"Argonauta is dedicated to helping individuals and companies achieve positive transformation"
Strategic Alliances Consulting -
What We Provide

 

 

Argonauta offers six distinct services. Separately they address an individual's or a firm's specific need. Together, they form a comprehensive plan for corporate success.

  1. Developing Strategic Alliances
  2. Making Alliances Work
  3. Creating a Strategic Alliance Centre of Competence
  4. Creating Internal Alliances
  5. Developing Corporate Strategy
  6. Executive Coaching

1. Developing Strategic Alliances

Argonauta will work with you to build strong strategic partnerships. Perhaps you have a corporate alliance already, and wish to evaluate it. Perhaps there's an area of your industry where you need a partnership to make an impact. Or perhaps you are just curious about what alliances could offer your firm.

Whatever your situation, Argonauta will help you succeed. We can help you determine

  • and develop your alliance strategy
  • what kind of new alliance would benefit you
  • the criteria for potential partners
  • and develop a joint strategy with your partners
  • cultural compatibility with potential and existing partners
  • how well your existing alliances are performing through an Alliance Audit

We focus on a structured, disciplined and facilitated strategy process to develop alliance strategy. These take the form of Strategy Sessions conducted with the organization's leadership, where the outcome is an actionable alliance strategy, strategic alignment with the partner, and an assessment of cultural compatibility. We will work closely with you in all these areas to ensure that any alliance adds value to your organization and its bottom line.

2. Making Alliances Work

If you have formed one or more strategic alliances, Argonauta can help you to get the most out of the partnerships. We evaluate how well the alliance is functioning and whether both partners are benefiting. We look at additional opportunities for both parties and the alliance. We work with the alliance to ensure that strategic alignment continues to exist throughout the life of the alliance. And we work with the partners to transform the conflict that inevitably arises in any alliance, into constructive and positive outcomes.

As an alliance's useful life comes to an end we work with you to determine further other opportunities for the partnership. Maintaining synergy and continuously seeking opportunities are our primary goals.

3. Creating Strategic Alliances Centre of Competence

When your firm begins to discover the benefits of strategic alliances, it may want to establish a Centre to create a core competence within the organization and to facilitate organizational learning. Argonauta can help you set up this Centre.

Argonauta can work with you to create the internal structure and process to create such a core competence. We can train the people in your organization to develop a working knowledge in alliances and maximize their ability to contribute to organizational success.

The advantages of this centralized approach to alliances are numerous. Information and expertise can be linked, "best practices" can be applied, more opportunities for partnerships will emerge, and problems are easily dealt with. It will enable the organization to achieve synergy from its partnerships and to create a corporate standard of performance for all alliances. All the alliances across your firm will benefit. By helping you create a centre for strategic alliances, Argonauta will help you get the most out of your alliances.

4. Creating Internal Alliances

Creating internal alliances is increasingly critical and challenging to achieve. Often internal alliances are an important aspect of making an external partnership possible. Through a structured facilitated strategy process, we will work with you to develop a joint internal strategy that will enable you to maximize your organizational potential.

5. Developing Corporate Strategy

We will work with you to develop your corporate or business strategy. We have a flexible and opportunistic approach to developing strategy. It should serve the organization and the leadership's purpose and create value. We will work with you to determine or clarify your vision, to assess market potential, to determine client/customer value, and to do an internal assessment of strengths and areas of development, in order to maximize your organization's potential.

This is achieved through a structured, disciplined and facilitated process with the leadership team. The outcome of these Strategy Sessions will be a concrete action plan with time tables and deliverables. It will be an actionable strategy. Once the groundwork has been laid, Argonauta will also help you to make your corporate vision a reality.

6. Executive Coaching

This one-on-one service focuses on helping executives improve their ability to think and work strategically. Argonauta will help you better understand how to deal with strategic issues. For example, we will coach you in the following areas: developing a vision for your firm, assessing your competitors and your environment, looking at who your customers are and where you add value, and designing an action plan that will put your findings into action. In all these ways, our one-on-one coaching will hone the strategic skills of senior executives.

The Need

Alliances create value. They enable companies to keep pace with change, with growing competitive pressures, and with increasing customer expectations.

 

 


Our Approach

At Argonauta we believe that corporate success starts with a well developed corporate strategy and a well developed alliance strategy. We believe that no step should be taken until decision makers determine and examine the range of possibilities.

 

Strategic Alliances Resources

Gonzalez, Maria. "Strategic Alliances: The Right Way to Compete in the 21st Century" Ivey Business Journal (September/October 2001): 47-51. (pdf)

Gonzalez, Maria. "Shifting the Performance Curve" Ivey Business Journal (July/August 1999): 18-23. (pdf)

Gonzalez, Maria. "Synchronized Strategies" The Journal of Business Strategy (May/June 1997, Volume 18, Number 3): 9-11.

Gonzalez, Maria, and Mintzberg, Henry. "Visualizing Strategies for Financial Services" The McKinsey Quarterly (1991, Number 2): 125-134.

Contributed to:

Corporate Strategy Board (Washington). "Institutionalizing Alliance Capabilities" (August 2000).

Insurance Advisory Board (Washington).
"New Ventures for an Uncertain Economy: Reinvigorating Growth and Profitability Through External Business Development" (2001).

Gonzalez, Maria. “Case: The Hewlett Packard Company”, published in The Strategy process, Quinn, J. Mintzberg, H., James R., New Jersey, Prentice Hall, 1988: 875 – 898