Aldersgate Advisors

Executives

 

Principled Prosperity In Practice

The Corporate Solution

“I find more and more executives less and less well informed [about the outside world] –
if only because they believe that the data on the computer print outs are ipso facto information.” Peter Drucker

Most large corporations confront many new challenges today. According to Industry Week, today’s senior management teams must have multiple talents to leverage technology and not be consumed by the flood of constant information.

The difficult part is to harness information and innovation to create future products and services that consumers and business will actually utilize.

How a company manages information issues can be the key factor in its survival and success. Senior management now demands multiple talents in marketing and technology as well as pure science to be able to leverage the value of technology throughout the corporation.

Many claim that technologists should be taking over America’s companies. With the information revolution in full swing, companies, and thus those that invest in them -the stockholders, have less time to place ever-bigger bets on often conflicting information.

By supplementing the management team with a managerial economists a company can acquire the scientific skills of a trained social scientist providing financial, economic, technological and informational advantages essential for success and demanded by sophisticated investors.

Chief Executive Magazine, reports companies need a new breed of senior management. The financial backgrounds prevalent  today need to be supplanted by technical and scientific backgrounds. Investors and board members are increasingly of the opinion that in addition to providing analytical training, a science background is increasingly necessary to timely discern the accuracy of relevant information and keep current with the escalating pace of change.

According to Alan Merten, Dean of Cornel University’s business school, technological issues, he argues, are increasingly cropping up at the highest level of corporate strategy. It takes a certain kind of background to handle them. The point about scientists as managers, Merten argues is that they have been trained in both quantitative techniques – math and statistics- 
and in what he calls modeling skills. That is, they are accustomed to abstracting the essential elements of a problem and solving it in a disciplined way. Non-scientist / technologists find ways of avoiding scientific and technological issues. Scientists are predisposed to embrace them. Scientists also receive general and specific training in problem solving.

The demand for science / technology trained senior executives is expected to grow. It has always been understood that science backgrounds were especially critical for senior executive teams who are leading U.S. corporations in technology based industries, such as chemicals and telecommunications. However, companies of all types - including financial services, consumer-packaged goods, retail, and medical companies increasingly need senior executive teams whose members have science educations and applied experience.

Investors prefer companies with some unique product or service as having the greatest chance of succeeding. According to the Harvard Business Review, the only truly sustainable advantage for companies comes from out-innovating the competition. 

Successful businesses are those that can evolve rapidly and effectively.

The economist’s ability to design and conduct market research studies and to analyze and interpret study results can provide a company with the advantage of proprietary information before the competition.

Experienced investors and venture capitalists looking for the companies with the greatest chances to succeed know that management is the key factor in determining where to invest. Sophisticated investors and venture capitalists tend to invest in management, not so much in "products" or "companies". They know that good ideas and good products are a dime a dozen. 

 

Good execution and good management, in a word good people, are rare. In fact, the only thing a good idea guarantees is that it will soon be copied. And probably by a larger competitor.

Knowledgeable investors almost always prefer a grade A management team with a grade B plan, to a grade B management team with a grade A idea. Investors always look for a balanced team and are put off by overly concentrated, one-dimensional management teams consisting of all engineers/technocrats, salespeople or financial executives.

 

Sophisticated investors know that for a company to succeed, its management team must now include scientists.

As consulting managerial economist, we often are used to supplement management acting primarily as an advisor to the President or CEO. We used scientific measures to analyze problems and policies related to the production, distribution and consumption of goods and services. We keep the key policy and decisions makers informed on the economic environment in which their organization operates.

Using knowledge of human nature, the economy, the industry, and specific organization, we recommend solutions to financial and economic problems and course of actions to exploit opportunities.

Much of our advice is influenced by how technological developments may affect your business and / or investments. We must stay current on technology, business finance and economic theory to be able to assess complex technical data and give you an advantage.

As consultants, we are not subject to the same pressures to conform as are employees. We are also exposed to diverse opinions and methods, many of which may be novel to you, your staff or even your industry.