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Moss Kanter – On Why Everything Goes Better with Partners

Rosabeth Moss Kanter explained about the collaborative advantage in her seminal essay ‘The Art Of Alliances’ back in 1994 and in her latest blog piece published today she neatly summarises the three reasons ‘why everything goes better with partners’. Over the past month I’ve been involved in many discussions about the role of partners, how best to develop and manage them – and the role of nurturing the most valuable relationships through a systematic programme.

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On Cafe Conversations, Connections & Collaboration

Its about conversation and collaboration. Wake up and smell the coffee..

The historian and philosopher Theodore Zeldin – founder of Oxford Muse.com says a lot with few words; “the kind of conversation I am interested in is one where you start it prepared to emerge from it a slightly different person”. As befits a great mind, this is a deceptively simple insight that contains within it a quite a profound truth. How often in business do you engage in a conversation where you are truly open to the ideas of others?

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Matt Ridley: On The Exchange Of Ideas..

Matt Ridley is one of the world’s great science journalists and the ex-Science editor for The Economist. A common theme in his work  – is the story of how collaboration and the exchange of ideas is the vital ingredient that powers great invention, trade, social change – and (and this is the important lesson for marketers) – commercial  innovation. In the TED video below, Ridley explains the importance of specialism and working together.  It’s an uplifting, fun and positive presentation – with a valuable message. This is something he explores in his excellent book – The Rational Optimist. Ridley points out that businesses manage a whole ecosystem of specialist suppliers, experts and increasingly, in our hyper connected super fast world, accessing those most valuable of raw business materials: knowledge and ideas. Nobody can do it alone.  At Benchstone we believe in the vital importance of critical third party collaborations that need be driven by relationship managers with attention to Fit, Planning – and Momentum. For more information on how effective partnership management and smarter collaboration strategies can sharpen your marketing approach visit Benchstone Marketing

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Collaborate To Innovate – Don’t Just Cannibalise

A very interesting article in HBR, Vicki Gardner highlights recent research from Nielsen showing that most of what is deemed marketing innovation actually just cannibalized existing products and market shares – and that genuine innovation should come from collaboration. As Gardner says; ” Regarding innovation, the numbers indicate that the vast majority of innovation also results in splitting the pie vs. growing the pie — and in some cases, innovation inadvertently shrinks the pie”.

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Tony Hayward – Lessons From Deepwater Horizon

We’ve all had bad days. Famously, even Richard Branson says he has days when he’s bored or feels he has not achieved things. The report is late, the boss is on the phone, the presentation fell flat. But there are not many people in the world who have had to endure the pressure that Tony Hayward, the ex-CEO of BP during the Deepwater Horizon disaster, had to deal with for most of 2010. If you get a call saying you need to meet with President Obama, leader of the free world, to discuss what your company is doing to overcome a massive oil leak – that’s a pretty tough day. If you have to agree to sell 10% of the business assets to help fund a $20 Billion relief fund that will be under massive media scrutiny – that’s huge pressure. And underlying all this, as Hayward was quick to point out, there is an environmental disaster and the tragic loss of 11 lives.
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Partnerships That Every Small Business Can Build

Smart and cost effective partnership marketing tactics are not just for large brands – small businesses can benefit from them too.

Partnerships and alliances are good for business. Big business has always known this — from McDonald’s building global co-promotions with Coca-Cola and Walt Disney, to Nike building trainers that talk to your iPhone. But alliances can bring significant benefits for small firms too – something I discuss in this article within MarketingDonut. In the article I outline the four main partnership tactics that small businesses can use; (1) Revenue Partners (2) Supplier Partners, (3) Industry Alliances and (4) Promotional and PR. These are the kind of marketing programmes that are used by some of the world’s biggest brands – because they’re cost effective and work. So if they’re not already doing so, isn’t it time small businesses started to build these approaches into their plans too? For more information on partnership tips and advice see Benchstone.co.uk

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Solutions For Small Business Partnership No-No’s

As an advocate in partnership marketing it’s just as important for me to point out that not all partnership and collaborative offers are good ones – and that sometimes it is best solution is to walk away from the deal.  As an old boss once wisely told me ‘do not fall in love with the deal’ – but keep a clear idea of what you really want from the relationship. In an interesting piece published in Business Insider in 2010, Venture Capitalist Don Rainey pointed out that small businesses need to just say no to certain partnership deals. I agree with Rainey up to a point but I think some of the ‘no-no’s’  he points out can be overcome with a sharper partnership approach too.

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Feeling The Squeeze – Time To Get Out More?

Marketers need to power up the radar, can the horizones and hone their ‘collaborative’ streak and realise, as some of the best brands in the world have, that the future is all about ‘partner or perish’ (to quote Xerox). Brands cannot go it alone they need to find collaborative allies.

In a recent article published in Marketing Society the editor of ‘Market Leader’ – Judie Lannon commented that marketers are getting ‘squeezed’ – as aspects of their role fall increasingly within the domain of others. She’s right of course – they’re getting squeezed. And to get away from the internal squeeze – marketers need to get out and engage and collaborate more. (You can see the original article and comments here. )

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‘Partnering Is A Matter Of Smarts’ – Says Judith Hurwitz, HBR

Hewlett Packard grew its business using powerful partnerships with Intel (chips) , Oracle (databases) and Cisco (networking) – but as Judith Hurwitz points out in a recent article published in Harvard Business Review (HBR) –  it now needs to revisit and reinvigorate these key relationships to regain its innovative edge.

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Content: It’s All A Little Bit More Complicated Now

The digital technologies have changed the world of entertainment licensing and its all a little bit more complicated now.

Its often a little bit more complicated...

Last week I was lucky enough to spend an evening being entertained by scientific stats, facts and wonders presented by Professor Brian Cox, Simon Singh and Ben Goldacre on their Uncaged Monkeys Tour. Whilst at times the science both baffled as well as entertained – one particular part of the show struck a chord: that the natural response of a good and rational scientist to people making sweeping statements, should always be along the lines of –  ‘things are a little bit more complicated than that‘.

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