Better Business Integration Strategy for Happy Businessesby Ankit Bourai on 3rd April, 2019  •  8 responses

Think of the best of brands you know. Give a moment to remember all your experiences with the brand. The times you hear about them or feel them or visit their showroom or website.

You not only remember them as the best of brands but also the coolest companies to work in. Great brands are experiential and they remain thoughtful for all. May it be customers, employees, vendors or communities. They do it continuously with business integration.

Best global brands in different category like Apple, Google, Coke, Amazon, Toyota have one thing in common – They generate a similar experience for which they are known. The experience is not just created by a few trained customer handling individuals but the entire organisation as a whole. Establishing great communication practices is strongly backed by the infrastructure to back the promises the company makes.

Global organisations do have the challenge to maintain their standards. A large amount of strategy revolves around to align their aspirations, objectives, operations, communications and human resource. Whether a B2C company or a B2B player business integration plays the thread to success. The entire strategy becomes a great hit with appropriate business integration in place else the best of strategies go for a toss.

Business Integration

“Integration is a must”, but where does actual integration happen? It happens within organizations. Many companies understand it, yet forget to implement it in the strategy. This exposes the business to multiple pains for efficiency, bottom line, human resource and more.

A simpler way for the complex exercise is to break it up in 4 parts on the strategy table. Tactical implementation will be easier and clearer with a documented thought.

Vertical Integration:

Align the purpose of your being vision, mission, values, business goals. These statements need not be fancy words but the guidelines for the business. It should spell out the various departmental, team and individual goals. A company with clarity of purpose can focus more on attaining the same.

Horizontal Integration:

Align organizational structure, capabilities and operations to create the foundation of integration. This is one of the most critical steps which ensures vertical integration does not just remain on paper. Capabilities to attain the vision needs to be developed. For example if “New Efficient Technology” is a requirement their needs to be ”Research & Development” center to work on it.

External Integration:

Align external touchpoints and communication to present similar messaging, feel and image for external stakeholders. There can we various platforms, experience zones and content types for varied stakeholder but the DNA of the theme needs to be aligned with the business goals. This is where the external world connects to the purpose of the organisation.

Internal Integration:

Human resource is the most important resource of any organisation. They are the ones developing and executing various functions. Align human resource with training and development to keep the organization thought, behavior and belief embedded in the culture. Take care of your employees they would take better care of your business.