Did you know that, on average, 95% of a company’s employees do not understand their organization’s strategy or don’t even know that such a specified strategy exists? And these issues are not only present in smaller, inexperienced companies, but even in huge corporations.
In 2013, a group of researchers from the University of Technology in Sydney surveyed employees of 20 major Australian corporations on the business strategy of their employers. The employees were asked to identify the strategy of their organizations by choosing one of the 6 presented answers. Only 29% chose the correct ones.
In such an environment, employees don’t feel a true connection with the business they work for and operate based on short-term objectives they have been presented by the managers, not following any end-goals. They don’t understand when they work can be considered successful and therefore lack motivation. This, in the end, results in a lower quality of products and services provided by the business.
How to change this? By building a clear strategy that lets your company grow steadily. And to do this, you will need expert business strategists.
What is a business strategist and what can they do for your company?
At first sight, the role of business strategists might feel as vague as a badly planned strategy. Their job, however, gets very easily understandable when you look at what their typical tasks are. And there are plenty of them.
Business strategists…
- Establish specific targets for the business to reach.
- Explain the targets in a clear way so that each person in the company can easily understand their role in achieving these goals.
- Prepare plans to follow in order to reach these targets. Prioritize the targets to be reached first.
- Define the problems standing in the way of reaching the targets and help in finding solutions to them.
- Look for business opportunities and adapt the strategy to them.
- Identify areas for improvement.
- Prepare documentation of the business strategy.
- Provide direction and motivate the people involved in carrying out the strategy.
- Assess whether the strategic goals have been reached.
- Present the strategy and updates on the progress to stakeholders.
For most small and medium-sized startups, business strategists plan the work for the whole business. However, in larger enterprises, there might be multiple business strategists, each building a strategy for a different product, service, project, or even a company’s division.
Business analyst vs business strategist — what are the differences?
These two terms are sometimes used interchangeably but they should be not — business analysts and business strategists are completely different roles.
The main job of a business analyst is an overall analysis of the technological solutions and processes at the company. They strive to improve and optimize these processes in order to increase revenue and cut costs.
Business strategists, on the other hand, look not only at the specific business they work with but on the whole market, trying to find new opportunities and establish a strategy that will allow their organization to win with the competitors.
What are the core skills of a business development strategist?
To thrive in the role and build a strategy that delivers amazing results for the company, business strategists should possess a set of specific skills. The most important ones are…
- Competitive attitude
To always focus on finding the best ways for the organization to win the market and beat competitors.
- Researcher attitude
To have the motivation to thoroughly explore the market possibilities and the needs of customers.
- Being always on the watch
To be constantly ready to adapt the strategy to sudden market opportunities.
- Leadership skills
To motivate and explain the importance of a great business strategy to everyone involved in its implementation.
- Critical thinking
To assess whether the common practices are really what’s best for the specific business.
Education and experience of best business strategists
Business strategists most often possess a bachelor’s degree in business management or business administration or an MBA. More than in their academic time, however, you should look into their job history. Business strategists often start their careers as business development managers, project managers, or in other relevant roles that allow them to plan, lead, research the market, and have contact with customers.
You should especially look for candidates experienced in your industry. While there are some generalists in the world of business strategists, most of them thrive in a specific niche. Hiring such a specialist will give you the peace of mind that you have teamed up with a person who already understands your audience and typical business obstacles on your market.
Top job interview questions to ask a business strategist for hire
You can get the best assessment of your potential business strategist’s skills by asking them questions tackling various scenarios and case studies. Before you run the interview, review well your candidate’s work experience — it will give you additional topics to talk about and allow you to even better understand how your candidate thinks.
Some of our favorite job interview questions to ask a business strategist are:
- What do you do when encountered by two stakeholders with different requirements? How do you find the common ground?
- How do you lead an organization when you don’t have the authority?
- How do you make sure you are up-to-date with all the latest developments and trends in our specific industry?
- How do you handle a situation when the people at the company you are working with have doubts regarding the strategy you have planned for them?
- Do you prefer working with younger startups or more experienced enterprises? Why?
- Which of your previous strategies do you consider the most successful? Why?
- What are the elements you evaluate before developing a strategy for your client?
- How do you make sure that your strategy involves enough short-term goals to motivate everyone involved in it?
- How do you approach understanding the target audience of the business you work with?
- How do you approach assessing what can be improved in the organization you work with?
The importance of referrals
Business strategists for hire often work on a freelance basis with multiple clients at the same time. This allows them to stay busy and in the flow while employers can reduce costs linked to hiring a new full-time employee.
The freelance work approach makes it also easier for you to make use of the power of referrals. You can find experienced business strategists via your peers from other companies and when you finally hire a business strategist — they might be able to recommend you some great devs or design talents to help you grow your business.
When possible, ask also your business strategist candidates about references from other businesses they worked with. Such references are usually given only by employers who are really satisfied with their business strategists giving you peace of mind that you are hiring the right person.
Leverage your great new business strategy
Having an experienced business growth strategist on board gives you the advantage of having a specified plan which, if correctly followed, will take you from where you are to where you want to be. But to get this done, you need to have the right team with you.
Whether you want to hire expert software developers, web designers, data scientists, or business strategists themselves, we can help. At Ideamotive, we’ve developed a broad network of top talents in the industry looking for new career opportunities. With us, you’ll get swiftly connected with the right people, matched with you according to your specific needs.
Contact us today and start growing with an excellent business strategy.
