Services

Consulting and Advisory Engagements

These engagements tend to be single organizations wanting focused or ongoing advice and facilitation on important innovation, organizational, and strategic challenges.

With experience in over a dozen industries and across sectors, Adaptive Edge's clients include leaders and decision-makers in: Fortune 100 companies, public sector agencies and government task-forces, multilateral organizations, Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs), civil society organizations, networks and associations.

To give a flavour, current projects explore a wide range of interesting topics focused on clients' specific strategic and innovation issues and questions. These topics include:

  • the future of fashion
  • the future of famine
  • the future of retail in Europe
  • the future of various emerging markets and countries (India, southeast Asia, China, Brazil, parts of Africa)
  • the future disruptions in the western healthcare approaches
  • the future of pharmaceutical industry
  • the future of the "Net" generation
  • the future of integration and immigration politics in Europe
  • the future of development in poor markets
  • the future of humanitarian AID
  • the future of social entrepreneurship
  • the the "anti-globalization" movement

    • For more relevant experience, see Nicole Boyer's biography section.

    Adaptive Edge often partners with other consulting firms, independent practitioners, and professional networks. In this capacity, the role is usually as a designer and facilitator of the "front end" diagnostic that frames key issues and assumptions.

    Client Examples

    TYPE #1: Large Multinational Corporation (UK)
    PROJECT: Impact of Obesity Debates on Brand & Implications for Future Products

    A global chocolate and confectionary manufacturer with a long heritage and venerable brand is struggling with the strategic implications of the current public debates and perceptions within Europe around the role of snack foods in contributing to obesity and other health problems.

    To explore this issue more fully and sensitize other managers to possible threats and opportunities on the horizon, a project was commissioned in early 2002 by a cross-divisional team on the future of processed snack foods in the next 7 years. The output included key implications for the new branding strategy and future product portfolio for the company.

    TYPE #2: Not-for-Proft Healthcare Provider (USA)
    PROJECT: Future of the Hospital

    A large billion dollar healthcare system in the southern US is coping with many uncertainties Ñ financing dilemmas, pace of technological change, empowered patients, new social trends in healthcare, shifting demographics, etc.Ñ in many different markets (large and small) simultaneously. After the failed Clinton healthcare reform efforts and the rise (and fall) of managed healthcare (HMOs) model, the executive team didn't want to be surprised again. They felt that a longer view was necessary, especially since they still needed to make some important strategic bets on new medical technologies, new medical approaches, the (re)building and acquiring of new hospitals, and the recruitment of talent.

    A two-year project was commissioned by the CEO and strategy team to explore the future of the hospital in the US within the next ten years. A diverse group of participants were recruited to be on this "Futures Task Force" including senior management, experts, internal and external stakeholders. The output informed key decisions on the system's mission, strategic direction and a number of specific capital expenditures and investments. The system has now gone international with several new hospital acquisitions outside of the US.

    Since its completion, this project has received much attention within and outside of the industry. For instance, The Wall Street Journal (Sydney Leavens, August 20, 2001) covered an interesting aspect of this process: that is, the use of "business theater" to dramatize and visualize the scenarios and their implications as a way to engage the top 100 executives of the hospital system.

    The Approach

    Engagements are designed after an initial "diagnostic" or "fitness for the future" evaluation with the client. This ensures that the most effective and highest leverage approach is taken, one that is highly customized to the clients' problems and issues.

    Adaptive Edge insists on putting the problem in the center of the process and only then selecting the most appropriate tools and content frameworks to address them. (A selection of these are listed below under the "Toolkit and Tradecraft" heading.) This avoids the "rule of the tool" tendency common in most consulting approaches, where every organization's nail is hit with the consulting firm's products and services, even if these are not the most suitable ones for the problem at hand.

    While there is no typical project, there are some common phases in most engagements as the diagram below shows:

    Read more about Adaptive Edge's approach.