Building The Transformational Company

Where did that come from?

I did not see it coming. This time it was not the competition, not the supply chain or the fulfillment partner. It was Covid-19. The date for me was March 13, 2020. Little did I know that my visit in the evening to an Italian restaurant was the last for months.

Our Stattys core business is to design, produce, and deliver workshop material used in offline workshops. If this situation would be a Transform! Simulation, we just got the Covid-19 bust card. A lockdown for a two-month period was not going to be good for our business. What followed was more of a shock than anything else. There was an urgent need for a transformation, a new business model.

Achieve more with partnerships

I consider myself lucky by having partners like Strategyzer (Alexander Osterwalder) and Strategy Tools (Christian Rangen). I find they are the go-to places when we talk about strategy and innovation. My own transformation process includes tools from both partners.

So. What did I do? First, I took a good look at my own current core Business Model and Value Proposition Canvas. Although these canvases have been long on the market, I still find them extremely useful. My focus went to my customers. Many of them are trainers, coaches, consultants, workshop facilitators, and project managers. I was asking myself what kind of pains they might have in the crises and lockdowns. I also started calling a few of them to check how they were doing. This was a good idea. I got more and better insights directly from the customer.

Gain speed with the right training

The next thing I did was to enroll to the Building The Transformational Company Certification Program – April intake, which started April 16^th, 2020. If you need to transform your own company/business or your job is to help others to transform, this course is a good investment.

Why? It helps you to get the right mindset to start with. It also provides you a roadmap, a framework and guidance how to start the transformation process. It is up to you, if you take your time and plan the transformation journey first and then start the process. If your case is a larger business, you likely want to start with the plan, get others involved and align them to the process. If you have a small business, like me, you might want to jump in and start using the tools right away. What helped me? I started with Strategy Intro, Industry Shifts Map, Market Opportunity Canvas and Minimum Innovation Strategy. We will start adding these and other Strategy Tools products here.

The visual way

I printed the canvas and put them on my orange board. Placing them next to each other, so that I could have a good overview is my preferred way of working with the canvas. For me the key is to visualize the strategy process and to see how I can connect the different canvases to each other. Using these simple tools and talking with the customers was a great starting point for me.

What can you expect from this (BTC) course?

You get 15 tools, which are canvases, maps or checklists, that provide you the roadmap, the framework. It is important to understand that these tools are there to support you and to enable you to start immediately and build your strategic process with a proven system. You will be able to download them or buy the prints from our Stattys website. With Strategy Tools we created the Building the Transformational Company – The Workbook. This workbook is in size A3 and includes short explanations of these 15 tools. You can buy it here and you will be able to download it during the course.

The new way of working from home office

If you have not yet conducted Zoom-meetings with break-out sessions, you will experience how easy it can be. You will learn how to use Miro’s online whiteboard in Zoom sessions and have the tools integrated in it. You will become part of a community and a telegram group, where you will be able to connect to other likeminded experts. Some of these experts you might find in your own city, others on the other side of the world. I am pretty sure you will also learn about the new upcoming Transform! Simulation Certification Program and the Transform! Simulation itself. I have been able to simulate the Transform! already three times by now and every time it was a unique learning experience. It is truly eye opening and engaging. The simulation is based on real cases and once you start and get into it, well, you forget everything else for a while and you will sense the urgency and pressure as if it was a real-life situation. If you are an agile coach, you should really consider this.

For everyone who joins the online course through my recommendation, I plan to start a bi-weekly online meeting, where we can support, ask questions and learn from each other. If you have a question, you can contact me here.

Join here.

Stay safe.

Mikko Mannila

Mikko Mannila
Entrepreneur and founder of Stattys