You probably noticed yourself during your consulting projects — that many times after the workshop nothing is actually implemented in terms of changing the business model.

That is an indication that the discussion was misplaced the reasons of internal politics, misfit with culture, organizational structures, decision rights, incentives, motivation of executives, etc.

My advise is to first to assure that no matter what the new business model is, it will be implemented. There are frameworks and tools to do that. They will help the consultant to find the right fit for business model project in the organizational/business setting of the client.

If the fitting work dome correctly, the business model exercise will go beyond and "mapping" or an academic discussion toward business transformation.

@Ben: Nice presentation. Maybe you want to update the Business Model Canvas in the middle?

@Sergei: Thank you for sharing your experience. I partially agree. Finding the right "level" is indeed a big issue today. Yet, it should not be so. People of all levels should simply be interested in genuinely creating value for customers with the right business model. Of course that sounds terribly naive…

Where I fully agree with you is on the mastery of selecting the right frame… which takes experience, knowledge and a lot of time…

Thank you for promoting Design Thinking in the form of "business model" design.

I would like to add that the consultants/experts should be careful while selecting the level of the business model discussion. They take into account the underlying business situation and the level within the organizational hierarchy.

If the problem/audience is "too low", the business model discussion might have very little meaning to people as they are more concerned with business process/value steam/project flow.

If it is too high, the management is more concerned with "portfolio management" rather than the discussion around the business model.

If you go even higher, people are more concerned with the financial performance, e.g. aggregated P&L, cash flow, total shareholder return and stuff.

So, you need to play on the right level for the right reasons. Otherwise the exercise will not move beyond "having an interesting conversation"

Also, people should not assume that "business model" framework represents the main components of the business structure. We've learned in the hard way.

In our work we use 1o frameworks (one of them is business/value model). The frames are "hard" and "soft". The "soft" frames are very "hard", but those are the ones where the business problems really are.

The true mastery of business design is the ability to analyze the business situation, select the right set of frames and show how the issues in say "political" frame influence the issues within the "business model" frame. This is how the holistic thinking brings value to business.

Sergei Dovgodko
3M Company St.Paul, MN
sdovogdko@mmm.com

I have recreated your diagram to include the full descriptions of the business model components for people who are not yet familiar with the vocabulary. I hope this is alright with you.

Feel free to check it out: http://www.lewebmobile.com/

How did we come up with it? A lot of reading of the existing material (Porter, foresight studies, etc.). Post all that information on the wall with post-it notes, add expert opinions, and start thinking hard, finally regrouping the post-it notes into categories – and then designing the right framework (four areas with sub-groups). Testing with examples. Re-design. Re-design. Test. Think. Discuss. Re-design. Eventually a concept emerges that looks & feels right.

Sounds messy? It is

So… How did you come up with the four categories of forces/trends? How would each sticky note be defined? Is there another book here?