Strategy Consulting: Why does the generalist approach work?

Arbitrage. That’s what comes to me when we are looking at the business problems. Gone are those days of providing strategic solutions where one wears only the hat of either a financial, marketing or technology analyst. The more holistic approach starts with looking at the ecosystem and the enterprise analysis. Now that throws open the question – when attacking the business problems – who fits in more - a generalist or a specialist?

A proposed problem solving technique would be to bring the leaders from various specialized fields in the same meeting and then debate and discuss. But it has been seen, such meetings fail as the stakeholders are not able to reach consensus.

The image above illustrates the divide and conquer approach. It is common in the industry to conquer a complex business problem by dividing it into manageable smaller modules based on multiple dimensions. Each module is led by a dimension/domain specialist. But in the process, are we not forgetting the generalists? Don’t we require someone to systematically connect the dots, oversee the system of connected dimensions and thus, order the chaos! From the above image, it appears the modules are in silos but in reality, the module overlap and talk to each other. And hence, the overlaps are best handled by generalists whose thinking cuts across domains.

With a complex nonlinear system, we just cannot divide the problem into parts and just add the things up and say this is the whole. The strong interactions between the modules needs to be analyzed based on the different dimensions.

Adding a new dimension say financial - to marketing, culture and technology is like putting a new pair of glasses and we could see stories we haven’t seen before. We can identify the causal chain of events that we never identified before. And thereby, it can enable us to see the “invisible hands” and the handcuffs that are impeding business eaders from doing things that increase stakeholder values!

Thus, the key role of the generalist is to be present on the dimensional/domain overlaps and spot the interactions and entanglements of the different dimensions and then take a crude look at the whole. The generalist can talk to the domain experts (or the specialists) and then arrive at a comprehensive solution to the business problem or opportunity.

Now, coming to the question in the first para of this article – ”… when attacking the business problems – who fits in more - a generalist or a specialist? ”.  Are we able to arrive at a decision now ?

Irrespective of the answer, one feels generalists are equally important as the specialists. Though from a career standpoint, it’s little harder to find jobs if you’re a generalist, but it’s easier to adapt to the changing business environment especially, in this age of Technology Disruption. Also, as generalist one can have a bird’s eye view of the issues at hand, which can help him to take up leadership roles.

Did you like the article and want to carry the discussion forward? You connect with me at d.santanu1@gmail.com

Brexit Impact on the Insurance Industry

June 23. The Leave vote being marginally higher than the Remain vote means there's a chance of invocation of Article 50 of the Lisbon treaty in the next two years. Although the results of the June 23 vote reflects aspiration of the people of UK but majority of the MPs are still in favor of Remain. Now, this adds to the complexity and results in uncertainty looking into future for all businesses which uses UK as launch pad for their European operations. In this article, we are going to look at how this political event impacts the insurance industry.

Financial Impact:

1. We are going to see a lot of volatility in the exchange rates . Post the Brexit vote, sterling hit a new 31-year low against the dollar. So, the profitability would be impacted.

2. The interest rates would be low as the central banks would be attempting to minimize economic risks.

3. There would be an increased need for more efficient and tighter financial models as far as underwriting and policy pricing is concerned.

4. Weighted average cost of capital (WACC) would rise owing to associated volatility and increased cost of raising capital. This would be reducing the valuation of UK assets.

Impact of Business Strategy and Operating Model

1. There would be a need for re-evaluation of market entry strategy for insurance companies looking for geographic expansion and involved in passporting business into the EU.

2. We shall see a decrease in demand of cross border insurance products amidst the uncertainty of other countries exiting EU post Brexit.

3. As a long term impact, there would be downward pressure on the margins owing limited premium growth and investment returns.

4. Impacted insurance companies may be look for inorganic growth options through M &A and strategic partnerships for venturing into US and APAC markets, if there are not present already.

Impact on regulatory and tax strategy

1. National and central banks may assert more authority over country specific regulations, thereby slowing down the process towards achieving a level playing field.

2. Cost of compliance to regulations would increase owing to the need for having different regulatory systems and technology for compliance to different standards.

3. Contractual obligations and agreements with the customers would requirement amendment.

4. Change in the right to work laws for UK based companies in the European countries may change, which might trigger relocation of offices based on client bases. This would have a natural impact on tax and governance issues.

Llyods which generates 11% of their revenue from EU wouldn't see much of an impact. Though Brexit comes a setback to them but since they have hubs in Dubai, China, Mexico, Singapore and Brazil, they can absorb the shock. Their playbook for distribution in the European part would require a transformation.

Hence, summing up, we can infer Brexit would impact the insurance industry but in the short term - the impact may not be grave. Yes, there would be cost and regulatory pressure on the industry with the need for transforming their business model in EU.