In February 2020, Bradley had recently stepped into his role as the operations leader for a Chicago based firm that sells and services industrial laundry solutions. As you might expect, this is a mature and competitive industry with established relationships across verticals like hospitality and health care. 

As you might expect from the competitive nature of sports, the sports apparel industry is similarly competitive. Jobs at firms are coveted by sports lovers, so high performance expectations tend to be intrinsically built into company cultures. This permeates into the everlasting chase of identifying new trends across cultures, sports, and market segments, which must be drilled down into the products Tom builds. 

Associations are a specific kind of nonprofit that usually represents a trade or professional group to communicate industry standards, avenues for continuing education, and policy considerations. Kirsten talks with us about the interesting industry landscape for Associations as well as the challenges of creating differentiated value. 

The Steel Construction industry is at the heart of large scale and infrastructure level construction projects, with notable rivals like Concrete and Wood. Brian speaks with me about how Steel Construction works with representative firms and government organizations to advocate for legislation that achieves its intended purpose while still encouraging a level playing field.

The energy industry is a massive complex network of power production, distribution and delivery that cooperates across regional and national boundaries that supports both our present and future economy. Dan talks with me about the challenges faced by our society as we recognize the importance of moving toward to more sustainable energy sources while our overall demand steadily increases. 

In this episode, Maggie talks with me about how she approaches strategy from a nonprofit perspective while leveraging the frameworks that, at first glance, might seem more suited to for-profits. While there are significant differences to explore between these two organizational models, the underlying purpose of strategy remains the same: Find a unique and sustainable way to create and capture value in a challenging industry and dynamic competitive landscape.

Procurement roles can sometimes be thought of as simply a business function that looks for the lowest price, but Sarah tells me about how much care and strategy is involve in every negotiation, whether it be with new or existing relationships. Having a strong understanding of your industry, competition, the firm you’re negotiating with, and even the individual across the table can all affect the ultimate outcome of buyer/supplier relationship.

“Last mile” delivery is the most salient portion of the supply chain industry, but it is also the most complicated and costly part. In the past, the US has only really relied on UPS, USPS, and FedEx. However, the growth in scale and scope of Amazon, rapidly changing that landscape. So what’s it like to compete in this industry? How will it change in the coming years, especially with our increasing reliance on those firms during the pandemic?

Marketing is already a challenging discipline because one must understand a plethora of complex interactions and motivations between the firm’s marketing mix and consumer. B2B marketing agencies have second and third orders of complexity. Not only do they have to be familiar with their market, but they also need to know their client’s market, and also know their client’s customer’s market!

Filling open positions at any company can be quite stressful. There are important trade offs between filling the role quickly versus filling the role with the right person. Kristy talks with us about how she helps firms develop strategies to not only hire the right person, but do to so efficiently. We also talk about the changing landscape of being a Talent Consultant and where her market might be expanding beyond what she traditionally targeted.