LAVAN Advisory · Business Strategy & Growth

A strategy the business can fund, staff and execute.

For founders and leadership teams deciding where to compete, what to stop, and how to grow from a position of strength.

When this is the right engagement

Four situations we are asked into.

Growth has flattened
The core business is profitable but no longer growing, and there is no agreed explanation why.
Too many options
Several opportunities look attractive and there is no shared basis for choosing between them.
The model is under strain
Pricing, margins or customer mix have shifted, and the original business model no longer fits.
A decision is due
An expansion, partnership or capital raise needs a strategy behind it that outsiders will believe.

Scope

An engagement draws on the workstreams the question needs. The scope is agreed in writing before anything begins.

01
Business model development
How the business creates, delivers and captures value, tested against its own economics.
02
Market opportunity assessment
The size, structure and direction of the markets you serve or could serve, with the evidence behind each estimate.
03
Pricing strategy
What customers pay for, what they would pay more for, and where margin is being given away.
04
Growth roadmap
A sequenced plan: what happens first, what depends on it, and who owns each step.
05
Strategic partnerships
Which partners would change your position, and on what terms a partnership is worth having.
06
Commercial feasibility
Whether a proposed move pays back, under assumptions leadership is prepared to defend.

Approach

Four phases. Each ends with something leadership can read, challenge and use.

01
Frame
Agree the decision to be made, the options on the table, and what would count as evidence for each.
OutputDecision brief
02
Examine
Market, customer and financial analysis, built from the business’s own data wherever it exists.
OutputFact base
03
Choose
Working sessions with leadership to weigh the options against the evidence, and commit.
OutputStrategic choices, in writing
04
Plan
Turn the choices into priorities, owners and milestones, and the financial picture that follows from them.
OutputRoadmap and scenarios

Deliverables

This is not a market research report. The output is a set of choices leadership has made and a plan to act on them.

Market assessment: Where the opportunity is, how large, and how confident we are.
Business model: How the business makes money, on one page leadership agrees with.
Financial scenarios: A base case and alternatives, with the assumptions that drive each.
Strategic roadmap: The sequence of moves over the planning period.
Implementation priorities: The first actions, each with an owner and a date.

Where we begin

You do not need the answers before we speak. Knowing which ones are hard to answer is where the work starts.

01Where does profit actually come from today, by customer and by product?
02Which customers would you lose first to a serious competitor, and why?
03What would you stop doing if you had to give up a third of your activity?
04What must be true for the growth plan to work, and which of those have you tested?
05Who, by name, owns each priority?