatives. Extensive business involvement is critical to enhancing ownership over the developed solutions.
5. Monitor: This step runs concurrently with deployment, where projects and programs are monitored, issues and risks are managed, resources assigned, and deliverables transitioned into operations. Governance, quality, testing, and organizational change management are key focuses during this phase. The outcomes and benefits are realized and managed, transforming the relevant business unit operations.
6. Adapt: Based on lessons learned, mid-course adjustments may be considered in response to shifts in strategic priorities, resource availability, and other constraints. The overall value achieved through executing the strategic portfolio initiatives is reviewed, and project portfolio management maturity is enhanced, maintaining knowledge databases to leverage past learnings.
Our Team
Our team consists of experienced consultants with diverse backgrounds in various industries, specializing in organizational change management, project portfolio management, and strategy execution. We combine our expertise to deliver innovative solutions to our clients.
Our Credentials
Acumen Plus comprises Senior Professionals with over 30 years of corporate experience in strategy execution, organizational change management, and project portfolio management. Our team has worked with clients across various sectors, including manufacturing, utilities, government organizations, and FMCG, in countries throughout the Middle East.
Our way
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We believe in a collaborative approach to consulting, emphasizing organizational change management, where we work closely with our clients to understand their needs and develop solutions together. Our goal is to enhance project portfolio management and ensure effective strategy execution, all while building long-lasting relationships with our clients.
Contact us
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Contact us
You can write to ramani@acumen.plus for more details on our offerings related to organizational change management and project portfolio management. Alternatively, feel free to send a message to our WhatsApp number +91 98802 80990 for inquiries about strategy execution.