Move forward together
Crafton and Lewis treat the alliance as they
would any business. The alliance has a mission statement, milestones to meet and a
group of people from both companies who
meet regularly to discuss the alliance.
Crafton and Lewis even hired an alliance
coach to discuss the needs of each company.
“Our goals were to innovate and create new
offerings to the industry that would not be
possible if we operate independently, and
bring out new-to-the-world concepts that
would benefit our clients,” Crafton said.
Executing a strategic alliance requires
dedicating staff members to the alliance.
Those staff members are charged with
updating the company leadership with the
progress of the effort and with treating any
problems that may arise.
The alliance also has two managers, one at
each company, and each are incentivized on
the success of the alliance — not on the
health of either company. Top-down commitment is also critical to the execution of the
alliance. At least four times a year, Crafton
and Lewis meet and discuss business.
Getting two CEOs who know and trust
each other to believe in an alliance is one
thing. Getting buy-in from the sales force and
others involved in executing the alliance is
quite another. Crafton says hunting for, and
celebrating, success early is crucial.
“If you can communicate something tangible where it’s making their life better or making people feel better about our offering to
our clients, then they have to see some base
hits,” he says. “They don’t have to see a grand
slam right out of the gate. They start to say,
‘Well, I can see that. It’s not just a press
release. This has some early wins and early
benefit to me and to my client whom I am
trying to serve.’ Don’t wait two years before
you have your first prototype. Get some
points on the board early.”
The victory has to be seen and felt by the
people working in the trenches of the company. It’s not enough for just those at the
top to believe in it.
“In a privately held company, I can just
tell people to feel great about it because I
said it,” he says. “But that doesn’t mean you
have the hearts and minds of your rank and
file. They have to have confidence that you
have a track record of doing things that are
good for our client.”
Creating excitement from clients is also
key to bolstering the success of an
alliance. CROSSMARK has a client advisory board, composed of representatives
from the company’s largest clients, who
meet periodically with CROSSMARK executives and give feedback on new initiatives.
“We socialize ideas with them to see how
good response will be before we go into
the general market,” Crafton says. “If you
have buy-in from five of your top clients
and you’re wrong, at least you weren’t deaf,
dumb and blind to your clients before you
went forward. We were all wrong together,
including your clients.”