Chief strategy officers (CSOs) or other executives in similar roles have a range of responsibilities in the organization, often including communicating corporate strategy to key stakeholders, promoting decision making that sustains change and engendering commitment to strategic plans. This paper aims to suggest that the CSO often adds the most value to the organization by identifying and helping to capture synergies from different products and services the company can provide. In essence, playing the role of chief synergy officer.
In this paper a number of case examples of businesses that have been able to unlock new sources of value by changing the scope of how the company meets customer needs are considered. Example businesses cited in the paper include automated vending services, travel agency, financial services and social networking. The paper then draws lessons that can be applied broadly across any business seeking to increase efficiency and value by changing the scope of services offered.
Executives with responsibility for strategy should not assume that the role of increasing the firm's efficiency is only the job of those with operating responsibilities. CSOs can support this objective through business synergies that come from changing the scope of what the company does. Often this can come from expansion into new activities where overlapping functions (sales, contracting, sourcing, research and development, etc.) can be shared, thereby spreading indirect costs across multiple products, customer groups, channels or parts of a vertically integrated firm. The paper also provides a number of lessons for achieving this successfully.
Business managers that have responsibility for strategy should not think of themselves as only documenting and communicating strategic plans. Instead they should emphasize identifying ways to improve the efficiency and value of the firm by changing the scope of its activities, and capturing untapped synergies between functions and business lines
