acumen

How NutriAsia compressed its marketing strategy cycles from months to weeks

Thu, 09 Jul 2026 03:43:46 GMT

NutriAsia’s marketing team had a problem most Filipino CMOs would recognise. Strategy and analysis cycles were stretching from weeks into months. Leaders across the team were working hard, but they were not working from a shared business language. The result was visible in every business review: analyses that did not align, plans that did not commit, and decisions that did not stick.

None of this was a problem of effort or talent. It was a capability problem, and it was showing up where the business could feel it — in the speed and confidence of the team’s commercial decisions. For a market-leading business operating in fast-moving, competitive categories, the cost of a slow decision is rarely a single missed deadline. It is a series of opportunities that close while the team is still aligning on how to read them.

THE CHALLENGE

One team, many ways of working

The question NutriAsia faced was a structural one: how could it transform its marketing team into an industry benchmark when tools, processes, and business language varied widely across leaders?

When every leader analyses the business differently, the cost compounds quietly. Reviews take longer because the team is reconciling methods before it can reconcile conclusions. Plans carry less conviction because they rest on analyses that do not line up. And strategy is harder to align across a complex, fast-moving business because there is no common foundation to build on. The fragmentation was not visible on any single scorecard, but it was being paid for in every cycle.

It is worth being precise about why this kind of gap is so easy to miss. Each leader was, individually, competent. The shortfall was not in any one person’s ability but in the absence of a shared system — a common way to frame a business problem, a common vocabulary for performance drivers, a common standard for what a rigorous analysis looks like. Without that, collaboration defaults to negotiation, and every cross-functional conversation starts a step behind. The team was spending its energy getting aligned on method when it should have been spending it on the market.

THE ACUMEN APPROACH

A program built around real business challenges

Acumen designed a five-day, immersive Business Analysis program built around NutriAsia’s own business challenges — not a generic syllabus, but live problems the team was already wrestling with. The method was learning by doing: experienced practitioners as faculty, frameworks customised to NutriAsia’s context, and real work as the vehicle for building capability.

The program rested on three anchors.

THREE ANCHORS OF THE PROGRAM

Built around real challenges — learning by doing

First, it built analytical mastery by equipping leaders with common frameworks to understand business models, KPIs, and performance drivers. Second, it introduced structured problem-solving so the team could consistently identify issues, opportunities, and actionable strategies. Third, it applied that learning in real time through live case analysis, group work, and leadership presentations.

This is the distinction Acumen draws between methodology and curriculum. A curriculum delivers content and certifies attendance. A methodology embeds a way of thinking by anchoring it to the real business, so the capability holds long after the program ends. The five days were not the point. The shared discipline they installed was.

The design choices followed from that principle. Using NutriAsia’s own business problems as the material meant participants were never translating a generic case back to their reality — they were working on the reality itself, which is where the learning had to land. Drawing the faculty from experienced practitioners meant the frameworks arrived with the judgement to apply them, not as theory. And building the work around live analysis, group problem-solving, and leadership presentations meant the team practised the behaviour together, in the room, rather than absorbing it alone. By the end, the leaders had not simply learned a set of tools. They had built a common way of working and rehearsed it on the problems that mattered most to the business.

THE OUTCOMES

Specific, and commercial

The results showed up in three places, and all three were commercial before they were anything else.

Faster decision-making. Strategy and analysis cycles that had stretched into months were reduced to weeks. The team spent less time reconciling methods and more time making calls.

Stronger alignment. Leaders now operate from a shared business language and a structured planning approach — the common foundation the team had been missing.

Sustained excellence. Enhanced analytical capability has enabled bolder, faster, and more cohesive strategies across the marketing organisation.

The CMO confirmed that Marketing Academy graduates show measurable capability gains.

THE WIDER IMPLICATION

Why methodology outlasts the classroom

NutriAsia’s outcomes are specific, but the mechanism behind them is general. When capability is built through methodology rather than curriculum, it does not stay in the classroom. It changes how a team frames problems, how it decides, and how it executes — for years afterwards. The frameworks become the team’s own way of working, not a course they once attended.

That is the difference between a training program and a capability journey. One issues certificates. The other changes the commercial behaviour of the team, which is the only outcome that shows up on the business.

NutriAsia is one engagement, but the pattern is not unique to it. Across more than 150 Philippine companies and 24 years, the same logic holds: capability built on the organisation’s own problems, embedded through practice and reinforced until it sticks, produces commercial outcomes that a catalogue of courses cannot. The specifics differ by client — the categories, the starting point, the particular gap — but the mechanism is repeatable. What changes a team is not how much it is taught. It is how deliberately the learning is wired into how the team actually works.

NutriAsia’s outcomes are specific, but the pattern is consistent. When marketing capability is built through Acumen’s diagnostic-to-revalidation methodology, decision cycles compress, strategic alignment deepens, and commercial confidence returns. If you are designing your 2027 capability plan, the most useful next step is to reach out to Acumen.

Subtraction as Strategy: How Filipino Leadership Teams Decide What to Stop

Mon, 06 Jul 2026 08:28:36 GMT

Subtraction as a strategy means deliberately choosing which businesses, products, and markets to stop funding, so a company's finite capital and management attention concentrate on the bets it can actually win. For multi-business Filipino enterprises, it is the harder — and more valuable — half of strategy.

Most leadership teams have made their peace with the idea that they must protect the core while pursuing growth. The harder decision, the one that rarely gets made in the planning room, is where to stop: which businesses, products, and markets the company will deliberately walk away from, so the rest can actually win.

That decision tends to be postponed. It is easier to add a new initiative than to retire an old one, and easier to fund a new bet than to defund a unit that already has a team, a budget, and a leader who will argue to keep it. So the portfolio keeps growing, and the company's finite capital and management attention get spread a little thinner in each cycle.

This is the default state of most multi-business Filipino enterprises, and it sustains itself without anyone deciding that it should. Every business unit has a reason to exist and a case for more investment. Every new opportunity, looked at on its own, sounds worth pursuing. Nobody in the room is wrong, exactly, which is why nothing gets stopped. The cost shows up slowly: a company that funds twelve priorities at sixty percent of what each needs will usually lose to a competitor that funds four at full strength. Capital spread evenly is capital that wins nowhere in particular.

Why is subtraction the harder half of strategy

Subtraction is the harder half of strategy, and it cannot be left to intuition. The reason is not that leaders lack the judgment to see which bets are weak. In most companies, the people in the room already have a fairly accurate private sense of which units are subscale and which markets the company entered out of optimism. The problem is what happens when that private sense has to become a shared decision.

Cutting a business is a deeply political act. The unit being questioned has a head who has built a team and a plan around it and will defend it with real conviction, because, from within that unit, the case for continuing is genuine. Without an objective basis for the decision, the conversation becomes a contest of advocacy, and advocacy rewards whoever argues hardest or with the most seniority behind them. The weak bet survives, not because anyone proved it was strong, but because no one could make the case to stop it from sticking.

The barrier to subtraction is defensibility rather than insight. A leadership team that wants to make different decisions needs a standard the room cannot argue around — one that converts a political question into a question of evidence, and lets a leader say no to a colleague's business without the no becoming personal.

Subtraction is concentration — at three levels

The reframe worth holding onto is that subtraction is concentration. Saying no is how a company puts its finite capital and attention behind bets that can yield a return. That logic holds at more than one level of the business.

At the operational level, subtraction means deciding what to stop making. We worked with a Philippine manufacturer whose core strength was highly customized business-to-business work, and whose customization had become its own bottleneck — the product range had proliferated until complexity, not demand, set the pace. The work was not to abandon customization, its genuine advantage, but to make disciplined choices about which parts of the model to scale and which to stop.

At the portfolio level, subtraction shows how a company refreshes its plan. We helped a major, publicly listed Philippine food and beverage company rework its five-year roadmap, and the value was as much in what came off the plan as in what went on it. Rather than adding new ambitions to the existing ones, the leadership team rebuilt the roadmap around a defined set of where-to-play and how-to-win priorities.

At the level of resource allocation, subtraction concerns how capital moves within a group. We worked with a Philippine pharmaceutical and consumer-health company whose business units had operated independently, each setting its own course — with the familiar risk of units quietly competing for the same finite capital. A strategic direction process brought them to a single set of focused priorities, so capital followed the bets that could win.

None of these companies has retreated. Each grew, and grew more reliably, because it had decided what it would not do.

The Strategic Choice Matrix: a method for deciding what to stop

The Strategic Choice Matrix is the standard tool for this. It evaluates every current and prospective bet on two questions. First, how attractive is the opportunity — is the market large enough, growing enough, and profitable enough to be worth winning? Second, how winnable is it — can this company credibly win there, given its capabilities and position? Each opportunity is shown in a single picture, and the whole leadership team looks at it at once.

The discipline this imposes is most useful for the second question. Teams tend to assess attractiveness reasonably well; they are good at sizing markets. Where honesty breaks down is on winnability. Optimism about winnability is how attractive-but-unwinnable bets earn their place and keep it. Forcing winnability into the open — making the team defend it with the same rigor it applies to market size — is where the Matrix does its real work. An attractive but unwinnable opportunity is not a growth platform; it is a place where capital goes to be consumed.

Laid out this way, the where-not-to-play decision rests on a common standard rather than on whoever spoke last. That is what makes it defensible to both the leadership team and the affected units. A business being wound down can see that it was held to the same terms as everyone else.

We saw this with BPI MS Philippines , the non-life insurance joint venture of BPI and Mitsui Sumitomo. The company came in without a unified strategic direction or an objective way to weigh its options. Acumen began with discovery — interviews with executives and a survey across the organization — then applied the Strategic Choice Matrix to evaluate attractiveness and winnability across its segments. The output was not a longer list of ambitions, but a short set of clear priorities the leadership team could agree on and cascade, with the bets that did not survive set aside.

What subtraction means for your annual planning season

Annual business planning is only a real strategy when the long-term where-to-play has already been settled. Walk in without that clarity, and the session becomes a budgeting negotiation: every unit defends its number, and the plan that emerges is additive by construction. The subtraction work belongs before the workshop, not inside it. A team that has used the Matrix to decide where it will and will not play can spend the workshop on how to win and how to resource the priorities that survived. The annual plan cannot make a decision that the company has avoided all year. It can only divide the budget.

The useful test for any leadership team is simple. If you were asked to name the one business, product, or market you would stop funding, could you name it — and could you defend that decision, on shared terms, to the people it affects? A team that can answer both halves has done the work of strategy. A team that can answer only the first has an opinion, not yet a decision.

If your leadership team is heading into a planning workshop this year, the Where-to-Play / Where-Not-to-Play Workbook turns this thinking into a session you can run — and we would be glad to be part of the conversation if the call in front of you is consequential.

Frequently asked questions

What does "subtraction as strategy" mean?

Subtraction as a strategy is the deliberate decision to stop funding certain businesses, products, or markets so that a company's finite capital and management attention concentrate on the bets it can actually win. It is the counterpart to growth: rather than adding initiatives, a leadership team decides where the company will not play.

What is the Strategic Choice Matrix?

The Strategic Choice Matrix is a decision tool that evaluates each current or prospective bet on two dimensions: how attractive the opportunity is (market size, growth, profitability) and how winnable it is (whether the company can credibly win given its capabilities). Plotting every opportunity on one shared picture turns a political debate into an evidence-based decision that the whole leadership team can see at once.

Why do weak business units continue to survive in multi-business companies?

Weak units survive because subtraction is a political act, not an analytical one. Each unit has a leader who will defend it with genuine conviction, and without an objective, shared standard, the decision becomes a contest of advocacy that rewards seniority and the strongest argument rather than the strongest business. The barrier is defensibility, not insight — leaders often already sense which bets are weak.

How is this different from normal annual business planning?

Annual planning divides the budget; it does not decide long-term direction. If a company has not already settled where it will and will not play, the planning session collapses into a negotiation in which every unit defends its number, and the plan grows by default. Subtraction decisions belong before the planning workshop, so the workshop itself can focus on how to win and how to resource the priorities that survived.

The Capability Gap Shows Up on Your P&L Before It Shows Up in a Performance Review

Mon, 22 Jun 2026 00:10:09 GMT

Most marketing leaders scoping their 2027 plans are not worried about whether their team is working hard enough. They can see the activity. The campaigns ship, the decks get built, the calendar is full. What they cannot always explain is why all that effort is not translating into the commercial results the business needs — why a capable, well-staffed team keeps producing work that is busy without being sharp.

That gap between effort and result is easy to feel and hard to name. It rarely looks like a capability problem from the inside, because the people are good, the hours are long, and the output is constant. It looks like a market problem, or a budget problem, or a problem with the brief. Often it is none of those. It is a gap in the quality of the thinking that happens before the work begins, and it is costing the business in ways that do not yet have a line on anyone's scorecard.

The conversation 2026 forces

For most of the last decade, the capability question could sit comfortably inside the people function. Training was something you did because it was good practice, because the team expected it, because the budget allowed it. The link to commercial performance was assumed rather than examined.

A slower-growth year removes that comfort. When the market is expanding, weak capability is hidden by the tide; teams hit their numbers because the category is carrying them. When growth tightens, every marketing peso is asked to justify itself, and the work that is merely busy becomes visible for what it is. The capability conversation moves out of the people function and onto the agenda of whoever owns the commercial result.

The wider data has been pointing this way for a while. In its Future of Jobs Report 2025 , the World Economic Forum found that skill gaps are the single biggest barrier to business transformation, with around two-thirds of employers naming them as a major obstacle over the next five years. The same research found that analytical thinking remains the most sought-after capability of all, considered essential by seven in ten companies. The skills that matter most are precisely the ones that are hardest to hire for and slowest to build.

In the Philippines, the money is already moving. Market estimates put corporate training spend on track to exceed PHP 50 billion , with a majority of firms planning to increase what they invest. The same estimates carry a quieter finding: a large share of companies say they struggle to source training that actually works. The spend is rising faster than the ability to tell a good program from a poor one. That is the real risk in a tighter year — not that companies will underinvest in capability, but that they will spend more on the wrong kind of it.

What capability actually is

The reframe that helps is simple to state and harder to act on. Marketing capability is not an L&D expense. It is a commercial performance lever — one of the few that compounds. Sharper thinking upstream produces better choices downstream, and better choices produce growth that would otherwise be quietly lost. Weak capability works the same way in reverse, except the loss never announces itself.

This is the difference between building knowledge and building judgment. Tonton Mapa , who leads Acumen's capability building practice, describes the work as building the commercial acumen of leaders so they can deliver sustained business growth in challenging circumstances, and is deliberate about calling the underlying skills foundational rather than basic. They are foundational because everything else is built on them. A team that cannot frame a business problem well will struggle with every decision that follows, no matter how much budget or talent sits downstream of that first weakness.

Seen this way, the capability question stops being about courses and certificates and becomes a question about commercial readiness. Can this team see the business clearly, understand the customer deeply, and make a sharp strategic choice before the work starts? When the answer is no, the cost is real and it is already being paid.

Where the gap actually is

What gets called "a capability gap" is usually one or more of three specific gaps, and they sit in a sequence. Each one builds on the one before it, which is why a weakness early in the chain compounds through everything after it. The Marketing Excellence Program is built around this sequence — analyze, then understand, then strategize — because that is the order in which good marketing thinking actually happens.

The analytical gap. This is the first and most consequential. The symptom is familiar: business reviews that stay on the surface, problem analysis that does not convince, plans the leadership team cannot fully back. The team is often data-rich and insight-poor — drowning in numbers but unable to translate them into a clear reading of what is driving the business. The commercial cost is effort that scatters. Without a sharp diagnosis, marketing spreads itself thin across too many initiatives, none of them aimed at the real driver of results.

The insighting gap. Most teams believe consumer understanding matters. Fewer have a rigorous process for producing it. The symptom is a team that respects insight in principle but reaches for assumption in practice, because it lacks the frameworks and the discipline to interact with customers and mine what they say for something usable. The commercial cost is strategy built on what the team already believes rather than on what the customer actually does. In a market as varied as the Philippines, that gap between assumption and reality is where growth quietly leaks away.

The strategy and communications gap. When analysis is thin and insight is shallow, the strategic choice that follows is necessarily weak — and so is the work that carries it to market. The symptom shows up in two linked ways. Upstream, the plan reads as a list of activities rather than a set of deliberate choices, so everything looks important and nothing is prioritized. Downstream, the campaigns that result do not stand out in the clutter, the messaging is inconsistent from one execution to the next, and there is an evident gap between the money spent and the impact returned. These are not two problems but one: a strategy that was never sharp enough to brief, expressed in work that was never going to land. It is also the part most often mistaken for the whole problem, because the weak output is the visible end of it. Fixing the campaigns without fixing the choice behind them rarely holds.

The point of naming the three is that the visible symptom is almost never where the gap actually sits. A team with a communications problem usually has a strategy problem behind it, and a team with a strategy problem usually has an analytical one behind that. Closing the gap means finding where in the sequence it starts, not where it shows.

If you want to know where your own team sits across these three, Acumen's Capability Gap Audit offers a structured way to assess it.

Why how you build it matters more than what you teach

Once a leader accepts that capability is a commercial lever, the next question is how to build it. This is where most capability spend is quietly wasted, and it has little to do with the quality of the content.

Most training buys a catalog. Modules are selected, sessions are scheduled, attendance is tracked, certificates are issued. The content may be excellent. The problem is that it floats beside the business rather than being anchored to it. People learn frameworks in a room and return to a job that looks nothing like the exercises, and within weeks the learning has evaporated because it never had anything real to hold onto.

Capability that changes behavior is built differently. It is built as a journey, on the organization's own live business problems. Acumen's approach moves through four stages — a diagnostic that establishes the team's real baseline against the company's business objectives, a design built specifically to that gap, the doing of actual work on the company's own challenges rather than generic case studies, and a revalidation that confirms the new behavior has held. The difference is not the rigor of the material. It is whether the learning is wired into the business or sitting next to it.

The work Acumen designed for NutriAsia shows what that looks like in practice. Rather than running a standard curriculum, the program was built around the company's own categories and business questions and integrated with how its teams already worked. Because the team was applying the thinking to live problems as it learned, the gap between learning and doing closed quickly — strategy cycles that had taken months began to take weeks. That compression is not a training outcome. It is a commercial one, and it came from how the capability was built, not simply from what was covered.

A catalog and a journey can cost similar money. They do not produce similar results. One leaves a team with new vocabulary; the other leaves it with new judgment that shows up in the next plan.

The variable that decides the return

There is a harder truth underneath all of this, and it is the one most worth saying plainly to anyone about to approve capability spend. The most common reason a capability investment returns nothing is not a weak program. It is the signal leadership sends about whether the learning matters.

When managers pull participants out of sessions to handle something urgent, when development is scheduled against competing deadlines that always win, when the program is treated as an HR initiative to be attended rather than a business priority to be practiced and coached, even an excellent program will fade. The team reads the signal accurately: this is not real work. And so it does not become real capability.

Acumen has seen this pattern repeatedly. In one engagement with a leading Philippine food manufacturer, the team had been through prior training, yet little of it had taken hold — not because the content was poor, but because senior managers were not consistently using the tools themselves or coaching their teams to use them. The work that changed things was not more training. It was redesigning the program around the managers: enabling them to model the discipline, to coach it, to make it part of how the team worked rather than something the team had once attended. Only then did the behavior change hold across the organization.

The lesson is uncomfortable because it points back at the buyer. The single biggest determinant of whether capability spend returns anything is owned by the sponsor, not the trainer. A proposal can be excellent and still fail on this one point. Before a leader asks whether a program is good, the more useful question is whether they are prepared to sponsor it as if it were a business priority, because that decision will matter more than the curriculum ever could.

The 2027 decision

For a marketing leader locking next year's plan, this turns the capability line into a more serious conversation than it usually gets — and one worth having with the CHRO and the CFO in the room rather than alone.

Three questions are worth putting on the table. First, is this a training line item or a commercial investment, and are we measuring it as the latter? If capability is meant to recover growth, it should be held to a commercial standard, not a participation one. Second, where is our real gap? Not where the symptom shows, but where in the sequence — analysis, insighting, strategy and communications — the weakness actually starts, because spending on the wrong stage is its own kind of waste. Third, who will sponsor it? If the honest answer is that no senior leader is prepared to own it as a business priority, the spend is unlikely to return what it costs, and that is worth knowing before the budget is committed rather than after.

These are not difficult questions. They are simply different from the ones usually asked when a capability proposal lands, which tend to be about content, cost, and calendar. The shift from those questions to these is the shift from buying training to building capability.

A choice already being made

The capability gap is not a cost a leader chooses whether to take on. It is a cost the business is already paying, quarter after quarter, in slower decisions and thinner work and budget that does not return what it should. The only real choice in the 2027 plan is whether to keep absorbing that cost where no one can see it, or to treat capability as the commercial lever it has always been and start closing the gap deliberately.

For the leaders who make that shift this planning cycle, the payoff is not a more trained team. It is a sharper one — a team that frames problems clearly, reads the customer accurately, and makes choices the business can back. That is what capability is for, and it is what a slower year makes impossible to keep deferring.

If this perspective is useful to your team, we would be glad to walk through how Acumen would diagnose and design a capability journey specific to your organization.

Consultants for Change: When to Bring in Specialists

Mon, 08 Jun 2026 08:32:20 GMT

Every organization eventually reaches a moment when what got it here is no longer enough to get it where it needs to go. A market shifts, a competitor moves, the business outgrows its own structure, or the leadership team looks around and realizes that the culture they built, the one that served them well for years, is now quietly working against them. The instinct in those moments is to plan, to strategize, to get everyone in a room and align around a direction. And most organizations do exactly that, only to watch the plan dissolve somewhere between the boardroom and the rest of the business. Not because the strategy was wrong, but because the organization was never truly brought along. Across twenty-four years of working alongside Filipino companies through their most defining transitions, this is the pattern we have seen more than any other. Change does not fail at the strategy level. It fails at the people level, and that is a very different problem to solve.

Organizational change, whether it involves a strategic pivot, a restructuring, a technology rollout, or a fundamental reset of culture and leadership, asks something of an organization that most internal teams are genuinely not positioned to deliver alone. Not because they are not capable, but because navigating change of real consequence requires things that are nearly impossible to assemble from inside: objectivity untouched by years of proximity to the problem, experience with how similar transitions have played out elsewhere, and the ability to hold the trust of leadership and the broader team simultaneously. When those things are missing, even a well-resourced transformation tends to stall, producing only surface-level change while the underlying reality stays exactly where it was.

What change management consultants actually do is less dramatic than the term suggests and more consequential than most clients expect. The work begins with frameworks or deliverables but with relationships, because without genuine trust at every level of the organization, nothing else holds. People need to feel that the change being asked of them is being led by someone who understands their reality, not someone who arrived with a methodology and a timeline and intends to apply both regardless of what they find. Once that trust is established, the real work begins: an honest diagnosis of where the organization is ready for what is being asked and where the gaps are significant enough to derail the effort if left unaddressed. From there, the work moves into strategy, not just for communicating what is changing but for influencing the behaviors that make the change real, aligning what leaders say with what the organization actually experiences, and building the accountability that sustains momentum long past the initial announcement, when the energy of launch has faded, and the harder work of adoption has set in.

In our organizational transformation practice at Acumen, we have come to understand that the technical dimensions of a transformation almost never determine whether it succeeds. A new governance structure, a revised operating model, an updated system- these are demanding but manageable. What determines the outcome is always the human dimension, and it is also the dimension that receives the least attention until something goes wrong. How do you shift a culture shaped over a generation? How do you develop leaders being asked to operate in genuinely unfamiliar ways, to decide differently, to hold their teams to a standard they themselves are still learning? And how do you do any of this inside a family-owned business, where relationships carry decades of shared history, where the most consequential dynamics are almost never written in any brief, and where a misstep in how the change is introduced can fracture trust that took years to build? These questions do not yield to a standard playbook. They require presence, patience, and a willingness to sit with the specific complexity of the organization in front of us rather than the one we expected to find.

Timing shapes everything in this work. Bring specialists in too late, and you are already managing the fallout of a change that has lost the confidence of the people it depends on. Bring them in without a clearly defined scope, and the engagement creates confusion before it produces anything of value. The moments when external support genuinely changes the outcome are specific and recognizable. A major transition, a merger, an acquisition, a significant technology implementation, a regulatory shift that fundamentally changes how the business must operate- these are inflection points where the complexity of what is being asked genuinely exceeds what internal teams can absorb while keeping everything else running. Rapid growth exposes inefficiencies and capability gaps that were manageable at a smaller scale but become real liabilities when the organization is being stretched in every direction. And stagnation or decline, where momentum has been lost and the internal diagnosis of why keeps returning to the same inconclusive answers, is perhaps the moment when an outside perspective is most necessary, because the people closest to a problem are often the last to see it for what it actually is.

We have also seen what happens when the moment is wrong. When consultants are brought in to fill a seat that should have been a permanent hire, to execute work whose scope was never clearly defined, or to provide the appearance of rigor around a decision already made internally. Those engagements rarely deliver what the client was hoping for, and they leave behind a skepticism that makes the next genuine need harder to address. Part of doing this work with integrity is being willing to tell a client when the conditions are not right, when what they need is not an external engagement but an internal decision they have been avoiding. We have paused projects and redirected briefs because the honest answer was that the organization was not yet ready for what it was asking us to help it do. That conversation is never comfortable. It is, however, the kind of conversation that determines whether the trust required for real change is possible at all.

A well-structured engagement does not arrive with answers already formed. It creates the conditions for the right answers to emerge from within the organization through honest dialogue, rigorous diagnosis, and strategies built around what the business's specific culture and capacity can genuinely absorb and sustain. It means working alongside people rather than above them, communicating differently to different groups because what lands with the leadership team will not land the same way on the floor, and measuring adoption not just at launch but across the months that follow. Because change that does not hold was never really change. It was momentum, and momentum without roots does not last.

At the end of a well-executed engagement, the organization should be more capable than the one that began it. Not more dependent on external support, but genuinely better equipped from the inside to navigate whatever comes next. That is the standard we hold ourselves to in every transformation we undertake, and the measure we would encourage any organization to apply when asking whether the work delivered what it was supposed to. Change is not an event that happens to a business. It is a capability a business builds, and building it in a way that endures is the most meaningful outcome any transformation investment can deliver.

If your organization is at one of those inflection points, facing a transition that feels larger than the team can carry alone, the right time to have that conversation is before momentum is lost. Reach out to our team or contact us:

Acumen’s Enduring Success Model: Building Blocks for Lasting Growth

Sun, 07 Jun 2026 16:00:21 GMT

Still relying on tactical marketing frameworks and approaches? Well, there is a familiar rhythm in how many organizations pursue growth.

A new campaign launches.

A pricing tweak is introduced.

A promotional push goes live.

The numbers move, sure. Sometimes up, sometimes not, sometimes in a way we’d rather not experience, and the cycle just keeps going. The focus is immediate, tactical, and often anchored in variations of the classic “5Ps”: product, price, place, promotion, and people.

Of course, there is nothing inherently wrong with these tools. But on their own, they are not enough.

Because lasting, sustainable growth rarely results from tactics alone. It is built from something deeper, something structural.

Too many organizations chase quick wins while overlooking the foundations that make those wins sustainable. Often, these organizations will optimize campaigns without aligning strategy. They push for revenue without strengthening the systems that support it. They invest in visibility without building the internal clarity that gives that visibility meaning.

This is the gap that Acumen’s Enduring Success Model is designed to address.

Rather than focusing on surface-level interventions, the model reframes growth as the product of five interconnected layers:

Clear Compass
Strong Leadership
Compelling Proposition
Strong Operating System
Right People and Culture

Together, these elements form the infrastructure of enduring success. One that does more than produce successful results; it also sustains them in the long run.

Quick wins feel good. But they don't build lasting organizations. Discover the five interconnected layers behind Acumen's Enduring Success Model — and why sustainable growth starts from the inside out.

Clear Compass: Setting Direction That Holds

At the center of every successful organization is clarity.

Clarity of purpose. Ambition. Clarity of the choices that define where to play and how to win.

Without this kind of clarity, even the most capable teams drift.

A “Clear Compass” does more than articulate a vision. It provides a roadmap against which every decision can be measured.

Should the company enter a new category? Expand into a new market? Invest in a new capability?

These are not isolated decisions, after all. They are strategic choices that shape the business's trajectory. And when the compass is clear, alignment follows. Resources are allocated with intent. Teams understand not just what they are doing, but why. Progress becomes actually measurable in a way that makes tangible sense.

Without that kind of clarity, organizations can fall into an unfortunate pattern of reactive decision-making, responding to short-term pressures rather than advancing a long-term agenda.

Strong Leadership: The Multiplier of Everything Else

Now, if strategy defines direction… leadership determines whether that direction is actually realized.

Leadership is not simply about authority. It is about influence. It’s about how leaders create trust, provide stability, and inspire confidence across the organization. Research from Gallup: How to Be a Better Leader highlights that “ leadership accounts for a significant portion of team engagement, shaping how people experience their work and their organization. ”

This matters because engagement, first and foremost, drives great performance.

Teams that trust their leaders? These are the teams that move faster, take ownership, and are empowered to navigate uncertainty with greater resilience. In contrast, weak leadership creates hesitation, misalignment, and, over time, disengagement.

Within Acumen’s model, Strong Leadership is embedded in how decisions are made and how accountability is structured. It’s an intrinsic part of how culture is reinforced.

Because even the best strategy will fail without leaders who can carry it forward.

Compelling Proposition: Why Customers Choose You

Picture a crowded market.

Is just standing there with your wares enough to get the audience you’re looking for? No, right? Same basic principle. And a “Compelling Proposition” defines why.

It answers a simple but critical question: why should a customer choose you over every other available option? According to Jason Weiland in Quicken's Business Value Proposition Guide , it’s the strong value proposition that communicates the uniqueness a business delivers, making it clear, relevant, and differentiated in the eyes of the customer. Thus, making that business the obvious choice.

But clarity is often harder than it seems.

Many organizations may describe what they offer without articulating why it is meaningfully different. The messaging can become generic. Positioning can become interchangeable. And in that environment, competition shifts toward price rather than value.

What can resist that pull? A compelling proposition.

It connects ‘customer need’ with strong business capability in a way that is both distinct and defensible. It is not just a statement—it is a commitment that shapes product decisions, marketing strategy, and customer experience.

When done correctly, as shown by Acumen’s successes, this is what builds preference.

Strong Operating System: Turning Strategy into Execution

If strategy sets the direction and execution determines the outcome, what bridges the two?

A “ Strong Operating System ”, that’s what.

It encompasses the structures, processes, and capabilities that allow an organization to deliver on its ambitions. Finance, operations, and commercial functions are not separate engines. They are interconnected systems that must work in sync.

Commercial excellence, in particular, plays a critical role. Organizations that align their go-to-market strategy with operational capability are better positioned to drive revenue and sustain growth. This requires more than periodic improvement. It demands continuous capability building—refining how the organization prices, distributes, sells, and delivers value.

Without a strong operating system, even the most compelling strategy remains theoretical.

With it, execution becomes consistent, scalable, and resilient.

Right People and Culture: The Foundation Beneath Everything

No system, no strategy, and no proposition can succeed without the right kind of people who can bring them to life.

The “ Right People and Culture ” are what anchor the entire model.

Organizational design is not just about structure. It is about alignment—ensuring that roles, processes, and incentives support the strategy rather than work against it. When people understand their role in the broader system, collaboration improves. Decision-making becomes faster. Innovation becomes more natural.

Culture, in this sense, is not abstract. It is expressed in everyday behavior—how teams communicate, how leaders respond to challenges, and how success is defined.

Organizations that invest in this layer create environments where performance and engagement reinforce each other. Those who neglect it often find themselves solving the same problems repeatedly, without addressing the root cause.

How Consultants Enable Enduring Success

The value of a framework is more accurately observed in its application. Theory can only go so far, after all.

In practical application, consultants play a critical role. Not as external observers but as partners embedded in the process. At Acumen Strategy Consultants, for example, consulting is not limited to diagnosis. Here, it is about facilitation, alignment, and capability building.

Teams work across functions, bringing together perspectives that can often be fragmented within the organization. Expert consultants from Acumen can challenge assumptions, introduce structure, and guide decision-making in a way that is both objective and grounded in experience.

Most importantly, they transfer knowledge.

With consultants like these, the goal is not dependency. It is self-sufficiency.

By the end of an engagement with this model implemented, the organization is not just equipped with a strategy. Rather, they have the capability to refine and execute that strategy over time.

It’s this that turns consulting from a short-term intervention into a long-term investment.

Quick Wins or Enduring Success: It’s Your Choice

In a business environment defined by speed and constant change, the temptation to prioritize quick and easy wins is understandable.

But quick wins, on their own, do not build lasting success.

They create some movement, sure, but often these quick wins can’t be done as solutions for the long run. There’s no enduring, sustainable progress.

Acumen’s Enduring Success Model offers an alternative. It shifts the focus from isolated tactics to integrated systems. From short-term gains to long-term value.

From fragmented effort to aligned execution.

The benefits speak for themselves.

There’s stronger employee engagement. Clearer strategic direction. More differentiated positioning. And ultimately? Yes, more sustainable growth.

So do these building blocks matter? Maybe the better question is whether organizations are willing to invest in them.

Because at the end of it all, growth is not just about what you do next.

It is about what you build now and how you can make it last.

Ready to move beyond short-term wins and build a business designed for lasting success?

Let’s talk and build your sustainable future over at Acumen Strategy Consulting.

Why professionalizing your family business is the best gift you can give your children

Wed, 03 Jun 2026 16:00:11 GMT

If you built your business from nothing, it can be painful to even imagine not being part of every department anymore.

But in many family businesses, what actually protects the next generation is not tighter control, but professionalizing the way the business runs.

In this article, we’ll explore why professionalizing a family business is not about surrendering control or replacing family values with corporate systems. It is about protecting what you built, reducing the burden your children may one day inherit, and creating a structure strong enough to carry your legacy beyond one generation.

Key takeaways:

Professionalizing a family business is about protecting your legacy, not losing control or family values.
Most challenges appear when the next generation starts noticing gaps in structure, roles, and decision-making.
Without systems, businesses become overly dependent on a few people, making growth and succession harder.
Professionalization brings clarity in roles, decisions, and governance, reducing stress for both family and business.
Strong structure helps preserve culture and ensures the next generation inherits a stable, scalable business rather than complexity.

The moment someone finally says, “We will lose the business if we don’t fix this”

In a family business, the conversation about structure does not usually start with the owner.

As the business founder, you may have experienced this: someone in your family raises concerns about structure. It may be your child who worked in a multinational company before joining your family corporation. They have seen how other companies work. Sometimes, it is an in-law who spent years in structured organizations before joining your business. They come in, observe how things are done, and quietly panic.

One daughter of a founder we recently worked with raised this same concern after a few months inside their company. She said that if they do not fix the structure, the business would go into a downward spiral. She wasn’t trying to disrespect her parents. She was trying to protect what they built. She had seen the business grow, but scaling it would require systems to support it.

Professionalization often starts with this moment: a family member who loves the business enough to say they can’t keep doing things this way and expect a different future.

1. Fear of losing relevance

For many founders, the business is not just a company. It is your life’s work, your identity, your proof that you built something from nothing.

So when people suggest professionalizing (creating systems, bringing in other leaders, setting up a board), it can feel like they are saying you are no longer needed.

You may start wondering what your place will be if you are no longer deciding everything. If your children and managers can run the business without you, what is your role now?

Professionalizing does not make you lose your importance. It shifts your role from crisis firefighter into architect and mentor, the person who designed a system that can survive beyond you.

What happens when everything depends on you

When everything depends on you, both the business and the family become vulnerable. If something happens to you, your children inherit complexity without structure. Studies show that many family businesses fail to reach the third generation not because the business is weak, but because succession and governance were never properly prepared.

2. Fear of exposing the secret recipe

Many founders are deeply protective of what they consider as the “secret recipe.” It can be a product formula, a pricing strategy, a way of choosing land, or an important supplier relationship.

Because of this, you may hesitate to share critical strategies with long‑time employees, open key roles to non‑family members, and bring in external consultants who might also work with competitors.

Your intention is to protect the business, but a business that holds too tightly to knowledge often struggles to scale. The unintended effect is that the firm becomes dangerously dependent on one or two people.

What happens when knowledge stays in a few heads

When only one or two people truly understand how things work in your company, the whole firm will depend on you for every major decision. If you get sick, retire, or simply cannot keep up, operations slow down or stall. It also becomes harder to train the next generation because there is nothing written down for them to study or practice.

3. Scared that documenting will reveal the mess

On the other hand, some founders worry because there is no clear “secret recipe” at all. So much of what you do is instinct. You just know which land to buy or client to trust. You just know when to walk away from a deal.

Because of this, you may feel uncomfortable writing things down. You worry that if anyone “opens the box,” they will see how informal everything really is. So you delay systems, structure, or documentation.

Putting structure in place is not about shaming your gut feel. It is about decoding it, turning what you already do well into a simple, repeatable guide that your children and key employees can apply.

What happens when everything is instinct-driven

When nothing is documented, your instincts cannot be taught or tested. It becomes difficult to attract serious managers, partners, or investors because they cannot see how decisions are made. Inside the family, your children may also feel pressured to “read your mind” instead of learning a clear way to decide.

4. “We’re not corporate people” anxiety

Many founders also carry insecurities:

“I didn’t finish college.”
“We’re from the province; we’re not corporate people.”
“What if outsiders think we look unprofessional?”

So instead of asking for help, you keep more and more to yourself. You protect your dignity in the short term.

However, the most effective families do the opposite: they choose advisors who respect their story, then work with them to validate what they already do well and strengthen what needs to change.

What happens when outside perspective is avoided

When you avoid outside perspective completely, blind spots stay hidden until they become full-blown problems, conflicts between siblings, unclear ownership, stalled growth, or talent leaving because they see no path forward. You may preserve your pride today, but you unintentionally put your children’s future at risk in the long term.

5. Protecting the family way from “corporate types”

Another unspoken fear about professional managers, independent directors, consultants is they will ruin the family culture inside the company.

In many Philippine and Asian family businesses, protecting the “family culture” is a top priority. You may worry that professionalization means becoming cold, corporate, or purely profit-driven.

But here is the hard truth: without structure, your family culture might already be at risk.

Right now, that culture lives mostly in stories and habits: “We treat people like our own.” “We take care of suppliers who have been with us from the beginning.” “We don’t abandon employees in hard times.”

But how can you be sure that culture will still exist when you are no longer the one enforcing it?

Professionalizing with the right partners actually helps you protect what matters most. You clarify your values, codify how you want people to be treated, and design governance that keeps those values alive even when leadership changes.

In other words, you are not erasing your culture. You are preserving it, so it can survive beyond one generation.

“Professionalizing the business is actually protecting that culture, writing it down and making sure it remains for the next generations.” - Trizia Ann Magalino, Consulting Project Manager, Acumen Strategy Consultants

What happens when trusted professionals are never brought in

When everything stays within a small family circle, culture depends entirely on personalities. If the next generation leads differently, the “family feel” can disappear anyway because it was never written down or built into systems.

What life looks like when a family business grows without systems

Before we talk about benefits, it helps to be honest about the cost of doing nothing.

From the outside, your company may look successful: strong revenues, multiple sites, a recognizable brand. Inside, everyday life often looks very different.

You are exhausted and always on call. Meetings run the whole day or even late into the night because there are no clear agendas or hard stops.
People are doing “everything” because no one has a clearly defined scope. Everyone is busy, but no one is fully sure what success looks like.
Your children or next-gen leaders hesitate to speak up. They worry that raising concerns might be seen as disrespect toward you as their parent.
Employees get caught in the middle. They try to follow instructions from different family members, often with no clear decision-maker to guide them.

Underneath the burnout is a simple pattern: no clear roles, no agreed decision-making process, and no safe space to surface what is not working.

Left unaddressed, this does not just slow the business down. It slowly strains relationships at home, makes the next generation question whether they want to stay, and quietly weakens the legacy you are trying to protect.

Benefits of professionalizing your family business

When you professionalize, you are not just making your organizational chart prettier. You are changing the experience of everyone who lives in and around the business, including yourself.

Here are some of the biggest benefits you can expect when you start professionalizing your family business:

1. Your business can grow without burning everyone out

As your company expands, informal systems (group chats, adhoc calls, marathon meetings) become inefficient and fragile.

Professionalization gives you clear roles, so people know what they own. You now have decision frameworks, so issues are escalated the same way every time. Not every problem needs you in the room because you have governance structures.

Scaling the family business becomes less about heroics and more about repeatable ways of working.

2. You reduce the risk of everything depending on one person

When the business lives inside your head and a few trusted family members, you become the single point of failure. If anything happens to you, your children inherit complexity without a map.

Professionalization spreads responsibility and documents your instincts and “secret recipes” in simple language. It also clarifies who decides, who does, who is consulted, and who is informed. Most importantly, it gives the next generation a manual on how to run the business and not just a history of how you started it.

3. You make it easier to attract and keep good people

Talented professionals (including your own children) rarely stay long in environments where decisions are unclear, favoritism overrides performance, and where roles and expectations change depending on who is present in the room.

Professionalizing introduces more transparent roles and merit‑based systems. People know what is expected, what growth looks like, and how decisions are made. That creates stronger motivation, accountability, and loyalty.

4. You protect the family culture you’re proud of

Without structure, “we treat each other like family” depends on personalities.

But with structure, you can write down the values and behaviors you never want to lose. You can also embed them into policies, stories, and everyday practices. You can even make sure that even when leadership changes, the way you treat people stays consistent.

5. You give yourself permission to step back without guilt

One of the goals of professional consultants is to “graduate” you over time. That means moving you from the one who does everything, to the one who decides, then to the one who is consulted, until you eventually become the one who is simply informed.

That also means that being less involved gives you more time to mentor your children and enjoy your life. Professionalizing is how you create that path for yourself and for them.

Tips for professionalizing your family business

You don’t need to implement a full playbook overnight. Think of this less as a checklist and more as a set of lenses you slowly look through and conversations you gradually start.

1. Be clear about the family’s role in the company

Instead of assuming your children will just take over, sit down and talk openly:

What do you want to keep doing?
Where do you want to start letting go?
What strengths can the younger generation bring? Is it innovation, technology, or expansion into new markets?

When the family’s role is clear, it becomes easier to decide which roles must stay in the family and where professionals can help the business grow.

2. Strengthen governance so conflict has a place to go

Professionalization is much easier when you have clear rooms:

Family councils or assemblies for relationship and values.
Owner meetings for shareholding and long‑term direction.
Boards for oversight and strategy.
Management meetings for day‑to‑day execution.

When everyone knows which “room” a topic belongs in, it becomes easier to keep family issues from hijacking business decisions and easier to actually reach a decision in the first place.

3. Build leadership systems, not just titles

Professionalization means you go beyond giving your child a C‑level title and hoping for the best. It includes clarifying the organization structure and reporting lines. It also means strengthening the leadership team, not just one successor; preparing succession plans that consider readiness, not just age or birth order; and agreeing on how performance will be measured and supported.

Over time, this gives your children and key people a clear path to grow into their roles.

4. Define your culture in writing

Every family business has unwritten rules: How you treat suppliers, how you respond in a crisis, and what you will never compromise for profit.

Professionalizing means capturing these stories, principles, and non‑negotiables in simple language. This culture becomes a guide for future leaders, so they don’t have to guess what you would have done.

5. Commit to performance over proximity

As the business grows, relying only on gut feel or family ties creates resentment.

Professionalization means slowly shifting toward clear standards and KPIs, regular performance conversations, as well as promotions and rewards based more on contribution than on last name.

This doesn’t erase loyalty. It makes loyalty more sustainable.

6. Make room for outside expertise, on your terms

You don’t have to open your doors to just anyone. But you also don’t have to carry everything alone.

Carefully choose organisation transformation consultants, advisors, or professional executives who can help decode what you already do well, translate instinct into teachable systems, and sit in meetings and call out old habits when you start to slip back.

The right partners will respect your values and boundaries while helping you move forward.

7. Protect your core values while letting traditions evolve

Some things in your business must never change: integrity, quality, respect, how you care for customers and employees. Other things like who signs every check or who must be present in every meeting can evolve.

Professionalization is about distinguishing which values are core and timeless, and which traditions were right for an earlier stage but may now be holding the business back.

The best time to professionalize your legacy

Founders often tell us, “I’ll fix the structure when I’m less busy.” But your business and your life rarely slow down on their own.

As Trizia Ann Magalino, one of Acumen’s project management consultants often tells families:

“Tomorrow is not promised to anyone. If there’s something so precious to you, why wouldn’t you protect it now?”

Professionalizing your business is your assurance that your children inherit a structure, not a struggle; that your employees have stability beyond one person; and that your values outlive you instead of dying with your signature.

You do not have to solve everything at once. You only have to decide that your life’s work and the people you love deserve more than hope. They deserve a business that has been thoughtfully, lovingly prepared for the day you finally allow yourself to enjoy life.

If you are starting to think about professionalizing your family business, Acumen Strategy Consultants works with families to help clarify roles, structure, and succession in a way that protects both the business and the relationships behind it.

Will my children fight each other? The unstated fear of every family business founder

Thu, 28 May 2026 05:34:59 GMT

If you’ve ever thought about stepping back from your business but felt a knot in your stomach, this article is for you.

After working with Philippine family-owned corporations, we hear the same questions and usually only behind closed doors:

“Are my children really ready to run this without me?”
“Will my company survive when I’m no longer in the room?”
“Will my children fight each other and undo everything I’ve built?”
“Is a succession plan enough, or do we need something more?”
“How do we protect both the family and the business when I finally let go?”

These concerns are often treated as succession problems, but they go deeper than that. At the heart of that fear is a lack of governance, not a lack of strategy.

Key Takeaways

Succession fears are rarely just about the business. They’re about family relationships.
Most transitions fail because of gaps in passion, competence, and boundaries.
Governance provides the structure that protects both the family and the company.
Having both a succession plan and a governance structure helps secure a family legacy.

Saying the fear out loud

There’s a question you think about but rarely say out loud: “I’m passing my business on to the next generation. Can they run it without fighting each other?”

You may never say this in public. But you think about it when the room is finally quiet.

In the Philippines, where most businesses are family-owned, many founders worry less about competition and more about what happens when the business passes from their hands to their children.

But here’s what you may really be worried about.

When you imagine your children fighting while running the business, you’re not just picturing arguments over market share or dividends.

You’re asking yourself whether you’ve given them enough training. You know they studied in good schools. But have they had enough exposure to the real world?

Somewhere between the boardroom and the family dinner table, your mind keeps returning to the same underlying question: “Can they do the work while competing with the best players in the industry?”

And underneath that is another question: “Did you protect them too much by bringing them straight into the family business?” On paper, they look ready. In your gut, you’re not so sure.

Possible gaps and why they break the transition

Transitions do not usually fail because of bad strategy. They fail because of gaps that were never addressed early enough.

In many family businesses, the next generation may appear prepared on paper. They hold titles, attend meetings, and understand the company history. But underneath the surface, there are often deeper gaps in passion, competence, and boundaries that quietly weaken the transition process.

Over time, these gaps create tension inside both the business and the family. And when they are left unmanaged, even the strongest companies can struggle to survive leadership transitions across generations.

The passion gap

When children are dragged into the business instead of drawn to it, they often show up because they were appointed, not because they genuinely love the company.

This is where family corporations can differ greatly from non-family firms. In most corporations, people compete fiercely to earn leadership positions. In some family businesses, however, the top seat can feel more like an obligation than an achievement, something accepted to avoid disappointing parents.

As a founder, you can speak about the business with conviction. You can talk about the company’s mission and vision without a script because you built it from scratch. But for the next generation, the experience is different. They may have grown up around the business, but never truly grown attached to it.

And because of this, your successor may show up physically but their heart is somewhere else.

The competence gap

The way you learned the business is very different from how your children are learning it.

You were the owner, manager, finance head, and operations lead all at once. You became a jack-of-all-trades out of necessity. You handled crises personally and learned through trial, pressure, and survival.

Your children, however, are stepping into a more professionalized structure. The company already has departments, clearer roles, and established systems.

Because of this, they may never experience the same situations that shaped your instincts. They may never need to sell during a crisis, negotiate with suppliers who trust only your name, or carry the emotional weight of near-failure.

In many ways, they inherit the title, but not the training.

And that gap is where many transitions begin to break down. The next generation steps into leadership roles without developing the same depth of experience that once held the company together.

The hidden cost of blurred boundaries

In family corporations, the line between work and home is often very thin.

You do not stop being a parent when you walk into the office. Your children do not stop being your children when they enter a management meeting.

As a result, emotions from one space often spill into the other. A sibling argument at home becomes passive resistance in the boardroom. A difficult feedback conversation at work reappears as silence during Sunday lunch. An old family trauma suddenly resurfaces as a disagreement about budgets, titles, or “respect.”

On the surface, it may look like a debate about business strategy. Underneath, it is often something much more personal.

This is where many founders feel stuck. You try to discuss dividends, roles, or succession plans, but instead find yourself managing unspoken resentments, long-standing comparisons, or in-law dynamics that have little to do with the business itself.

This is relationship conflict, one of the most destructive forms of conflict in family enterprises because it creates emotional insecurity and personal attacks.

The result is that families either avoid difficult conversations to preserve harmony, or they bring everything out at once in the wrong setting. And when boundaries blur, every conversation starts to feel like a family meeting. Even when you desperately need a business decision.

Why governance matters in family business succession

When every conversation starts to feel like a family meeting and nothing gets decided, there is usually another issue underneath it: the way decisions are being made.

In many family-owned corporations, this becomes the default setup:

Meetings stretch from morning until night
Family dynamics, ownership concerns, and operational issues are all discussed in the same room
Sunday lunch turns into a board meeting
Board meetings turn into family therapy sessions.

Eventually, everyone becomes exhausted, yet nothing truly moves forward. The real problem is not a lack of love for the family or a lack of business strategy. It is a lack of structure.

Most family businesses do not realize how weak or non-existent their governance structure is until they spend an entire day in the boardroom and still leave without resolving anything.

This is why governance matters. Governance creates clarity around where conversations should happen, who should make decisions, and how conflicts should be managed before they damage both the business and the family.

In the next sections, we’ll discuss three governance frameworks that can help manage boundaries, improve decision-making, and prevent unnecessary conflict in family businesses.

Four-Room Model: Separating Family Conversations From Business Decisions

As Trizia Ann Magalino, Consulting Project Manager at Acumen Strategy Consultants, shared: “In most family corporations we’ve worked with, meetings used to be unlimited. No hard stops. No boundaries. Everything, everywhere, all at once.”

If you want to make clearer and more effective decisions in the boardroom, the Four-Room Model can help create structure without damaging family relationships.

Think of your family corporation as a house with four separate rooms:

Family Room for relationships, values, and family matters
Owner Room for shareholding, dividends, and long-term direction
Board Room for oversight, strategy, and leadership appointments
Management Room for day-to-day operational decisions

In a healthy family enterprise, not every topic belongs everywhere. If you are discussing who will inherit the business, that belongs in the Owner Room. If you are approving strategy and monitoring company performance, that belongs in the Board Room. If you are discussing daily operations, that belongs in the Management Room. And if you are dealing with personal hurts, family history, or unresolved tensions, that belongs in the Family Room.

Once everyone understands which “room” they are in, conversations become clearer and more productive. Families gain the language to say, “That discussion belongs in another room.”

Clear rooms do not automatically remove conflict. But with the right governance structure, conflict becomes easier to contain and manage, protecting both the business and the dinner table.

DACI: Clarifying who makes decisions

One of the biggest sources of tension during succession is uncertainty around decision-making. Who decides? Who executes? Who gets consulted? Who simply needs to be informed?

This is where frameworks like DACI become useful. DACI is a decision-rights framework that helps clarify:

Driver - the person collecting all necessary information and the scope of the decision
Approver - the person with final decision-making authority
Contributors - the people whose input is needed before decisions are made
Informed - the people who should be updated after decisions are finalized

When families adopt simple decision-rights frameworks, people stop overruling each other simply because they are older or more vocal.

Siblings gain permission to contribute without competing for control. Non-family professionals gain clarity around when they are truly empowered and when they are not.

Again, governance does not remove emotion. It gives emotion a structure to move through. It also gives everyone permission to ask an important question: “Is this my decision to make, or am I simply being consulted?”

RACI: A simpler way to reduce friction

If DACI feels unfamiliar, it may help to start with a simpler and more widely used framework: RACI. RACI clarifies who plays which role in a task or decision:

Responsible (R) - the person or team doing the work
Accountable (A) - the person ultimately answerable for the result
Consulted (C) - the people whose input is needed before decisions are made
Informed (I) - the people who need updates after decisions are finalized

Even agreeing on who is “R” and who is “A” for major decisions can reduce a surprising amount of silent friction inside family businesses. No more three siblings all believing they are accountable for the same decision. No more key employees feeling blindsided because they were never consulted or informed.

The goal of these frameworks is to stop decisions from living only inside people’s minds and move them into a clear, shared structure that everyone understands.

Difference between succession plan vs governance

Most founders think of succession as a document where they can determine who gets which role, who owns what percentage, and when the transition happens. That’s important. But it’s only the script.

A succession plan is your script, while governance is your operating system. A script answers: “Who is the next CEO?”, “When do I step back?”; “How will the shares be divided?”

However, it does not answer:

“What happens when my children disagree?”
“Who has the final say on major decisions?”
“How do we protect both family unity and business performance?”

Because this is the work of governance. It covers: The Four Rooms (where we talk about what); decision rights (who decides, who does, who is consulted, who is informed); forums and rhythms (board meetings, owner councils, family assemblies), and rules that apply regardless of who is in the room.

A succession plan without governance is fragile. It depends on emotions and personalities, not principles. When you have both, you get to see the next 3–5 years clearly. Your children get concrete next steps as they “climb the ladder.” Everyone will have the same answer when they are asked who will make the final decision.

The mindset about consultants

There’s one more fear that often gets in the way. You hesitate to bring in advisors or talk about governance because you might be afraid of your model being shared with another company, being laughed at because of looking unprofessional in front of consultants.

And because of these factors, you keep everything in your head. Processes stay informal. The “secret recipe” might die with you.

Here is the hard truth that you might need to hear. As Trizia Ann Magalino, Consulting Project Manager at Acumen Strategy Consultants, shared: “The only way to truly preserve your legacy is to document it.”

Consulting and governance work are not about stealing your business model. They are about:

putting language to what you already do well
turning instinct into teachable systems
making sure your children have a manual, not just memories.

This is not to shame the years of work you’ve done. We are all about validating you, naming what you did right and showing how it can stand side by side with the most professional corporations in your industry.

Case Study: A real estate founder finally ready to retire after decades of building the business

When Acumen first met one family-owned real estate corporation, the founder was already in his 80s. In stakeholder interviews, he kept returning to the same questions: “Are they ready?”, “Can they make it?”, “Do they have what it takes?”

He loved his children. He also knew they had grown up in a very different world from his. On paper, the next generation held senior titles. But in his heart, he was not sure they could run the business without him.

Over the course of the engagement, we listened to him, his children, and key people within the company. We introduced clear “stairs,” step-by-step ways of working and making decisions together as siblings.

We helped them map their Four-Room Model and design how decisions would flow across the Family, Owner, Board, and Management rooms. We also independently assessed the readiness of each child for different roles.

By the time we closed the engagement, the father spoke again. This time, he said he was finally ready to let go.

What changed was not the structure alone. It was the introduction of a shared system for how his children would make decisions together. There was external validation of who was ready for which role. There was a clear path he could finally see, instead of the uncertainty he had been carrying for years.

As Trizia Ann Magalino, Consulting Project Manager at Acumen Strategy Consultants, put it: “What changed wasn’t just the org chart. What changed was the father’s confidence that his children would not destroy each other—or his life’s work—once he stepped back.”

He could finally retire without replaying “Will they fight?” on loop.

Professionalizing your business is an act of love

You didn’t build your business just to see your children fight over it. And you also didn’t build it so you would never be allowed to rest.

Putting governance in place is not a threat to your authority. It is the best gift you can give:

To yourself — the freedom to retire or step back without fear
To your children — a clear structure instead of a guessing game
To your employees — stability beyond one person
To your legacy — a business that can outlast you

The best way to protect your family legacy is to professionalize: to set guidelines, build structure, and elevate your business while you are still here to guide the transition.

If any part of this feels uncomfortably familiar, you don’t need to solve it all at once.

You can start small by mapping your Four-Room Model, clarifying one critical decision — who decides, who does, and who is informed — and having one honest conversation with your family about what you are really afraid of.

And when you are ready to have a partner in that work, you don’t have to look far.

Acumen Strategy Consultants is a trusted organization transformation advisor for Philippine companies seeking to scale, professionalize, and protect family legacies.

We treat your business like it’s our own.

A human consultant or an AI consultant: who to consider?

Wed, 27 May 2026 16:00:49 GMT

Picture this. Your leadership team is in a room, budgets are being carved up for the year ahead, and someone slides a question across the table that nobody quite knows how to answer: why are we still paying for consultants when AI can produce a strategy deck in minutes? It is a fair question. It is also the wrong one, and how your business answers it will quietly shape whether your next big decision gets the thinking it deserves or the speed it does not need.

We have been on the other side of that conversation for twenty-four years. In that time, we have worked with more than 150 Filipino companies, from family-owned businesses navigating their first major expansion to large corporations making billion-peso calls on where to grow next. The tools around us have changed dramatically. What has not changed is what determines whether a business comes out of a hard decision stronger or diminished: the quality of judgment brought to it, and the trust that makes honest judgment possible in the first place.

AI is genuinely capable, and pretending otherwise helps no one. In a well-structured environment with clean data, clear audience profiles, and a properly built digital infrastructure, AI personalizes at scale, automates workflows, and processes patterns across datasets that no human team could work through at the same speed. For businesses that have done the foundational work, it delivers. The problem is that most businesses have not done that work before they deploy the tools. In 2025, standalone AI across email generation, blog writing, sales outreach, and lead scoring delivered little meaningful return across B2B environments. Not because the technology was wrong, but because it was placed on top of systems that were not ready for it. A tool cannot think its way out of a broken foundation. It simply executes the dysfunction faster.

What we bring operates in a different layer entirely. Our senior consultants and engagement leads are not career consultants. They come from inside industries, from general management, from having sat where our clients are sitting now and carrying the weight of decisions that had real consequences either way. That experience shows up not in credentials but in the quality of questions asked before any recommendation is made, in the ability to sense what is not being said in a room, and in the willingness to tell a client something they did not come in wanting to hear. AI generates a scenario and moves on. It bears no consequence if the scenario turns out to be wrong. That absence of stake changes the nature of the advice in ways that matter when the decision is significant.

Acumen once worked with a client who came to us convinced their problem was the brand. Revenue was soft, the market felt crowded, and the instinct was to refresh the positioning. We started with discovery, the way we always do, and what the data revealed was that the brand was fine. The real problem was organizational, structural, and sitting several layers beneath anything a campaign could reach. We paused the engagement and told them exactly that, knowing it meant walking away from a project already underway. The client was not expecting it. But they came back, and the work that followed that redirection was among the most consequential we have done together. Integrity that only holds when it is convenient is not integrity. It is just good manners under easy conditions.

That same quality of presence matters in family businesses, where the most consequential dynamics are almost never the ones written in the brief. The weight of who holds authority, the history between family members in the room, the decisions everyone is circling but no one has named, these do not show up in a dataset. They require someone who can read what is not being said, hold the business reality and the human reality simultaneously, and earn trust that takes time and cannot be replicated by any tool. Some clients have described working with Acumen as closer to having a trusted confidant in the room than a vendor on retainer. We take that as a measure of whether we are doing the work the right way.

None of this means AI has no place in the work. It does. The question is never which one to choose. It is knowing which layer of the problem each belongs to. AI belongs in execution, where tasks are repeatable, data is structured, and value comes from doing the right things faster. Human judgment belongs in strategy and relationships, where the quality of thinking and the trust between people determine whether the outcome is worth executing at all. Deploy AI without the strategic foundation and you execute the wrong things efficiently. Rely only on human judgment without using available tools and you leave real capacity untouched. For most businesses with real challenges, the answer is both, in the right order.

If the challenge is about scale and execution, build the infrastructure first and let AI work inside it. If the challenge is about direction, about a decision significant enough that getting it wrong costs more than the engagement, about a leadership team that needs to align around something they will genuinely own, that is where human judgment is not optional. And if it is both, start with the foundation. Get the thinking right first, build the system, then let the tools do what they do best.

Twenty-four years of this work has taught Acumen that the moments that define a business rarely arrive with clear instructions. They arrive with pressure, competing priorities, and people in the room who need someone they can trust to help them think it through. That is the work we show up for. If your business is in one of those moments, we would be glad to be part of the thinking.

Reach out to our team today.

Lessons for a Challenger Brand: Eyes on the Consumer, Not the Market Leader

Sun, 24 May 2026 16:15:29 GMT

From homegrown heroes like Jollibee to rising local giants, the secret to defeating multinational competitors lies not in matching their budgets, but in mastering the foundational capabilities of deep customer insight and sharp business analysis.

Say ‘winning challenger brand’ in the Philippine context and Jollibee would be one of the first, if not the first, names that pop up.

The blue-chip Jollibee Group has grown into a multinational corporation with a diversified portfolio of 19 brands that have a combined global footprint of over 10,000 stores across 33 countries – and counting. But the original Jollibee, the homegrown fast-food chain serving up burgers and fries, still shines as the top-of-the-head Filipino brand that won – and continues to win – against American giant McDonald’s.

Jollibee’s market leadership over the years, in terms of branch network and consumer preference surveys, has not simply depended on the Filipino market’s sense of nationality. It never really played up the Filipino-versus-foreigner match. Its campaigns were never really shouting about “Let’s Buy Filipino!”

Instead, it puts the spotlight on local values, everyday life, and the realities of how purchasing decisions are made.

And that reflects deep Customer Understanding and an effective Insight Mining such that the messaging really touches on consumer truths and needs.

Other Filipino-owned companies that are winners in certain product categories include: NutriAsia (Condiments with their Datu Puti, Silver Swan, and UFC brands), and listed-firms Century Pacific Food (Canned Tuna - Century brand; coconut products – Coco Mama and Vita Coco) and Monde Nissin (Instant noodles – Lucky Me; Crackers – Skyflakes).

As these large local companies maintain their market leadership in their respective corners, they are also venturing into segments that remain dominated by multinational corporations such as ready-to-drink juice, milk and dairy products, and health-focused as well as vegetarian/vegan food.

Can – or should – these LLCs simply bank on and apply the marketing formula of their winning brands to the new products?

NutriAsia, for example, builds on the value of tradition in Filipino kitchens to maintain its top position in the condiments market. Will that work for its emerging Locally brand juices? Can Century Pacific’s Angel topple Nestlé as the all-purpose cream for the Filipino Christmas fruit salad? Can Monde Nissin make healthy food feel as comforting as a bowl of instant noodles?

The answer lies in the sound of Business Analysis.

Successful marketing campaigns, defined as those that translate to revenue generation, begin with commercial acumen – the skill of using data to understand the market and make decisions based on quantitative and qualitative information.

Understanding the Filipino market is not just about looking at demographic profiles such as age, and income and purchasing power. It is more about understanding what Filipinos consider as truly important, how those values have shifted over the years, and their impact on how purchases are made at individual and household levels.

With business analysis and customer knowledge, leaders and their teams can craft a sound Marketing Strategy and Effective Communications for the new brand.

These are foundational capabilities that are vital and enduring regardless of the changing marketing landscape. These have also been proven to be powerful against limitations in terms of budget and manpower.

In Acumen’s collaborations with companies in different industries, the turning point for winning is common when teams stop obsessing about what the bigger, leading brands are doing.

Their focus turns out instead of learning about the consumer and how they can make deep connections.

And the ways brands can touch base with the market nowadays have been significantly altered by the internet and technological innovations.

The marketing playing field has also been forever changed by global trade, e-commerce, and advances in logistics, which have allowed for the freer flow of goods across borders and oceans. For Philippine LLCs, this means wider and stiffer competition beyond MNCs. Consumers around the world are also evolving, and the Filipino shopper is no exception.

Navigating through and keeping up with all these shifts requires core competencies – skills in business analysis, consumer understanding, and effective communication – that can cut through noise and disruptions.

Being a winning challenger brand is not a one-off victory, and the continuing narrative of Jollibee is a testament to that.

The sustainable success of a brand, and the business for that matter, requires constant innovations that are grounded on foundational marketing capabilities. That’s Marketing Excellence.

Learn more about Acumen’s Capability Building service and how we can collaborate on developing your teams into sharp commercial thinkers and strategists.

Power of Consulting: Go Big or Go Solo

Wed, 20 May 2026 05:21:43 GMT

There is an underlying weakness in many organizations that these organizations may not realize they have.

Certain organizations may have experts in their team, and these experts could be motivated, hardworking, and creative, absolutely. There is no lack of effort on their part as individuals. And yet, there is significant struggle thanks to a fragmented focus.

Marketing is pushing for growth. Sales is chasing targets. Operations is trying to keep things stable. Product development is the process of building what it believes the market needs. Each function is doing its job, often well, but not always in sync. The result is a kind of organizational noise—activity without alignment, motion without momentum.

This is where consulting, done right, can change the equation.

Not through a single expert with a sharp point of view, but through a team that understands and reflects the complexity of the business itself.

Because today, the problems companies face are no longer single-discipline problems.

They’re systemic.

The Cross-Functional Collaboration Difference

When you see a well-executed marketing strategy out in the world, it can be an impressive feat altogether. But what makes it a truly effective strategy is understanding the mechanics that made it what it is.

The truth is, the outcome of effective marketing in today’s shifting landscape takes more than just creative execution or media spend.

Much of it depends on how well an organization understands its moving parts and how they work together. Campaigns are not simply isolated efforts; they are reflections of the collaboration of sales, product, customer success, and operations.

Research according to Monday.com shows that marketing outcomes are more likely to improve when these teams collaborate, using shared data and unified dashboards to align decisions and iterate quickly.

Now, of course, that sounds straightforward enough as a data point. In practice, however? It rarely is.

Inside many companies, silos are not necessarily intentional. It is simply that teams are measured differently, rewarded differently, and often operate on entirely different timelines.

Marketing plans quarterly. Sales thinks monthly. Operations react daily.

Without a unifying mechanism to bring these perspectives together, decisions become slower, less informed, and harder to execute. Fragmented.

A consulting team, by design, breaks that pattern.

At firms like Acumen Strategic Consulting, collaboration is not an afterthought. At Acumen, this is a core operating principle.

“When Acumen is in the room, our clients and collaborators don’t see the distinction,” as their internal philosophy puts it. And that’s the difference in cross-functional collaboration.

This matters because focused, strategic alignment is not just something that can be achieved once. It is something you build, conversation by conversation, across disciplines.

One Mind vs. Many

Yes, the idea of the lone expert is appealing.

It suggests efficiency, clarity, and speed. One person, one perspective, one direction, and all that. But that simplicity is also the limitation.

An individual consultant, no matter how experienced, operates within the boundaries of their expertise and personal experience. A marketing specialist will see marketing problems. A finance expert will frame issues in financial terms. Even the most versatile professionals carry a bias shaped by their background.

More often than not, these simple facts have been found to be true: independent consultants can be “limited to their expertise,” all the while consulting teams “deploy full teams across functions.”

Consider a company facing declining sales. A solo consultant might diagnose weak messaging or poor channel selection. A team, however? A team like Acumen will ask a broader, perhaps even more specialized, set of questions.

Is the product still competitive? Is pricing aligned with market expectations? Are there operational bottlenecks affecting delivery? Is the sales team equipped to convert demand?

These are not separate issues but are interconnected. Therefore, solving them requires interdisciplinary expertise that simply cannot be found in just one person.

It takes a team structure—engagement leads, strategists, associates—that allows consulting firms to mirror the complexity of the client organization. Each member brings a different lens, but more importantly, those lenses are integrated into a single, coherent approach.

The outcome is not just a better diagnosis. It is a solution that holds together under real conditions.

From Structure Comes Speed

Collaboration alone does not guarantee results, of course. Without structure, it can slow things down. As the old saying goes, “Can’t have too many cooks in the kitchen.”

Here is where methodology matters.

Modern consulting teams operate on agile principles, using short cycles of planning, execution, and review. Work is broken into sprints, allowing teams to test ideas quickly, gather feedback, and adjust before committing to full-scale implementation.

Within Acumen’s approach, ideas are not simply presented. Instead, they are tested, challenged, and refined with stakeholders before moving forward. The effect is, thus, twofold.

First, it reduces risk. Decisions are not made in isolation but are stress-tested through multiple functions. Secondly, it accelerates progress. Instead of waiting for a truly “perfect” solution, teams move forward with informed, risk-assessed situations, improving as they go.

Unified dashboards play a critical role here. When teams share the same data, discussions shift from opinion to evidence. Priorities become clearer. Trade-offs become explicit. Decisions that might have taken weeks in a traditional setup can happen in days.

In this environment, speed is not about moving faster. It is about efficiency by removing friction.

How Can We Measure Team Success?

The value of a team of consultants, as opposed to a single expert, is most evident in the data. It’s in the outcomes.

Acumen’s track record offers a useful lens. Over 24 years, with more than 150 clients served, the firm has grown almost entirely through referrals, expanding at an impressive 25% compound annual growth rate without formal marketing. That kind of growth is not driven by good presentations alone.

It is driven by results that clients love to talk about because those results? Now those results are tangible.

Revenue growth. Market share gains. Organizational transformation.

In one such case, a company struggling with stagnant revenue worked with a consulting team that addressed not just its marketing strategy but its entire commercial model. Product mix, pricing strategy, channel distribution, and sales capability. The outcome was not that of a single campaign but of an entire system capable of sustaining growth.

In another, a family-owned business facing internal friction required more than a strategic plan. It needed alignment across stakeholders with unspoken dynamics—hierarchies, expectations, and personal tensions. Here, the consulting team functioned not just as strategists but as facilitators, helping surface difficult conversations and guiding the organization toward a shared direction.

These are not problems a single consultant can easily solve alone.

They require a combination of business savvy, organizational insight, and, as Acumen puts it, a “heart” to pull something like that off.

Supporting the System

Now, for organizations looking to maximize the value of consulting, the implication is clear: hiring a team is only part of the equation; you must also support them.

This means creating space for cross-functional engagement, encouraging regular standups to align different departments on priorities, and investing in shared data systems so that decisions are based on a common understanding of reality.

Most importantly, it means being open to an external perspective.

One of the recurring themes in Acumen’s philosophy is the danger of insular thinking.

Pauline Fermin, President and CEO of Acumen Strategy Consultants, said it best: “ The biggest mistake is thinking you are your target market. ”

Without external input, without other ideas and perspectives coming in, organizations tend to reinforce their own assumptions, even when those assumptions no longer hold. A consulting team disrupts that pattern.

It brings objectivity, challenges internal narratives, and introduces perspectives shaped by experience across industries.

But that only works if the organization is willing to listen.

The Power of Consulting: You Have to Go Big

The phrase sounds dramatic, sure, but in this context, it is practical.

Complex problems require integrated solutions. Integrated solutions require collaboration. And meaningful collaboration, at scale, requires a team.

A single consultant can offer insight. A consulting team can transform or even revolutionize how a business operates. That is the difference between a single expert and a consulting team. And in a global, modern market defined by speed, complexity, and constant change, the difference that can make to an organization is not theoretical.

So the question is not whether to bring in help.

The question is: how serious are you about your organization’s growth?

Because when you’re aiming for overall success, which would you rather go for: going big or going solo?

Want to know the best possible solutions for your organization?

Your company has a training schedule. Does it have a Marketing Academy?

Mon, 18 May 2026 07:36:17 GMT

The difference between a training program and a Marketing Academy — and why it matters more than most CEOs realize.

In Acumen’s decade of Filipino generational research, one finding appears with striking consistency across industries: marketing teams default to “the Filipino consumer” as if that person exists. She doesn’t. There are four distinct Filipino consumer cohorts — Boomers, Gen X, Millennials, and Gen Z — each with different definitions of health, money, family, and the role brands play in their lives. A strategy built on a single portrait cannot serve all four. Yet that is exactly what most marketing teams are producing, because they were never built to see the distinction.

This is not a strategy problem. It is a capability problem. And capability of the kind that actually shifts commercial outcomes is not built in a seminar.

The difference that actually matters

The term “Marketing Academy” is used loosely. Most organizations use it to describe a calendar of training sessions — a workshop on digital tools here, a seminar on consumer trends there. That is not a Marketing Academy. It is a training schedule.

A real Marketing Academy is a structured, sequenced capability-building program built around the specific skill gaps of your organization, using your actual business data as the raw material for learning. The distinction matters because the two approaches produce fundamentally different outcomes. A seminar transfers information. A Marketing Academy changes how people think.

The sequence is not cosmetic. What participants learn in Module 1 becomes the foundation for what they do in Module 2. The outputs of each module feed the inputs of the next. By the end, they are not applying frameworks to hypothetical cases — they are applying frameworks to live business challenges, in front of stakeholders who can see the improvement.

PROJECT ALPHABET • 2025

Health is the #1 priority for every Filipino generation — but Boomers define it as independence, Gen X as resilience for the family, Millennials as holistic self-care, and Gen Z as mental and emotional balance. Same word. Four entirely different marketing briefs. A team without the capability to see this distinction is building strategy on a foundation that doesn’t exist.

“The programs that fail are almost never the ones with bad content. They fail when the line manager never bought in — when participants are pulled out of sessions to hit a deadline, and the message sent to the organization is that the learning can wait. That single variable predicts outcomes more reliably than curriculum quality.”

— RJ Rasalan, Capability Building Associate, Acumen

The real cost of not building this

A skeptical CFO’s instinct is to treat capability building as a cost. That framing inverts the actual risk.

When marketing decisions are driven by gut feel rather than rigorous business analysis, the downstream consequences are measurable: product launches built on assumptions that the consumer research would have disproved; campaigns that spend against segments that no longer exist; brand strategies calibrated to a consumer portrait that is two generations out of date. The losses show up in underperforming P&Ls, in budget cycles that can’t justify their spend, and in the slow erosion of brand relevance that rarely announces itself before it is expensive to reverse.

There is also the talent dimension. Acumen’s Project Alphabet found that across every Filipino generation, the #1 retention driver — beyond salary — is growth. Employees who do not feel they are developing disengage first and leave next. The cost of replacing an experienced marketer, factoring in recruitment, onboarding, and the institutional knowledge that walks out with them, is rarely included in the training budget conversation. It should be.

And then there is the organizational efficiency argument. Teams that have been through a shared, rigorous learning experience speak the same language. They use the same frameworks when they brief each other, challenge each other’s assumptions, and present to leadership. The friction cost of not having that shared language — in rework, misalignment, and slow decision-making — compounds quietly until someone measures it.

W hat a real Marketing Academy looks like

There are four non-negotiables. Each one is a point where programs commonly fail, which is why they are worth naming explicitly.

It is structured and sequenced — not compressed.

Compressing a five-day program into a single day to reduce costs is one of the most reliable ways to ensure zero behavioral change. When too many concepts are forced into too little time, nothing sticks. Participants leave overwhelmed, not equipped. The investment, however small it appeared, returns nothing.

It is customized to your actual business.

Generic case studies do not build real capability. The most effective programs use your organization’s real data, real categories, and real business challenges as the raw material for learning. Participants are not solving someone else’s problem — they are solving their own, in a structured environment where they can get it wrong before it costs anything.

It is measurable — in behavior, not just satisfaction scores.

Post-training surveys measure how participants felt in the room. That is not the same as measuring whether behavior changed. The right indicators are visible weeks after the program ends: how people frame a business problem, how they challenge a consumer insight, how they present a recommendation to leadership. When basic concepts still require prompting six months later, the program did not deliver.

It requires active leadership sponsorship, not passive approval.

The most common point of failure is not the curriculum. It is the message that leadership sends about whether the learning matters. When managers continue to pull participants out of sessions, assign competing deadlines during program weeks, and treat capability development as an HR initiative rather than a business priority, even the best-designed programs fail to take root.

from the field

We worked with a major Philippine FMCG client whose marketing teams had a surface-level approach to business analysis and no shared analytical language. Their aspiration was to be consumer-centric; their practice was not yet reflecting it. Over the course of a full Marketing Excellence Program, we introduced frameworks calibrated to their internal tools and live category data. After the program, the way their teams thought about the business, built consumer arguments, and presented to senior leadership had measurably changed — not just by their own assessment, but by the assessment of the leaders who commission their work.

Why this matters, in 2026

The Philippine macroeconomic environment is creating a specific kind of pressure on marketing organizations. Consumer spending is bifurcating: premium segments are growing among upper-income Boomers and Gen X; value-conscious, intentional spending is intensifying among Millennials and Gen Z navigating inflation normalization. Brands that understand both dynamics simultaneously will capture disproportionate share. Those that default to a single consumer strategy will find themselves squeezed from both ends.

Meanwhile, the AI adoption wave is creating a false sense of capability acceleration. Tools that generate faster outputs do not build the analytical judgment required to know which outputs are right. The organizations that invest in deep marketing capability now — in business analysis, consumer understanding, and strategic thinking — will be the ones that use AI as a multiplier rather than a substitute for thinking.

The companies that build genuine marketing capability during uncertain periods are the ones that lead recovery, not just survive through it. The question is not whether your organization can afford a Marketing Academy. The question is whether it can afford the gap it is currently closing without one.

“Eighteen years into our partnership with Globe, the curriculum has evolved significantly — the categories shift, the tools change, the business priorities move. What hasn’t changed is the underlying structure: building analytical rigor before consumer understanding, and consumer understanding before strategic output. That sequence is not arbitrary. It is the architecture that makes everything else work.”

— Tonton Mapa, Vice President for Capability Building, Acumen

How Acumen’s Marketing Excellence Program is built

Acumen’s Marketing Excellence Program is a structured 12-week capability journey organized around three core modules: Business Analysis, Consumer Understanding and Insight Mining, and Marketing Strategy and Effective Communications. The sequence is deliberate — each module builds the analytical foundation required for the next.

Every program begins with a collaborative discovery phase: Acumen works with the organization to map actual skill gaps and calibrate the content to live business challenges before a single session is designed. The faculty are C-suite level practitioners with direct experience in Philippine and multinational marketing organizations. Participants work with their own data, not hypothetical scenarios.

The program has been delivered to marketing teams at Globe, NutriAsia, BPI, Metrobank, and Cisco Philippines, among others. Some clients are in their third batch. The longevity of those relationships is itself a proof point: organizations that see real behavioral change renew. Those that don’t, don’t.

Is your team ready to compete at the level your business needs?

Talk to Acumen about your team’s specific capability gaps — and whether the Marketing Excellence Program is the right fit. Every engagement begins with a discovery conversation, not a sales pitch.

6 ways to know you hired the right consultant

Mon, 04 May 2026 05:00:58 GMT

Hiring a consultant feels like the hard part. It is not. The hard part is realizing, three months in, that the person you brought in is talented, well-credentialed, and still wrong for what you actually need. By then, the contract is signed, the work is underway, and changing course costs more than the remaining fee. Fit should be settled before any of that begins, and it comes down to six things.

The first is self-clarity. Before you evaluate anyone, you need to answer the questions that a serious engagement will surface anyway. Where does this business need to be in three to five years, and what is genuinely standing in the way? Is the revenue problem rooted in the brand, pricing, channel, or something structural within the organization? Is the strategy already outpacing the team's ability to execute it? Are decisions being made on current customer data or on assumptions that have not been tested in years? These are not warm-up questions. They are the starting point of every real discovery session, and if you cannot answer them before the consultant walks in, the early weeks of the engagement will be spent doing exactly that, at your cost.

The second is specialization matched to your challenge. A consultant strong in corporate strategy, helping leadership align on where to play and how to win over the next three to five years, will approach a revenue problem very differently from one whose background is in commercial operations, diagnosing why a brand is losing ground or why a go-to-market plan is not converting. Both may be excellent. Only one is built for what you need. The question is never whether they are generally capable. It is whether their specific depth fits your specific problem.

The third is integrity in practice, and it is the one most businesses fail to screen for. The right consultant tells you when the problem you came in with isn't the real one. They redirect an engagement if the diagnosis points to a direction the original brief did not anticipate, even when it costs them the project. They walk away rather than execute an approach they know is wrong. They do not talk down to you, do not hide behind frameworks designed to impress, and do not use language that makes your team feel behind before the work even starts. These are not personality traits. They are professional standards, and they are evident early on. In the first conversations, notice whether they ask hard questions or avoid them. Notice whether they push back when something does not add up or simply agree and move forward. How a consultant behaves before the engagement begins is exactly how they will behave when the decisions carry real weight.

The fourth is a track record that reflects situations close to yours. A result achieved somewhere else is only useful if the context transfers. A consultant who has delivered within a large corporation may not have the instincts needed within a family-owned business, where decisions carry decades of relationship history, where the most consequential dynamics often go unspoken, and where how a recommendation is delivered matters almost as much as the recommendation itself. When you review case studies and speak with past clients, look for patterns. You want evidence that this consultant has encountered your specific type of problem before, not just a version of it that shares the same industry label.

The fifth is working style compatibility. Some consultants hand over a finished framework. Others walk the client through the entire thinking process so the output is genuinely owned by the people who will execute it. That distinction matters most when the work involves organizational change, where a recommendation the leadership team did not build together is far harder to implement than one they arrived at with guidance. Beyond method, watch the pace. When a consultant's speed and your organization's capacity to absorb new thinking do not match, the engagement does not fail dramatically. It slows in ways that are hard to name, and that slowness makes it nearly impossible to tell whether the work is underperforming or whether the value is simply getting lost in the gap. If a consultant presents solutions before they have finished asking questions, that pattern will define everything that follows.

The sixth is a shared definition of success, set before the work begins. For some businesses, this is a three to five-year strategy document that the entire leadership team owns and returns to every year. For others, it is a commercial plan that addresses the actual drivers of a revenue problem rather than its symptoms. For others, it is still a more capable team that can develop and execute a strategy independently after the engagement ends. Whatever it looks like for your business, it needs to be specific enough that both parties can sit down midway through and have an honest conversation about whether the work is on track. A consultant who helps build that definition at the start and treats accountability as part of the service rather than a condition to negotiate later is showing you exactly what kind of partner they intend to be.

The right consultant asks hard questions before offering any answers, shows their integrity before the agreement is signed, brings experience close enough to your reality that their judgment transfers, and works in a way your organization can absorb and act on. When you arrive at that conversation having done your own thinking first, the right fit becomes far easier to recognize. And if you are not sure where to start, ask the real experts here .

Acumen is a trusted transformation advisor for Philippine companies seeking to scale, professionalize, and compete regionally.

We treat your business like it’s our own.

Does branding work for real estate?

Sat, 18 Apr 2026 00:25:18 GMT

Buying a property requires serious money and as such, people need assurance that their investment will grow and that they will be part of a thriving community that aligns with their values and aspirations.

Having spent nearly 17 years working for one of the country’s most trusted real estate developers, I’ve seen firsthand how crucial branding is in the property industry.

My journey took me through various senior roles in retail, hotel, strategic land bank, office, residential, and international business units. With each role came a new challenge and an opportunity to reinforce the brand I was proud to represent. Branding is not just a marketing tool, it is the lifeblood of a real estate company, especially when that brand is intertwined with the identity of a prominent business family and one of the largest conglomerates in the country.

At the company, branding was more than just creating a name or a logo. It was about building trust, fostering a sense of community, and delivering consistent value to our customers. What was key was that the brand was the founding family’s name, carrying with it the heritage of the oldest and one of the most diversified Philippine corporations.

This legacy placed an enormous responsibility on us as marketers and executives. We were not merely promoting a product or service; we were custodians of a brand that represented a storied history, a commitment to quality, and an unwavering dedication to nation building.

High-Value Investment

Real estate is quite unique in that it involves high-value, long-term investments. People don’t just buy properties, they invest in lifestyles that reflect their own life stage, future, and legacies. They seek assurance that their investment will grow and that they will be part of a thriving community that aligns with their values and aspirations. This is where branding becomes an invaluable strategic asset.

As a leader in the industry, branding was integral to our business model. Each campaign year, we had to ensure that the brand remained relevant to the times (from mainstream TV, radio, print to digital website and social media platforms) and the market we served. This wasn’t a one-time effort but a continuing process that required us to be attuned to the changing needs and preferences of our customers.

For instance, in the retail sector, branding was about creating spaces that resonated with shoppers’ lifestyles and offered more than just a shopping experience. In the residential sector, it was about building homes that reflected the aspirations of families and generational individuals.

Each business unit had its unique challenges, but the core branding principles remained the same: quality, trust, and a commitment to enhancing lives. This consistency was key in ensuring that regardless of the business, customers could trust that the mother brand’s development would deliver on its value proposition.

Brand Evolution

One of the most challenging yet rewarding aspects of my role was ensuring that the brand evolved with the times. A brand that doesn’t adapt risks becoming irrelevant. This was particularly important in the international sector, where we had to package the brand to markets with different political preferences, contexts and expectations. Here, branding went beyond promoting our developments — it was about communicating our values, heritage, and commitment to nation building by aligning the company’s narrative with the political climate, from PNoy’s Kayo ang Boss ko to Duterte’s 10-point agenda. Duterte, for example, won among OFW voters so we aligned our story to that market, which went as far as bringing financial literacy experts to help our workers abroad manage their earnings and finances properly.

In the hotel sector, we had to adapt to the evolving needs of modern business travelers, who increasingly sought authentic experiences and sustainable practices. This required us to align our brand with the values of green living and the local culture.

Commitment to Excellence

Working for a top developer taught me that branding in real estate is not just about marketing: it’s about a commitment to excellence. It’s about ensuring that every aspect of the project — from the vision of a parcel of land to the initial planning stages to construction to the final handover —reflects the values that the brand stands for. This is branding at the different stages of the customer journey. This commitment to integrity, reliability and excellence builds trust, and trust is the cornerstone of any brand, especially in real estate.

I remember this new residential brand that we launched back in 2010. We recommended attaching a stronger endorsement to the introductory brand, fought tooth and nail with the brand owners, and lost. The intro brand’s narrative was to carry the same brand of quality and people from the mother brand and wasn’t just about selling homes — it was about empowering the greater underserved market to finally make their dream of having a home become a reality, and it would be a home with the stamp of the gold standard in real estate.

That intro campaign resonated deeply with our target audience because it wasn’t just about the physical attributes of the homes; it was about their aspirations and lifestyle that the brand promised. This is the power of branding in real estate; it goes beyond the tangible and taps into the emotional and aspirational needs of people. That campaign achieved unprecedented top of mind awareness in all areas of operation and endeared the mother brand not only to the high-end market but also to the larger underserved Filipinos.

So, does branding work for real estate?

Absolutely.

Branding is not just a part of the real estate business; it is the business. It is what differentiates one developer from another and what makes a buyer choose one property over another. It is what turns a first-time buyer into a lifelong customer and an advocate for your brand.

Branding is about more than just selling properties; it’s about selling a promise – a promise of integrity, reliability and commitment. And as long as real estate is about people, their homes, and their futures, branding will continue to be a fundamental aspect of the industry.

As brand custodians, we have a duty to uphold that promise, ensuring that our brand remains relevant, trustworthy, and aspirational, no matter how much the world around us changes.

By Anna Garcia-Ramos

Shifts in Filipino values and priorities: Being well, finding balance, keeping the faith

Wed, 11 Mar 2026 07:02:09 GMT

Acumen’s Project Alphabet, undertaken in 2025, showed movements in the top five values that influence behavior and decisions among Filipinos across generations compared with the study 10 years earlier. So, what has changed?

In the decade between 2015 and 2025, a major shift took place in the Filipino psyche.

Acumen’s Project Alphabet research study in 2025 shows that faith — which was among the main themes in Filipino life and culture in the initial 2015 study on Filipino generations — is no longer among the top five influential factors that guide decisions and goals.

But let’s take a ground reality check: Go have a peek at a Catholic church or chapel anywhere in the Philippines on a Sunday and chances are, it will be pretty much packed during a scheduled Mass celebration. And there is the lingering devotion to what some may call as miraculous churches like in Quiapo and the Basilica Minore del Santo Niño in Cebu City.

Judging by those scenarios alone, it would be easy to say that faith is alive among Filipinos and religion remains a core cultural element.

Fact is, the Philippines is still a country where close to 80% of the population profess Catholicism as their faith. The remaining 20% are by no means irreligious with about 13% belonging to a Protestant or Christian denomination and 6% Muslims.

The demographics clearly indicate that considering one’s self as belonging to a faith-based community remains a common Filipino trait.

So, what do the Project Alphabet survey’s qualitative and quantitative data indicate?

Health as an enabler of freedom is a top priority for all generations. What it means, though, vary for the different age groups:

Gen Z — As a digital generation, strongly influenced by online conversations on burnout and anxiety
Millennials — Consider health as holistic self-care and an expression of self-respect
Gen X — Link health to their responsibility to support and protect their families.
Boomers — View health as independence, giving them the ability to remain active for both leisure or continued professional productivity.

Work-life balance is a breakthrough value. It is a dramatic leap from the work-work-work attitude that has been carried over from the Boomers’ post-war culture.

Like health, finding balance also differ among the generations: For Gen Z, it is having the freedom to pursue passion; for Millennials, it is striking harmony between ambition and rest; and for the Gen X and Boomers, it redounds back to family — being a good provider, not being a burden, and having the means to take life more easy.

Filipinos of all generations continue to embrace the deeply-rooted values of family and faith, but at the same time adopting mindsets that align with a world now largely defined by technological advancements, self-awareness, and well-being.

First, let’s look at the baseline results from 2015 when Acumen undertook its first generational study. The dominant themes in Filipino values then were:

Budget — Balancing income and expenses were the biggest stressor
Happiness — No matter what, Filipinos found reasons to be happy, grounded in simplicity and gratitude.
Family — The root and center of one’s life
Faith — Belief and prayers were a source of hope and resilience.
Education — The ticket out of poverty
Social connection and face — Having a social circle and maintaining good reputation was highly valued.

From a bird’s eye view, these themes show a landscape where people are centered on relationships, guided by faith, and grounded in perseverance for a better life.

That landscape would be shaken in the next 10 years by digital developments, marked changes in weather patterns, and an unparalleled global health event that would prove to be the most pivotal of all disruptors: the COVID pandemic.

Within this global and national context, Filipino mindsets shifted.

Family holds steady as a core value, along with education and money.

Nine out of 10 Filipinos still rank family as a top priority, based on Project Alphabet. The older generations — Boomers and Gen X — express their love for that circle which is most important to them in terms of sacrifice and duty. The younger generations — Gen Y or Millennials and Gen Z — demonstrate this value more by being present, prioritizing closeness and open communications.

Meanwhile, perception of education is no longer simply a “ticket out of poverty” but a tool for self-development and pursuing one’s passion.

Filipinos’ view on money has expanded beyond budgeting. Awareness has grown across generations on the importance of financial security, though what it means still varies across generations.

What have emerged in Project Alphabet as new central themes for Filipinos are health and work-life balance.

“It’s not just about the money (that is important)… it’s also about spiritual life as well as social life,” said a Gen Z respondent from Davao.

Filipinos across generations continue to be grounded in their faith while redefining resilience in a more pragmatic sense. They now see wellness as a key component in the pursuit of a good life.

“I always pray before making big decisions, especially sa business. Kasi hindi lang naman ako ang affected,” said a Gen X member from Metro Manila.

A Boomer from Cebu said going to church remains a tradition that keeps the family close: “We make it a point na magsimba together. It’s part of how we stay connected as a family.”

What Project Alphabet tells us is that Filipinos are not giving up their faith. Rather, they are transitioning towards a more holistic mindset wherein priorities are moving towards immediate and more tangible enablers of freedom such as physical health and mental well-being.

By Marifi Jara

When Good Intentions Get Misread: Why Generational Fluency Matters

Mon, 02 Mar 2026 05:45:57 GMT

Since 2014, Acumen has led a multi-year generational study in the Philippines, mapping the shifting values, fears, and aspirations that drive behavior and decision-making. Project Alphabet is the latest in this series of studies conducted in 2025, with data and insights that can help companies better understand the evolving multi-generational Philippine consumer and workforce.

Generational Fluency is one of the key concepts laid out in Project Alphabet. Read on to get a glimpse of why it is a strategic skill for leaders, teams, and organizations in today’s workspaces.

Have you ever said something in a meeting and suddenly felt the air shift, like you had triggered tension you never intended?

I have been there.

Once, I gave what I thought was simple feedback to a group of young analysts. Nothing dramatic, just notes for revision. But the reaction was intense. Another time, I suggested improving a process an older colleague had built years ago. The response was immediate defensiveness.

As we analyzed the data and interviews from Project Alphabet, our latest study on Filipino generations, I realized my own experiences were not isolated moments. We kept hearing the same stories, only told from different sides.

The younger colleague was not resistant to feedback. What hurt was feeling their effort was unseen.

The older colleague was not against change. What they resisted was the sense that their contribution no longer mattered.

That was the turning point.

Across generations, people actually want the same things at work. Respect, trust, growth, and the chance to contribute. But each generation interprets these differently based on the context they grew up in.

When those contexts collide without understanding, miscommunication turns into misalignment, and eventually mistrust.

Here is where Generational Fluency comes in. But what is it?

What this means for consumers

We must emphasize that Generational Fluency is not simply a soft skill. It has structural implications.

For leaders, it is a capability that must be intentionally developed within teams. Many organizations are embedding generational fluency into leadership and commercial capability programs to strengthen execution and collaboration.

For organizations navigating changing customer expectations, it becomes a strategic advantage. Generational insight can sharpen value propositions and inform more meaningful customer experiences, especially as expectations evolve across generations of customers.

For family enterprises transitioning leadership across generations, it can mean the difference between continuity and conflict. We often see this emerge most strongly in family corporations navigating succession and professionalization journeys.

From the research, here are a few ways organizations can begin building generational fluency:

Listen for intent, not just words. Pause before reacting and ask, “What did they really mean?” Curiosity shifts conversations away from conflict and toward collaboration.

Respect the past, invite the future. Acknowledging what has worked creates psychological safety for innovation. Legacy and progress are not opposites. They are partners.

Clarity is crucial. Make assumptions, expectations, and decision rules explicit. What feels obvious to one generation is often invisible to another.

Organizations can move beyond misreads, recognize each generation’s strengths, and build workplaces and businesses that work better because of their differences, not despite them.

If these challenges sound familiar, we invite you to explore more insights from Project Alphabet and how Generational Fluency can be applied within your organization.

It is about empathy, language, and awareness to see beyond the labels and to harness the strengths of all four generations together.

As of 2024, Generation Y (born between 1981 to 1996) and Generation Z (1997 to 2012) make up 75% of the Philippine workforce. The older Gen X (1965-1980) and Baby Boomers have become a minority but they still hold majority of senior leadership roles.

It is this new mix that is driving much of the tension seen in the workplace today.

The evolving workforce composition demands that organizations pay close attention to its implications.

Companies are feeling the strain as long-established systems built on stability and uniformity are being challenged by growing demands for flexibility, transparency, and personalization. These demands are shaped by the different values and priorities that the younger generations bring into the workplace.

Generational Fluency is the ability to understand the perspective each generation brings and intentionally bridge those differences to unlock stronger collaboration and better outcomes.

What surprised us most in Project Alphabet was this: These misreads do not only affect workplace relationships. They influence how teams make decisions, how leaders manage change, and even how organizations understand their customers.

In highly competitive environments, teams that lack Generational Fluency often struggle to align internally, resulting in slower execution, weaker strategies, and messages that fail to connect externally.

Organizations that build this fluency see something different. Clearer communication, stronger leadership alignment, and sharper understanding of evolving customer expectations.

By A ndrea Oliveros

The hidden costs of ignoring generational needs

Mon, 09 Feb 2026 06:55:02 GMT

Our Project Alphabet provides comprehensive insights on how each generation defines work — and why Gen Z is now demanding quality life, not just quality job, demanding the end of unnecessary suffering disguised as professionalism.

In boardrooms across the Philippines, leaders are asking the same familiar questions.

Why is employee engagement declining despite competitive pay and benefits? Why is succession planning becoming more urgent, yet younger employees seem reluctant to step into leadership roles? Why are younger customers harder to convince even when products are strong? And why does adaptation to change feel increasingly slow, exhausting, and fragile?

Behind these challenges is a deeper issue: Generational needs — both as consumers and as employees — are being misunderstood or oversimplified. When organizations rely on outdated assumptions about what motivates people at different life stages, the true costs are often underestimated.

These costs show up in very real ways: disengaged employees who may be capable and confident but no longer fully committed; brands that slowly deteriorate in customer consideration; innovation efforts that struggle to gain traction; and change initiatives that stall before value is realized. Over time, these blind spots translate into missed market opportunities and growing organizational risk.

Let’s take a closer look at the two levels — business and organizational — in which the drawbacks are manifested.

Organizational-Level Hidden Costs

Low engagement and weak talent attraction

Engagement declines long before people resign.

Project Alphabet’s findings show that definitions of rewards and recognition are no longer straightforward.

Younger generations tend to favor cash flexibility and experiences, while older employees continue to value symbolic recognition. At the same time, changing definitions of family have increased expectations for more inclusive benefits — such as coverage for pets or LGBTQ+ partners.

The workplace is increasingly where values collide. Flashpoints emerge in predictable ways: work-life balance as a baseline versus something to be earned; short, visual communication versus formal, direct messaging; salary as an entry requirement versus culture and clarity as retention drivers. These tensions also debunk common stereotypes — loyalty is not exclusive to older generations, just as younger ones will stay when the culture works for them.

Yet, employer branding often lags behind these shifting expectations. Many organizations continue to signal stability, scale, and tenure, while younger talent looks for growth, purpose, learning velocity, and a sense of progression that feels meaningful.

Over time, organizations struggle not only to retain talent, but also to attract the energy and capability needed for future growth.

Hidden cost: Higher attrition, rising hiring costs, longer vacancy cycles, and a workforce that does not fully commit.

Succession planning at risk

Succession planning is crucial to the sustainability of any organization.

When generational needs are ignored, leadership pipelines thin out, not because talent is unavailable, but because leadership pathways feel misaligned or unattractive. High-potential employees may not see leadership roles as worth the personal trade-offs, while senior leaders may struggle to trust readiness that looks different from their own career journeys.

Linear career paths are no longer the norm. Many employees are comfortable remaining individual contributors or prefer less cut-throat corporate cultures. Without acknowledging these shifts, organizations risk misreading hesitation as lack of ambition.

Over time, leadership transitions become riskier as institutional knowledge declines. When transitions finally occur, organizations often realize too late that readiness was assumed rather than intentionally built.

As the workforce mix continues to evolve, companies must pay closer attention to the implications for leadership continuity.

Hidden cost: Leadership continuity becomes a vulnerability to long-term sustainability.

Bringing the Two Together

The business and organizational costs of ignoring generational needs reinforce each other.

Weak brand relevance reduces market momentum. Lackluster innovation dampens growth. Low engagement and slow implementation make recovery harder. Succession risk compounds long-term uncertainty.

To truly work across generations, organizations need generational fluency — the ability to see beyond labels and harness the strengths of all generations to inspire teams, connect with consumers, and grow the business.

B usiness-Level Hidden Costs

Brand deterioration

Brands rarely collapse. They fade.

When generational needs are overlooked, brands gradually lose mental space among emerging customer cohorts. Products may still function, pricing may remain competitive, and distribution may still be wide — but the brand no longer feels for me.

When a single brand narrative attempts to speak to all generations in the same way, it resonates with none deeply.

Messaging becomes generic, positioning is diluted, and emotional connection weakens. Declining customer consideration follows — not necessarily because competitors are superior, but because the brand feels increasingly disconnected and irrelevant.

While all generations may share similar values, their perspectives differ — shaped by distinct experiences and expectations.

For example, while money continues to be a top value among Filipinos, financial motivation differs by generation. Gen Z seeks independence and non-reliance on parents. Gen Y aims for financial freedom — the ability to spend without constant trade-offs. Gen X prioritizes a comfortable life for both self and family. Boomers focus on continued support for family, including grandchildren. When brands treat “financial value” as a single idea, these nuances are easily missed.

Hidden cost: Marketing spend rises simply to maintain awareness, while conversion, advocacy, and loyalty quietly weaken underneath.

Lackluster innovation outcomes

Many organizations believe they are innovating because they are launching new initiatives, features, or formats. Yet many also complain about lackluster performance from these efforts.

Increasingly, companies are turning to Project Alphabet to understand what opportunity spaces open up when they look beyond surface demographics and instead decode deeply held values, fears, aspirations, and life contexts by generation.

When generational needs are misunderstood, innovation solves internal assumptions rather than real human tensions; new offerings become incremental improvements rather than meaningful shifts; and adoption lags despite technically sound solutions.

Different generations experience unresolved tensions. When these tensions are not decoded accurately, innovation becomes detached from lived reality. Products and services may make sense internally, but fail to resonate externally.

This explains why organizations often ask, “Why didn’t the market respond?” – and this question is raised long after launch, investment, and effort have already been sunk.

Hidden cost: Innovation investment delivers low returns, creates fatigue, and increases risk aversion toward future initiatives.

By Barbara Young

Gen Z isn't just YOLOing, they're money-managing smarter than you think

Fri, 09 Jan 2026 06:33:30 GMT

Contrary to stereotypes about their lifestyles, Filipino Gen Z are proving to be savviy money managers. Shaped by pandemic realities and digital fluency, they balance practical spending with purposeful careers, seeking financial independence not for frivolus pursuits but to secure freedome and meaningful life experiences.

Our teens and young adults have earned a bad reputation for their FOMO and YOLO mindsets. And all that coded language they use doesn’t really help overcome communication roadblocks.

But is Gen Z’s penchant for experiencing the world to the fullest — you know, got to address that Fear of Missing Out because You Only Live Once, after all! — truly synonymous with a frivolous and foolhardy lifestyle?

Several years ago, the answer mught have been “yes”. But not anymore.

The bottom line is that beneath casual slang and carefree aesthetics lies a generation that has fundamentally changed what fiscal responsibility looks like. Gen Z isn’t abandoning financial prudence; they’re reimagining it. They’ve seen their older ates and kuyas, and young titos and titas struggle with poor financial choices, witnessed their parents navigate economic crises, and came of age during a global pandemic that upended any notions of stability.

The result? A pragmatic cohort that saves deliberately, spends intentionally, and refuses to sacrifice mental health and meaningful experiences for outdated definitions of success.

Their “YOLO” isn’t reckless — it's calculated.

They’re not choosing between financial security and living to the fullest, they’re engineering a life where both coexist. When a generation can code-switch between discussing investment portfolios and planning their next adventure with equal fluency, perhaps it’s time executives and companies recorgnize that their approach to money isn’t naive — it has evolved.

Gen Zers aren’t just smarter about money than we think. They might just be smarter about money than we’ve ever been.

Take a deeper dive into the Gen Z's money-managing mindset by subscribing to Project Alphabet.

Listen to the Filipino Gen Z speak:

“Hindi naman ako madalas lumabas. Mas gusto ko gumastos sa travel once in a while kaysa every weekend na gastos,” said a Gen Zer from Metro Manila.

Another from Iloilo said: “Sa totoo lang, di ako mahilig gumimik. Gusto ko sa bahay lang, tipid pa. Iniipon ko nalang para sa future.”  

The older segment of Gen Z, now in their early to late 20s, already comprise more than a quarter of the country’s workforce. They are awake to the intertwining economic-social-political realities that have been borne during and in the aftermath of the disruptive pandemic period.

“As I grow up, spending became more practical. I divide wisely my wants and needs,” said a Gen Z from Davao in southern Philippines.

The lockdowns that prompted faster rollout of digital applications have also enhanced the instinctively online nature of Gen Z, who was born into and grew up in the internet age.

They are digital natives, and that has consequently made them global citizens – borderless, empowered, and conscious of concepts and viewpoints beyond those of their family and the local culture.

In that context of a no-boundaries online universe, Gen Z embraces their freedom and they want to grab opportunities to travel and explore the wider world.

More than just FOMO, their deep angst is losing that freedom on different levels: physically, emotionally, and mentally.

“Gusto ko yung feeling na may sarili akong pera, na hindi ako hingi nang hingi sa magulang,” says a Gen Z from a highly-urbanized area.

The Gen Z hold their freedom dearly, and they understand that freedom must be earned.

In their professional lives, though, they remain uncompromising in their positive wakefulness and independence.

“Mas gusto ko na yung mga trabaho na masaya, hindi lang basta mataas ang sweldo. Gusto ko rin ng purpose,” said an Ilonggo Gen Zer.

“Ayoko na ng toxic na environment. Gusto ko peaceful, tahimik, maka-focus ako sa goals ko,” according to a Gen Zer from Metro Manila.

And when they talk about “purpose” and “goals”,Gen Z means that they value career and other monetary pursuits in terms of being a bridge towards becoming financially stable – and capable of enjoying their YOLO bucket list.

By Marifi Jara

Gen Z isn’t escaping the work system; they’re upgrading it

Mon, 05 Jan 2026 06:47:47 GMT

Our Project Alphabet provides comprehensive insights on how each generation defines work — and why Gen Z is now demanding quality life, not just quality job, demanding the end of unnecessary suffering disguised as professionalism.

For almost a year, I sat in every focus group discussion, interview, and analysis session, listening firsthand to how each generation defines or has redefined work — and why Gen Z is now demanding quality life, not just quality job.

Across Philippine boardrooms, human resource channels, and leadership meetings, one question keeps resurfacing: What does Gen Z really want?

Some call them fragile. Others claim they’re entitled. Still others see them as “quiet quitters” who don’t want to work the way older generations did.

But findings from Acumen’s Project Alphabet interviews tell a deeper, broader story.

Gen Z is not running away from the system — they are interrogating it, challenging it, and reshaping it with demands rooted in wellness, authenticity, and activism.

And when you step back and look at the bigger arc of Philippine generational behavior, their actions don’t look rebellious. Rather, they are inevitable.

Work, as a cultural institution, has evolved dramatically across four generations:

Baby Boomers (born within 1946-1964) : Have Work — stability and survival.
Gen X (1965-1980) : Have Quality Work — competence, excellence, and career pride.
Millennials (1981-1996) : Have Life Outside Work — boundaries and balance.
Gen Z (1997-2012) : Have Quality Life Outside Work — well-being, purpose, and a lifestyle work must support.

This progression is not random. It reflects how socioeconomic conditions, workplace realities, and cultural pressures shaped each cohort. Understanding this context allows us to finally see Gen Z clearly — not as a “problem to fix” but as the generation insisting that the old system finally be fixed.

Gen Z: The Push for Quality Life, Not Just a Balanced One

If Millennials wanted life outside work, Gen Z wants a life of quality outside work.

And for them, work is merely the tool to fund and protect that life.

As one Gen Z participant confidently put it: “I want to have a holistic life… work is my means to do everything I want — travel, family, sports.”

They don’t want to escape work but they want work that does not harm them. They value compensation not as status, but as empowerment. They prioritize lifestyle, wellness, and meaningful experiences.

Gen Z is also the first generation to treat mental well-being as non-negotiable. They know the language of mental health. And they talk openly about it.

“Normalized na siya. Wala nang stigma,” one young worker shared.

Gen Z is unabashedly straightforward. They speak up. They negotiate. And they refuse unreasonable requests.

One supervisor described them as “disciplined in saying ‘no’ to work.”

Another young professional explained their instinct to question practices that don’t make sense: “I should be wrapping up — bakit uutusan pa ako?”

They critique norms not to disrespect authority but to fix inequity, inefficiency, or sheer irrationality.

They even embrace the label “mareklamo,” reframing it as courage: “Real change happens because someone goes out and says, ‘This is not it, guys.’”

More than any previous generation, Gen Z scrutinizes a company’s integrity. They care about whether an organization aligns with their values — especially on issues like social justice, transparency, inclusion, and sustainability.

One respondent asked explicitly: “Is my job serving a higher purpose?”

They’re not satisfied with corporate “mission statements.” They want proof manifested in culture, leadership, and daily decision-making.

To Gen Z, integrity is not branding — it is employer accountability.

When Boomers stayed, it was out of duty. When Gen X stayed, it was out of pride. When Millennials stayed, it was out of balance.

When Gen Z stays, it is because the work supports the life they want to live.

And if it doesn’t? They leave. Not out of defiance, but out of clarity.

“I want to protect my life,” one young worker said. Not their ego. Not their image. Their life.

It is the most rational career philosophy yet. And we can see that the future of work is healthier because they demand it. They are the end of unnecessary suffering disguised as professionalism.

They are not escaping the system. They are upgrading it.

Boomers: The Era of Security and Sacrifice

For Boomers, work was synonymous with survival — a necessity to anchor a family, build a future, and secure stability in a recuperating economy.

One interviewee summed it up simply: “Boomers… would really tend to find stable work.”

Loyalty was a virtue. Sacrifice was expected. Pension schemes and long-term employment were the markers of success. Many Boomers defined their lives by the companies they stayed in for decades.

“I only know about our company because it’s my first and hopefully my last employer. Dito na ako magre-retire,” one respondent said proudly.

To Boomers, having work was the dream.

Gen X: The Rise of Competence and Professional Identity

Gen X inherited the Boomers’ hunger for stability but added their own twist: pride in mastery. For them, work wasn’t just a job — it was a craft.

“I take it seriously,” one Gen Xer shared. “This is what I do, and this is what defines me.”

Described by peers as “driven… adaptable… resourceful,” Gen X framed their identity around being technically excellent and professionally reliable. They respected hierarchy but valued fairness. They pursued titles, expertise, and the privilege of being trusted to perform.

To Gen X, having quality work was the goal.

Millennials: Boundary Builders and Balance Seekers

Then came the generation raised on overwork, globalization, and burnout: Millennials.

They were the first to actively challenge the idea that life must revolve around work.

One interviewee reflected: “Over the years… aabot ka talaga sa point ng life mo na, okay work, pero I have life outside work.”

Millennials mainstreamed the language of “boundaries,” “self-advocacy,” and “work-life balance.” They began negotiating compensation more boldly and rejecting the “martyrdom” culture of their elders.

And yes, they were the first to be labeled “entitled,” especially for demanding fair pay and humane policies. But their advocacy paved the way for what Gen Z would later take even further.

To Millennials, the priority became life outside work.

By Trizia Ann Magalino

Generational Money Mindsets: Spending, Saving, and Investing

Mon, 15 Dec 2025 06:42:53 GMT

What we’re now seeing in 2025, through our Project Alphabet, is that Filipinos are no longer managing money just for survival but with intention. They think about money with far more intentionality, discipline, and long-term focus.

From Gen Z’s side hustles to Boomers’ legacy plans, money means different things to every generation. For some, it’s freedom, while for others, it’s security, comfort, or survival. And over the last decade, with the pandemic period having a major impact, the Filipino relationship with money has transformed in different ways.

Since 2015, Acumen has tracked how Filipino generations think, spend, save, and invest. What we’re now seeing in 2025 through Project Alphabet is not just a change in financial behavior, it’s a complete shift in meaning. Filipinos today think about money with far more intentionality, discipline, and long-term focus than ever before.

From Survival to Intentionality: The Pandemic Effect

If finances in 2015 was a source of aspiration and stress for Filipinos, finances in 2025 has come to be defined by something new: Intentionality toward financial stability. Before the pandemic, many Filipinos, especially the younger generations, viewed money through a day-to-day lens. Budgets were flexible, purchases were spontaneous, and “future planning” felt like something only older generations worried about.

But the pandemic created a collective awakening. It reminded every Filipino, regardless of age, that life can change overnight. Uncertainty became real. Stability can disappear overnight, emergencies can happen anytime, and financial preparedness is not optional. Financial security now represents independence and peace of mind.

Money Has Shifted in Meaning Across Generations

For Gen Z and Millennials, money represents freedom with responsibility and independence. Gen Zs seek independence, spending on experiences and things that they deem meaningful for them and worth their hard-earned money. Millennials desire the ability to spend without guilt, balancing indulgence with discipline while keeping family obligations in mind. Both generations want as much money as possible not for status, but for the ability to live comfortably without anxiety, guilt, or reliance on others.

For Gen X and Boomers, money continues to symbolize provision and duty. They take pride in giving their families a comfortable life, settling obligations first, and finding fulfillment in providing. For them, financial security is not just a personal goal, it is a legacy to sustain their loved ones.

This cross-generational shift is the backdrop of everything else. It reshapes how each generation spends, saves, spends, invests, and aspires.

Investing Mindset: Growing Wealth While Safeguarding What Matters

Across generations, Filipinos now see investing as a pathway to freedom, protection, and long-term possibility — a shift driven by both experience and aspiration.

Gen Z and Gen Ys prefer passive, low-effort investment routes such as real estate, condos for rent, or gold, largely because their focus is still on building careers or businesses. But once they understand something deeply, they become surprisingly aggressive (e.g. automating crypto or forex trading, or venturing into new business categories after researching financial returns.) As one Gen Y said, “Wala namang nagturo sa akin mag-invest — nag-search lang ako online. Trial and error talaga.”
Gen X and Boomers, meanwhile, gravitate toward stable, appreciating assets they can pass on to their families (e.g. house and lot, farms, MP2, gold jewelry, or rental properties) always guided by the belief that wealth built slowly and safely protects the next generation. For them, investing is never impulsive; it is deliberate, sustainable, and rooted in stewardship.

Within this broader investment mindset, insurance has emerged as one of the most valued and universal forms of protection. What used to be seen as a product you “only benefit from when you’re gone” is now understood as a smart financial shield — something that secures health, safeguards income, and ensures family stability no matter what happens.

A Gen Z captures it simply: “Insurance is peace of mind.”
Gen Ys now appreciate its living benefits — “Ngayon, may value na habang buhay ka.”
Gen X and Boomers consider insurance as something that is intertwined with responsibility and legacy: “Meron akong life insurance. Para sa pamilya ko ‘pag wala na ako,” “Importante talaga insurance… may maiiwan ka sa pamilya.”

Across all generations, insurance has become both an investment and a safety net — offering stability, emotional assurance, and the confidence that families will be protected in the present and in the future.

What this multi-generational story shows us is simple but powerful: Filipinos are no longer managing money just for survival, they’re managing it with intention. At the end of the day, money has become more than currency, it’s a reflection of the Filipino’s hopes, fears, values, and dreams.

And as these generational money mindsets continue to evolve, business leaders who stay fluent, empathetic, and forward-looking will be the ones who build brands and organizations that truly connect, serve, and endure.

Savings at the Forefront

Saving has now become a great equalizer across generations — a behavior once associated only with older generations. Today, every generation treats savings as a non-negotiable, with Gen Zs building emergency funds earlier, older generations reinforcing their buffers, and families openly discussing financial planning in ways that used to be somewhat taboo.

Saving is no longer just a mathematical exercise, it is emotional. Though motivations differ, the mindset is shared: Savings give security, and in today’s world, that security is what gives Filipinos confidence, calm, and control over their future.

Across all age groups, saving has become more intentional and disciplined.

Gen Zs save to gain independence , using digital banks, e-wallet pockets, and micro-investing apps to build small but consistent buffers.
Gen Ys save to achieve financial freedom without guilt , the ability to enjoy life without compromising responsibilities.
Gen Xers save to secure a comfortable life for their family , prioritizing education funds, insurance, and future-proofing the household.
Boomers save to continue s upporting not just themselves but also their children and even their grandchildren . They are focusing on health, legacy, and stability.

Spending Mindset: Practical, Intentional, Family-First

Across all generations, a clear shift is visible: practicality is the new priority, and Filipinos now spend only on what truly matters. Each generation has quietly redefined value — favoring intentionality, quality, and family-first consumption. In this new era, every peso must serve a purpose, reflect responsibility, and support the people who matter most.

Gen Zs, raised in a world of constant trends and temptations, are learning to minimize impulsive purchases made on a whim. They’ll still spend for the things that spark joy, but only if the purchase feels sulit and genuinely “mapapa-happy talaga ako.” For them, value is emotional and practical at the same time: enjoy life, but never irresponsibly.

Gen Ys echo this mindset but from a more mature, life-stage perspective—rewarding themselves occasionally, but only after family needs are secured. They’ve embraced delayed gratification, choosing to spend for themselves only when the essentials and obligations of the household are covered.

Meanwhile, Gen X and Boomers remain anchored in a family-first spending mindset — prioritizing needs over wants, choosing durability over trendiness, and finding joy in providing for children and especially grandchildren. When extra funds allow, they reward themselves as a well-earned payoff after years of hard work, but practicality continues to guide their everyday decisions.

By Kristine Santos

A Portrait of the Filipino Generations: Faces of Family, Freedom, and Balance

Tue, 02 Dec 2025 06:27:02 GMT

More than a Sunday meal, this is a portrait of the Filipino family. All four generations are bound by commitment to family, yet each defines success through a distinct lens of duty, freedom, and work-life balance.

Picture this: It’s Sunday noontime. The setting could be a dining room at home. Or a fast-food joint, a casual dining place, or an upscale restaurant. Or outdoors in a park, a little farm, or perhaps the beach. Plates of viands and, of course, rice are laid out. A small crowd of different people, young and old, gather around to share the meal over stories, banter and laughter, and inevitably some scolding and squabbling.

Someone will surely be taking pictures.

And there you have a portrait of the Philippines, where family remains at the core of every Filipinos’ goals, mindset, and decisions.

Across that table sits the multi-generational Filipino family. They dine together like their parents did and their children will. They share values but live them differently. Boomers, Gen X, Millennials, and Gen Z shape those values according to the times that shaped them.

Let’s zoom in on the faces in the frame.

The Strength Within Our Differences

Each generation brings its distinct flavor to the gathering: Gen Z's hunger for meaningful experiences, Millennials' quest for work-life harmony, Gen X's unwavering stability, and Boomers' hard-earned wisdom. Yet despite their differences, they remain bound by the same thread that has held Filipino families together for generations — the belief that success is measured not by individual achievement alone, but by one's capacity to uplift and provide for the family.

That Sunday picture freezes more than just smiling faces; it immortalizes a narrative of continuity and change that is uniquely Filipino.

This multi-generational portrait is not without its tensions.

The Boomers who value delayed gratification may not always understand Gen Z's desire for instant experiences. Gen X's commitment to responsibility might clash with the Millennials' need to set boundaries. But it is precisely within these tensions that the Filipino family finds its strength. That Sunday meal becomes more than shared food; it becomes a space for negotiation, understanding, and ultimately, acceptance.

Beyond the Dining Table: Why It Matters to Businesses

For businesses and organizations, understanding these generational nuances is no longer optional. Workplaces must balance Gen X's dedication with Millennials' need for flexibility. Companies must create spaces where all generations can contribute to their own unique perspectives.

In the marketplace, brands must cater to Gen Z's demand for authenticity while respecting Boomers' preference for reliability.

Together, these four generations shape our households, markets, and workplaces.

A Picture of Our Future

The next time you see a family taking a group picture, look closer. You're witnessing not just a happy moment, but a snapshot of the Filipino heart and soul – where every generation adds their own color to a portrait that never stops evolving yet remains unmistakably Filipino.

To understand more how these generations are reshaping households, workplaces, and markets, explore the full Project Alphabet report.

Gen Z (born within 1997 to 2012)

Gen Z is the full-blood digital generation: teens and young adults raised in a borderless world. They remain deeply rooted in their family while fully embracing their freedom, which they define as having the means to experience the world and living life with substance and enjoyment.

A Gen Z respondent from Metro Manila captures that sentiment: “I want to be successful – achieve my dream so I can provide for self and family. I can have things I want without having any problem.”

For Gen Z, the endpoint isn’t just stability, their desire is to have the freedom to design a life that reflects their values, while uplifting the family that shaped them.

Millennials (1981-1996)

They are also known as Gen Y, and we can also call them the connectors – moving into adulthood during the transition period into the digital age and serving as a bridge between the generations before and after them.

They strive for balance, seeking fulfillment in both the personal and professional aspects of their lives.

"Mas gusto ko na ngayon yung trabaho na nagbibigay ng oras para sa pamilya at sa sarili, kahit hindi kasing taas ng sahod kumpara sa corporate," says a Millennial who lives just north of the capital.

For Millennials, success is balance, not burnout.

Gen X (1965-1980)

We joke about the “titos and titas” of social media, but there’s a reason Gen X fills that role: they are dependable. They are anchors of stability — practical, resilient, grounded.

Their sternness is not a lack of empathy; it is the muscle memory of responsibility.

A Gen X parent from the south puts it simply:

“Sanay na kami sa trabaho at responsibilidad. Hindi na rin kami basta natitinag kasi marami na kaming pinagdaanan para mabigyan ng maayos ang pamilya namin," says a Gen X from southern Philippines. 

Gen X embodies the Filipino principle that duty is love translated into action.

Boomers (1946-1964)

A Boomer from Cebu takes pride in continuing to have influence and being valued by the family for wisdom and rationality, especially through a rough patch: "Ako yung parang adviser sa pamilya, ako nilalapitan ng mga anak at apo kapag may problema." 

Having lived through a post-war time of rebuilding and limited resources to what is now a fast-paced and copious hi-tech era, Boomers see the world through a lens of non-instant gratification, discipline, and dedication. For them, dignity and independence are the end-goals of financial stability. They are the guardians of legacy.

By Marifi Jara

Connecting to a multi-generation Filipino marketplace: Why your brand needs Generational Fluency

Fri, 28 Nov 2025 07:30:07 GMT

Long-held stereotypes have been debunked by Acumen’s Project Alphabet study. Filipino Boomers and Generations X, Y, Z are not static age boxes. They are all moving mindsets. Tap into Generational Fluency to understand these generational shifts – and build strategic marketing plans that not just communicate, but connect.

Walk into any Filipino supermarket, family reunion, or company boardroom and you’ll see a curious phenomenon: four generations navigating the same space, but living entirely different realities. They shop from the same shelves, eat at the same restaurants, and scroll the same social feeds, yet they interpret the world through very different lenses.

From how they evaluate risk to how they define success, the mindsets of Boomers, Gen X, Millennials, and Gen Z have diverged and evolved in ways many brands still fail to grasp. And in a marketplace where attention is scarce and loyalty is fragile, that disconnect is costing companies more than missed opportunities — it is eroding trust, relevance, and market share.

This is the central challenge Generational Fluency is built to solve.

Why Generational Fluency Makes or Breaks Brands

In a fragmented world, Generational Fluency gives brands a strategic edge. It allows you to design messages, experiences, and solutions (products/ services) that meet people where they are, not where you assume them to be.

1. You Build Brands That Connect, Not Just Announce

The failure of most campaigns is not messaging — it is mismatch.

The message is accurate, but the translation is wrong:

“Health” means resilience to Boomers.
“Health” means capability to Gen X.
“Health” means balance to Millennials.
“Health” means emotional regulation to Gen Z.

When brands speak the wrong language, the campaign feels tone-deaf.

When they speak the right one, it feels personal — not targeted.

2. You Design Innovation Ahead of Demand

Product relevance is not a lucky accident.

Health apps, telemedicine, family insurance, Buy Now Pay Later, creator tools, hybrid work systems — none of these are trends. They are responses to generational stress.

Generationally fluent companies don’t chase markets.

They anticipate shifts in mindset before they become mass behavior.

This is how category leaders are born.

3. You Drive More Meaningful Sales Conversations

In retail, banking, FMCG, or B2B, sales is about identity.

Not the brand’s identity — the customer’s.

A Gen X CEO wants ROI and reliability.

A Millennial HR head wants talent culture and sustainability.

A Gen Z procurement lead wants autonomy, trust, and user reviews.

Different mindsets, different conversion triggers.

A Call for Generational Fluency

When marketing and sales teams speak the customer’s generational language, the conversation stops being transactional — it becomes empathetic. And empathy is not a soft skill. It is conversion fuel.

Generational Fluency is not a future trend. It is a required skill. Organizations that decode generational signals will build culture, products, and experiences that stay relevant over time.

As Project Alphabet continues to map how Filipino generations evolve, one lesson remains unmistakable:

The brands that win the future will not be the ones that talk to every generation —

but the ones that know how to listen to them.

Generational Fluency: Beyond Marketing Demographics

Traditional segmentation has trained organizations to think in stable age clusters:

18–24; 25–45. 45–65. It’s clean, familiar, and easy to put on a slide. It is also increasingly useless.

Generational Fluency takes a different stance: in addition to age, generations are shaped by context, experiences, pressure, and transitions. For brands, this is not a philosophical distinction, it is strategic. To design solutions that matter, we must speak to how generations live, not merely when they were born.

This is precisely what Acumen’s Project Alphabet uncovered over the past decade: Filipino generations evolve much faster than brands evolve their messaging, product development, or onboarding experiences.

On the surface, Filipino generations appear “more alike than different.”

They all use smartphones.

They all have family responsibilities.

They all believe in the future.

But similarity in access does not equal similarity in meaning.

A Boomer opening a health app is doing so to avoid burdening their children.

A Gen X parent tracks steps to stay capable and dependable.

A Millennial views it as self-care, proof of being responsible to their family.

A Gen Z uses it to track emotional wellness or sleep patterns.

It is the same activity, but four different psychological stories.

When companies speak with one tone, one promise, or one conversion signal to all these groups, they don’t create efficiency, they risk disengagement. Its critical for brands and business owners to unpack the dimensions of each generation, need and psyche to unlock messages and solutions that will truly resonate.

What Project Alphabet Revealed About Filipino Generations

For years, brands have simplified generations into stereotypes — Boomers are the technophobes, Gen Xers are the rigid generation, Millennials are entitled, and Gen Zs are snowflakes. However, the data from Project Alphabet tells a richer and eye-opening story. Here are some of the insights we uncovered

Boomers: Not Technophobic — Selectively Digital

The stereotype paints Boomers as reluctant online users. Reality is sharper: they are confident, expressive, and social online — but selectively.

They will adopt platforms and products that feel safe, familiar, and within their control.

They do not experiment for fun. They experiment when the risk is low, and the payoff is meaningful: convenience, independence, or legacy.

A retirement plan framed as “protecting your children from financial burden” will resonate far more deeply than “maximise financial growth.” Their goals are emotional guardianship and longevity of dignity — not accumulation.

Gen X: Burdened, Pragmatic, Loyal to What Works

Gen X is the most financially and emotionally burdened generation.

They are caregivers to aging parents, support children, and still push career goals. They are the backbone generation — quiet, efficient, tired, and still moving.

Brands who win Gen X don’t sell excitement.

They sell time, trust, and sanity.

They do not want romantic narratives or overly curated messages.

They want frictionless experiences, reliable guarantees, transparent fees, and zero gimmicks. Ironically, the simplest message often works best for them — but only if it is backed by operational consistency.

Millennials: From YOLO to “Stability Mode”

The YOLO generation matured.

After years of chasing experiences and self-expression, Filipino Millennials entered the “stability era”: mortgages, insurance plans, wellness routines, family investments, alternative income streams.

They still crave meaning, but their bar for practicality is higher.

They want solutions that serve their identity, aspirations, and responsibilities simultaneously. Purpose and pragmatism are not in conflict for Millennials — they are prerequisites.

A bank that markets a savings product as “a foundation for your family’s resilience” will outperform one that promises “rewards for your lifestyle.”

Gen Z: Free Agents of a New Economy

Gen Z is expressive, articulate, and emotionally literate.

They’re not “rebellious”; they are autonomy-driven.

They protect personal agency above legacy, duty, or tradition.

This generation is the first to walk away — from careers, brands, even communities — if they feel restricted or unheard. Freedom is not a buzzword; it is their psychological oxygen.

They thrive in systems that give control: customizable tiers, opt-in communities, co-creation, transparency.

A brand cannot demand loyalty from Gen Z — it must earn it and continually negotiate for it.

By Kristine Santos

Project Alphabet at the BusinessWorld Forecast 2026

Fri, 28 Nov 2025 02:22:49 GMT

Our President & CEO Pauline Fermin presented headline findings from Project Alphabet: Decoding Filipinos Across Generations at the BusinessWorld Forecast 2026 inside the premier business forum at Grand Hyatt Manila.

As the Philippines enters a demographic landscape where Gen Zs and Millennials comprise 75% of the working population, understanding generational shifts in consumer behavior, values, and workplace preferences is no longer optional — it's a strategic imperative.

Project Alphabet represents our commitment to delivering robust, practical, experience-tested insights that enable companies be ready for a rapidly evolving market, in both commercial and organizational front.

Thank you to BusinessWorld Publishing Corporation for convening the country's brightest minds in business and policy, and to everyone who engaged with our research today.

Ready to transform generational tensions into organizational strength? Visit our website for more information:

Filipino Priorities: Family, Health, and the Pursuit of Balance

Thu, 13 Nov 2025 06:21:46 GMT

A decade ago, most Filipinos were focused on making ends meet and moving up. While those ambitions remain, the motivations and measure of success are shifting. The Filipino story is changing as these three priorities now stand at the center of the pursuit of a good life.

Talking about life goals and values with my co-workers usually reveals how striking generation gaps can actually be. In expressing what I care about most, I’m often met with variations of surprise or disbelief, with my older colleagues recounting how they had valued very different things when they were my age.

Some focused on career advancement, others, securing financial stability as quickly as possible. For me, it was always about personal growth, flexibility, and finding balance.

These conversations have always made me wonder: Is our generation just different or has the definition of success for Filipinos changed?

A decade ago, most Filipinos were focused on making ends meet and moving up. While those ambitions remain, the motivations and measure of success are shifting. The Filipino story is changing as Family, Health, and Work-life balance now stand at the center of the pursuit of a good life.

The Rise of Balance

Success for Filipinos is no longer just about how much we achieve but how well we live.

Work-life balance has shifted from a dream to a demand. Many are seeking flexibility, hobbies, and purpose. The “hustle” mindset is giving way to something deeper: the desire for rest, meaning, and connection.

“Gusto ko may saysay yung ginagawa ko, hindi lang para sa pera.” – Boomer, Cebu

This is reshaping what Filipinos expect from employers, communities, and brands. People now look for organizations that support well-being, not just productivity.

A New Kind of Ambition

In conducting this study, it became clear that while each generation might approach their goals differently, the values at the core are quite similar. The motivations and prioritization of each value may differ across generations, but today, we’re all ultimately chasing the same things.

These changes raise important questions about how Filipinos live, spend, and work today.

How are the different generations redefining health and wellness?
What new financial behaviors are shaping the Filipino approach to money, risk, and reward?
How is the pursuit of balance changing expectations of work and leadership?

And ultimately, how can organizations and brands stay relevant in this new definition of a “good life”?

To stay relevant, companies need to evolve with these priorities. It’s no longer about fitting into the Filipino household budget but rather fitting into their rhythm of life – helping them stay ambitious without losing balance, to thrive and not simply survive. The Filipino journey has always been about resilience. Today, it’s about redefining what that resilience is for.

Let’s explore how each generation is shaping this shift and what it means for your business. Visit our website:

Family: An Unchanging Core

No matter how times have changed, one thing remains true for Filipinos: Everything is for, with, or because of family.

Family continues to shape the Filipino identity. It defines life goals, inspires day-to-day sacrifices, and influences the constant choices that need to be made.

“Balik ko sa kanila. Sila ang nag-sacrifice para sa akin. Gusto ko naman silang pasayahin ngayon.” – Gen Z, Davao

The expression of that devotion is now evolving. While providing for loved ones still matter deeply, non-tangible marks of commitment such as being present, being well, and being together have also become very important.

“Mas gusto ko flexible schedule… at least may oras ako sa family.” – Gen Y, Bulacan & Pampanga

There’s a growing understanding that caring for family also means caring for oneself. Moments spent with each other, with health as currency, have become central themes for the Filipino family.

Health: The New Foundation for Freedom

Health has moved to the top rank of Filipino priorities. A few years after the peak of the pandemic, being healthy is no longer just about avoiding illness.

Well-being now encompasses various facets, defined differently by each generation. While Physical health is still a priority, Mental Health has also increased in significance.

“May mga time na gusto kong tapusin iyong task pero if it gets too much overwhelming, I take that mental health break that is needed” – Gen Y, Iloilo

Health, at its core, is the new foundation for freedom, productivity, and happiness. Filipinos are paying more attention to the value of rest, and how they manage stress. It has become both personal and shared, with the rising awareness that it serves as one of the main drivers to enjoy life fully.

“Nagpapa-check up ako regularly ngayon – hindi lang para sa akin, Kundi para makapag-support pa sa pamilya ko.” Gen X, Bulacan and Pampanga

From Friction to Fluency: Leading with empathy across generations

Tue, 11 Nov 2025 10:36:29 GMT

In a multi-generational workplace, cultivating empathy can bridge generational divides, unlock innovation, attract and retain top talent, and build a more inclusive and successful organization.

A brand assistant arrived in the office at 8:30 a.m. Her brand manager calls her and starts discussing a project. She said, “It’s not yet 9 a.m. Can we talk then? It’s not yet work hours.”

The CMO was aghast, “I can never imagine talking back like that to my boss!”

The CMO is a Boomer; the brand manager a Millennial; the brand assistant a Gen Z-er.

If interactions like this persist, what’s the ending to this story? The brand assistant will resign because of “toxic culture,” both the brand manager and CMO pressuring HR to immediately find a replacement, since there are many brand launches in the pipeline.

75% of today’s Filipino workplace are composed of Gen Zs and Gen Ys — the digital generation. 25% are Gen Xer and Boomers who comprise majority of the senior leadership.

Each generation brings distinct values, experiences, and expectations, shaped largely by the context in which they grew up and achieved success in. And after a whole decade of researching them, we find that there are now numerous systemic tensions because of diverging values and points of view.

Do we let those tensions brew and accept the negative consequences: high attrition, low engagement, impaired corporate reputation due to “toxic culture” posts?

The answer lies in whether the company begins to develop the new, critical skill called Generational Fluency. For senior leaders, this demands a deep-seated capacity for empathy.

Empathy, in this context, transcends mere sympathy or “putting yourself in someone else’s shoes.” It signifies a leader’s ability to genuinely understand and appreciate the perspectives of employees from different generations — to grasp the why behind their actions, their motivations, and their concerns. It’s about recognizing that a Boomer’s approach to work might be shaped by decades of experience, while a Gen Z employee’s perspective is influenced by a digitally native upbringing.

How do we cultivate empathy? Are we practicing it enough? For me, one tell-tale sign of not empathizing enough is when I find myself hogging the conversation — which means, I speak more than I listen. Here are practical ways to begin strengthening our empathy muscle:

Active Listening : Make a conscious effort to actively listen to employees from a generation different from yours. Ask open-ended questions, seek to understand their perspectives, and resist the urge to interrupt or judge. Unless you have been able to “peel the onion” through several layers of “why is that?,” then you’ve not fully understood their perspective and motivation.
Perspective-Taking: Challenge your own assumptions and biases. Try to see the world through the eyes of someone from a different generation. Imagine yourself going through the same experience — both good and bad — and see how your thought process will begin to shift.
Seeking Feedback: Solicit feedback from employees of all ages. Ask them how you can be a more effective and empathetic leader.
Creating Dialogue: Foster open and honest communication within your organization. Encourage employees to share their thoughts and feelings without fear of retribution.
Lead by Example: Demonstrate empathy in your words and actions. Be a role model for others to follow. Do not just mouth it, really examine your day-to-day actions.

In a multi-generational workplace, empathy is no longer a “nice-to-have” — it’s an indispensable leadership competency. By cultivating empathy, senior leaders can bridge generational divides, unlock innovation, attract and retain top talent, and build a more inclusive and successful organization.

Why Empathy Matters for Senior Leaders

Bridging Generational Divides: Without empathy, senior leaders risk creating or exacerbating generational divides. A lack of understanding can lead to miscommunication, resentment, and ultimately, disengagement.
Unlocking Innovation: Diverse perspectives fuel innovation. Senior leaders who cultivate empathy are better equipped to tap into the unique insights and creative potential of each generation.
Attracting and Retaining Top Talent: In today’s competitive job market, empathy is a powerful magnet. Senior leaders who demonstrate genuine care and understanding are more likely to attract and retain employees across all generations.
Building Trust and Loyalty: Empathy fosters trust, a cornerstone of any successful organization. When employees feel understood and valued, they are more likely to be loyal, committed, and willing to go the extra mile.

Empathy in Action

No one would argue about the importance of empathy. But often, we don’t stop to think about what this looks like exactly. Here are some examples:

The Empathetic CEO: Faced with declining morale among younger employees, this CEO implemented “skip-level” meetings, providing a safe space for direct reports to share concerns with senior management without fear of reprisal. By actively listening and responding to their feedback, the CEO fostered a culture of transparency and trust, leading to improved morale and retention.
The Change-Resistant Executive: Initially skeptical of new technology and work styles, this executive underwent “reverse mentoring” with a younger employee. By listening to their perspectives and engaging in open dialogue, the executive gained a new appreciation for the benefits of innovation and embraced change, leading to improved team collaboration and productivity.
The Project Leader: This project leader noticed that the Gen Z worker on the project was disengaged and not working to the expected standards. Instead of disciplining him, the project leader asked the employee about his engagement and what he found exciting. In the end, the project leader found out that the Gen Z worker was looking for more creative freedom and a place to contribute and implement his own ideas. Upon discovering this the leader decided to give the worker more freedom, increasing his sense of purpose and drive.

By Pauline Fermin

The State of the Filipino Workforce: 4 Generations, 1 Office

Mon, 10 Nov 2025 06:30:43 GMT

The Filipino workplace hosts Baby Boomers, Gen X, Millennials, and Gen Z—each with distinct values, habits, and work styles. This generational mix produces both friction and synergy. With thoughtful leadership and flexible strategies, companies can turn diversity into a competitive edge, driving innovation, productivity, and engagement for a future-ready workforce.

How Boomers, Gen X, Millennials, and Gen Z Collide and Collaborate Under One Roof

When four generations come in for the Monday 9AM hybrid townhall, they’re not just warm bodies filling a room or nameless faces joining a zoom call. Minutes before it starts, you’ll hear the loud banters, the ping of texts in the background, frenzied typing on the laptop, and the chirpy “good mornings,” yet you notice some just sitting quietly in the room, scrolling through FB, or waiting in video off mode. Colleagues with varying histories, habits, and hopes. Each with its own rhythm, values and unspoken nuances.

The Monday townhall scene hints at both friction and symbiosis. Understanding how these generations interact is more than a cliche; it’s the core for productivity, engagement, and retention in the modern Filipino workplace.

Portrait of an Office Ecosystem

Step into any office with an open floor layout and you’ll see more than swivel chairs, whiteboards, and sticky notes. You’ll get a sense of the generational landscape:

25% are Baby Boomers and Gen Xers, who’ve seen typewriters give way to touchscreens and columnar pads convert to excel spreadsheets;
75% are Millennials and Gen Zs, the digital-native innovators on a mission for purposeful work and young, fresh hires hungry for mentorship and autonomy.

The office hums with so much activity – emails, face-to-face meetings, cellphone calls, video chats, online training, and endless texting. Despite different preferences among employees, there is but one goal: deliver results in a competitive market by performing their respective roles in the best possible way.

Tensions and Synergies: The Generational Tightrope

These differences in generational personas naturally trigger conflicts and tensions. The most obvious ones are seen around communication styles, leadership approaches, and views on worklife balance. On communication, for example, Boomers lean on formal email, while Gen Z pushes for instant messaging and video notes. On leadership, older generation leads with structure, discipline, and authority, but the younger generation looks for flexibility, autonomy, and collaboration. On worklife balance, the younger generations clearly define self-care, mental health, and personal space, while the older generation expects work demands to be prioritized and fully satisfied. Yet, these flash points become opportunities when each side flexes.

To exemplify synergy, in a multinational insurance company based in the Philippines, each generation plays a role in their innovation sprints:

Gen Z drives innovation through fresh, purpose-led thinking and digital experimentation.
Gen Y translates ideas into scalable and user-friendly solutions.
Gen X builds the structures and frameworks that ensure innovation aligns with business strategy and operations
Boomers provide historical perspective and organizational memory that ground innovation in experience and continuity.

This collaboration is a perfect example of how each generation’s strengths can be leveraged for a common goal. When seasoned professionals share context and fresh voices inject momentum, organizations unlock unexpected creativity.

Forward-Looking Solutions: Building a Future-Ready Organization

Over the next five years, the generational balance will shift - by 2030, Millennials and Gen Z could represent almost 80 percent of the Philippine workforce. Therefore, conflicts brought about by the generational mix will continue, fueled moreso by evolving priorities and old systems needing to adapt.

As such, strategic pivots are necessary, such as:

Adopting multi-channel and intentional interaction : This means making sure communication touchpoints work across generations — emails for Boomers, chats or short videos for younger employees. “One-size-fits-all” no longer fits; shift to multi-modal.
Experimentation on flexible work setups : Identify specific roles or business groups where flexible arrangement may continue to work effectively, without impacting productivity. Agree on proof points or metrics to measure success during a pilot implementation.
Leadership training on Generational Fluency: Equip managers to decode generational nuances and be able to leverage strengths and mediate conflicts constructively.
Purpose-centered projects : Design initiatives that resonate across ages—environmental drives, community outreach, and skill-sharing platforms.
Leadership mindset change : Shift from authority to stewardship, nurturing trust, and deepening mentoring and coaching.

Organizations that start embedding this ethos now create resilience and adaptability for tomorrow’s challenges and retain the talent they need to be a sustainable enterprise in the future.

Generational Diversity: No Less than a Collective Force

Back at the office townhall, coffee break just got announced, colleagues from all generations file out to queue for brewed kapeng barako, softdrinks, and simple merienda. The chatter of stories and the clatter of spoons against ceramic echoes the harmony they’ve forged across decades. This simple ritual captures the essence of the Filipino workforce today: diverse, dynamic, and bound by a shared drive to perform their best.

In the end, it’s not just about managing four generations under one roof. It’s about understanding and weaving their strengths into a tapestry of mutual respect and collective ambition. When that happens, the office doesn’t just hum—it sings.

Meet the Four Generations

Baby Boomers: The Legacy Guardians

Born between 1946 and 1964, Boomers define work by commitment and reliability. For them, a handshake matters more than an emoji. They prefer clear structure and direction, and loyalty is demonstrated with commitment to finish the job, even it means long hours. They value direct connections and cherish being asked to help solve problems. However, existing stereotypes on Boomers make them feel useless and unwanted causing breakdown in understanding and connection. Organizations should leverage the presence of Boomers as they offer the legacy of deep, historical knowledge and cultural memory, maybe even better than the company archives.

Generation X: The Steady Providers

Gen Xers, born 1965 to 1980, often see their work as a contract and a commitment. For them, showing up is proof of responsibility — even when personal problems weigh heavily, they will still deliver. They grew up analog, but adapted to digital. They are in the middle of things, witnessing the evolution of a changing work environment, and therefore becomes the perfect mediator across generations - negotiates deadlines with Boomers, translates data for Millennials, and hashtags project updates to keep Gen Zers in the loop. Resilient, pragmatic, and dependable, they resist extremes and become an anchor for stability—seeking a balanced approach that respects tenure and embraces agility. Organizations benefit from their ability to moderate between groups and ensure continuity during transitions and transformations.

Millennials: The Connectors

Millennials, coming into this world from 1981 to 1996, chase meaning alongside milestones. They want to innovate, collaborate, and see real-world impact. Purpose needs to be aligned to their values and they view work as an extension and expression of those values. They are known to defer to opportunities that help them make positive change, even if it may not be the highest offer they got. They are collaborative team players and thrive on constant feedback loops and collective brainstorming. As such, organizations would do well to harness their collaborative style, which, if empowered, can unify diverse teams and drive inclusion.

Generation Z: The Changemakers

Gen Zers—those born from 1997 to 2009—have never known life without high-speed internet. They live digitally blended lives, shifting across multiple personas depending on context. They prize quick feedback, social impact, and work–life harmony. They view work as a “stage performance,” where there is another life outside of it, thus making clear delineations between work and personal life. There is a noted skills gap which organizations need to address – while fresh hires may have strong academic credentials and technical knowledge, they need to be “socially prepared” to thrive in the workplace. To truly unlock their role as changemakers in organizations, Gen Zers need the right circumstances, in order for them to bring fresh, purpose-driven ideas, and digital experimentation that spark innovation.

By Jocelyn Labrador

Mind the Gap: Generational Fluency at Work

Wed, 08 Oct 2025 10:34:26 GMT

As you walk through any workplace, you will see it– different generations working side-by-side. On the surface, it looks simple enough. Everyone goes about their day, quietly and steadily. But the truth is, when people work together, they don’t just co-exist. They either collaborate or collide.

Why Generational Dynamics Matter

Companies must pay close attention to these dynamics because it can make or break an organization. The company will grow if its people thrive. And they will thrive under circumstances where there is respect and trust, where they have a voice, where they find purpose and can meaningfully contribute. All generations aspire for these same values. But there will be differences in perspectives, preferences , either in the way they interpret a value or in the way that they manifest their beliefs at work.

When cross-generational teams work in harmony, they turn diversity into advantage.

They draw strength from each other’s experiences, share ideas openly, give feedback respectfully, and hold each other accountable to shared goals. This is demonstrated by openness in sharing and accepting ideas, in expressing their thoughts or providing feedback, in setting and living up to work expectations. This is where collaboration sparks innovation, growth and creative problem solving.

Without openness and understanding, tensions will occur. New ideas may sound threatening to those who hold on to tradition and legacy, feedback may feel like criticism and judgment, and upholding boundaries for worklife balance will sound like an excuse from fulfilling commitments and being devoid of a sense of urgency.

As the generation mix in the workforce becomes more diverse, these tensions are becoming more prevalent. Organizations now find themselves needing a new skill to bridge the implications of a multi-generational workforce: Generational Fluency.

A Strategic Skill, Not a Buzzword

Therefore, Generational Fluency should not be perceived as another fashionable buzzword. It is a strategic enabler —one that organizations must urgently cultivate to unlock the engagement, performance, and innovation across their workforce. And in the Philippines, where family, hierarchy, and community deeply influence workplace dynamics, Generational Fluency is not optional — it is essential.

At Project Alphabet, we have been listening to voices across generations — from Gen Z’s calls for empathy, to Millennials’ push for growth, to Gen X’s need for balance, to Boomers’ desire for stability. While the study highlights shared values, without Generational Fluency, those shared goals get lost in translation.

Three signs you may have a Generational Fluency gap

Feedback loops stall. Messages get taken as personal, not professional.
Meetings end polite, but unresolved. No one is sure who should decide.
Good people leave quietly, not for pay, but because they don’t feel understood.

Three small shifts to start building it

Explain the why, not just the what. People anchor better when they understand context.
Highlight the value of what is existing, before proposing change. It honors legacy, while making space for progress.
Adjust recognition. Some want public thanks; others value private acknowledgment or growth opportunities.

Generational Fluency is not about characterizing people into generational labels — it is about seeing each individual, beyond age, to understand what drives, inspires, and challenges them. This is the missing skill in Filipino workplaces that must take priority. And organizations that make the shift converts generational diversity into a real competitive edge.

In the coming weeks, we will share more findings from Project Alphabet — insights and stories on how leaders can start practicing Generational Fluency in everyday moments. Visit our website:

What Is Generational Fluency?

Generational Fluency is the ability to appreciate the uniqueness of each generation, not necessarily to have to bend to each other’s whims, but to see how understanding a different point of view and preference might give rise to a win-win solution, a compromise and shared progress.

It is the art of navigating generational differences with empathy, agility, and strategic intent . Importantly, it goes beyond knowing the stereotypes (e.g., Boomers value loyalty, Gen Z wants flexibility) and instead focuses on:

Appreciating and understanding the experiences that shaped each generation’s perspective
Recognizing behavioral patterns in communication, motivation, and decision-making
Adapting leadership and organizational practices to meet diverse generational needs
Developing inclusive environments where all generations feel seen, heard, and valued

It is not about satisfying preferences—it is about developing a climate where multigenerational teams can better collaborate, co-create, cooperate, so that everyone thrives and the organization grows.

By Jocelyn Labrador

Before shaping your brand architecture, first have a strategy

Tue, 12 Nov 2024 03:21:02 GMT

A strong brand strategy is the backbone of effective brand architecture. As companies grow and expand, defining a clear brand strategy provides focus and direction.

A well-defined brand architecture is essential for businesses to grow, expand into new markets, and introduce new products while maintaining a clear and cohesive identity.

At the heart of a successful brand architecture is a strong brand strategy that aligns a company’s vision, values, and market positioning with its portfolio of products and services.

Without a deliberate and clear brand strategy, businesses risk diluting their brand identity, confusing customers, and ultimately hindering growth.

What is Brand Architecture?

Brand architecture is the organizational structure of a company’s portfolio of brands, sub-brands, and products. It outlines how these various elements relate to one another and to the parent brand.

A well-constructed brand architecture helps customers understand a company’s offerings and how each product fits into the bigger picture.

There are three primary types of brand architecture:

Branded House (like Apple), where all products are marketed under one overarching brand;

House of Brands (like Procter & Gamble), where each product has its own brand identity; and

Hybrid (like Google and Alphabet), which combines elements of both.

A strong brand strategy is crucial to a company’s success because it lays down the foundation for the development of products and services, and the corresponding marketing plan.

Clarity and Cohesion. A strong brand strategy ensures that the brand architecture is clear and easy for customers to understand. Without a coherent strategy, a company may introduce products or services that are inconsistent with the core brand identity, leading to customer confusion.

A well-thought-out strategy helps businesses determine whether a new product should fit under the parent brand (branded house) or should be developed as a separate brand (house of brands).

For example, Nike has successfully maintained clarity with a branded house approach. Their core brand values of performance and innovation apply to all their products, from footwear to sports apparel, reinforcing Nike’s identity as a leader in athletic performance. This consistency across all product lines strengthens customer trust and loyalty.

Efficient Resource Allocation. A strong brand strategy helps businesses allocate marketing and operational resources effectively. When a company knows how its various brands and products fit within the overall architecture, it can prioritize marketing investments, avoiding duplication and unnecessary spending.

For instance, in a branded house model, marketing efforts for one product (e.g., iPhone) also enhance the visibility of the overall brand (Apple), benefiting the entire product line.

On the other hand, in a house of brands strategy, each sub-brand has its own identity and requires separate marketing efforts. Companies like Unilever manage this well, with distinct brands such as Dove, Axe, and Lipton each having their own marketing campaigns tailored to their target audiences.

Flexibility and Scalability. A strong brand strategy ensures that the architecture can evolve as the business grows or enters new markets.

For example, when Google restructured into Alphabet, it allowed for the parent company to expand into new industries like autonomous driving and healthcare without diluting the Google brand, which remained focused on technology and internet services. This flexibility allows companies to pursue innovation and diversification while maintaining the strength of their core brand.

Customer Experience and Brand Loyalty. A coherent brand architecture, guided by a strong strategy, enhances the overall customer experience. When customers can easily understand the relationship between a company’s products and its core brand promise, it builds trust and loyalty. This alignment reassures customers that regardless of the specific product or sub-brand, they can expect the same level of quality, values, and experience.

For example, Coca-Cola’s strong brand strategy has allowed it to create a consistent brand image across a broad portfolio, from its classic cola to newer offerings like Coke Zero and Diet Coke, without diluting the core brand's identity.

In summary, a strong brand strategy is the backbone of effective brand architecture. It provides clarity, ensures resource efficiency, allows for flexibility in growth, and enhances customer loyalty.

As companies grow and expand, defining a clear brand strategy becomes essential for long-term success, enabling businesses to navigate complexity while maintaining a unified and recognizable identity.

By Tina Sabarre

You realize you’ve overextended your brand. Now what?

Wed, 30 Oct 2024 03:26:30 GMT

Overextending your brand into unfamiliar markets or products can alienate loyal customers, especially if the expansion seems like a blatant cash-grab rather than a well-thought-out strategy.

Overextending a brand happens when a company stretches its brand identity beyond its core competencies, diluting its value. That means brand architecture becomes confused, customers end up being unsure of the brand's direction, and financial performance can suffer.

When businesses realize they’ve overextended their brand, it’s essential to take corrective actions to avoid long-term damage.

First, what are the signs of brand overextension?

Brand Dilution: A clear indicator of overextension is when consumers no longer understand what your brand stands for. If you’ve introduced too many products that stray from your core offerings, customers might struggle to associate your brand with its original value proposition.

For instance, Harley-Davidson’s attempt to launch a cologne was met with confusion — consumers could not reconcile a motorcycle brand with a fragrance.

Decreased Customer Loyalty: A direct consequence of brand overextension is the erosion of customer trust and loyalty. If customers feel your brand no longer aligns with their expectations, they may turn to competitors. Overextending into unfamiliar markets or products can alienate loyal customers, especially if it seems like a blatant cash-grab rather than a well-thought-out strategy.

Sales Decline: Overextending can lead to an inconsistent product portfolio, where certain products cannibalize the sales of others, or where underperforming new ventures drain resources from your core strengths. Financial setbacks are often an immediate red flag, signaling the need for course correction.

WHAT TO DO

When the warning signals start blinking, it is time to reassess and re-strategize.

Here are the steps to take when you’ve overextended .

Re-evaluate Your Core: Acknowledge what made your brand successful in the first place. This might mean returning to your original product lines, values, and consumer base.

For example, after American clothing enterprise Gap realized it had diluted its brand, the company reverted to focusing on its classic basics, shedding non-core ventures.

Simplify Your Portfolio: Begin by trimming the excess. Reduce the number of products or services that don’t align with your brand’s identity. Streamlining will help sharpen your message and refocus on offerings that have strong customer support and brand recognition.

Clarify Your Brand Architecture: Decide if your brand should continue under one umbrella, or if a house of brands approach would better serve your expanded offerings. Creating sub-brands that target specific markets without diluting your master brand can protect your brand equity.

In short, recognizing brand overextension early allows for realignment, and focused efforts can help regain consumer trust and preserve long-term growth.

By Tina Sabarre

Delivering consistent, rigorous Capability Building programs in the Philippines and beyond

Wed, 16 Oct 2024 03:30:40 GMT

Acumen’s objective in it's Capability Building practice is to impart knowledge to participants through relevant and value-adding modules so that they can apply their learnings in their day-to-day work.

In May 2024, Acumen successfully facilitated a training program for a leading beverage and food company in Southeast Asia with participants from various countries in the region.

The client was founded and is headquartered here in the Philippines but has expanded its operations across Southeast Asia. Since 2020, Acumen has built a strong partnership with this client, starting with training programs in its head office to enhance the capabilities of their leaders and teams on business strategy and consumer understanding.

Over time, the management extended these initiatives to their regional teams. And despite cultural and linguistic differences, we share and take up the same goal: boosting business and marketing skills.

When I started working in Acumen, I was not immediately involved in any of our pool of accounts. However, I was eager to contribute to our team’s success. Observing my teammates’ dedication to delivering quality training output that definitely satisfied our clients inspired me to learn more. Through years of hands-on experience, I acquired a deep understanding of our processes, and equipped with this knowledge, I advanced in my career towards handling my own accounts and delivering quality training programs.

Over the years, we have documented our processes in Capability Building and implemented them through a rigorous approach, ensuring a consistent delivery of high-quality training modules not just in the Philippines, but across the Southeast Asian region.

When I say quality programs, it means going beyond simply delivering training materials; it is about ensuring that the training content is internalized by participants and they are able to actually apply it in their own different real-life business scenarios.

Regardless of the subject matter, project team involved, and location, our clients are guaranteed to receive a consistent, effective, and high-quality level of training.

Our objective in capability building is to impart knowledge to our participants through relevant and value-adding modules, so that they can apply their learnings in their day-to-day work.

Our commitment to deliver relevant and value-adding capability building training is grounded on four elements:

Facilitators: Our faculty members are subject-matter experts who have years of experiences locally and internationally in their own fields. They themselves take part in the different stages of enablement to clearly understand the nuances of effective engagement, knowledge transfer, and training for the participants.

Content: Our modules have a standard outline that are customized to different markets and clients. Our Program Directors and Content Managers make sure that the modules we deliver are grounded on both foundational concepts and in-depth practical application for the client’s business. In some cases, we also tap subject-matter-experts who can provide specific cultural and local knowledge to ensure that the training is tailor-fit for the business.

Engaging Delivery: We go beyond traditional lectures. Our modules incorporate interactive activities, case studies relevant to the business context, and practical exercises to solidify learning and encourage application. Our facilitators also ensure that they maintain a safe learning environment that will create a more favorable training experience.

Performance Measurement: We don’t arbitrarily say the training was a success — we objectively measure the effectiveness of our programs through regular assessments, evaluations, and a feedback mechanism. This allows us to identify the areas for further development and refinement. This will also help us adapt the modules to ensure they meet the evolving needs of our clients across the region and leave a great impact to our learners.

By upholding and maintaining these rigorous standards in our Capability Building programs, we empower our learners across Southeast Asia with the knowledge and skills they need to excel and perform better in their jobs.

Acumen recognizes that the workforce is the backbone of any organization. Our training programs are designed to empower our clients’ leaders and employees and set them up for long-term learning, growth, and success.

By Uella Casera

A Tribe with a Heart

Tue, 17 Sep 2024 03:49:48 GMT

Acumen Tribe members spend time away from work, engaging in a shared experience of bringing a little joy and kindness to Bahay Kanlungan’s elderly.

In just several months of joining Acumen as part of the People Team, I can say I have met the brightest people in the consulting industry. Their intellectual horsepower is palpable, but they are also a fun-loving Tribe.

When we, in HR, proposed to have a fun, no-brainer day away from work, we were thinking of bowling or other typical group leisure activities. But we were pleasantly surprised when majority voted to do an outreach for the elderly.

In partnership with Compassionate Community Kitchen (CCK), the Acumen Tribe visited Bahay Kanlungan in Muntinlupa City. It is a facility that provides care for abandoned elderly people.

The lolos and lolas there played games with us, decorated cookies with us and even indulged us in a light Zumba workout led by one of our very own Tribe members.

As lunch time approached, some Acumen volunteers helped in distributing the nutritious food prepared by the CCK team. Some volunteered to feed the elderly who are bedridden and had to stay in their rooms. Most of us stayed in the activity room and assisted the lolos and lolas while they ate. It was a precious moment listening and exchanging stories with them — a privilege knowing about their journey through life.

It was refreshing to see the Acumen tribe in a non-work setting, but what made the day even more special was knowing that these very busy people chose to spend their time with the elderly and show them compassion.

As we were informed by the Bahay Kanlungan staff, the lolos and lolas have no families to care for them and were turned over to the facility either by the barangays or Muntinlupa Hospital. It makes them really happy when they get visitors who interact with them. At the end of our visit, we felt that we were the ones blessed for having that opportunity to serve the lolos and lolas.

We were also grateful for the chance to meet the other Tribe members and engage in a meaningful experience together. Personally, I felt proud at that moment to be part of the Acumen Tribe — a Tribe with a heart big enough to enable organizations transform AND do small acts of kindness to give back to the community.

By K aren Menez

Philippine real estate industry: New growth corridors are on the rise

Thu, 12 Sep 2024 00:22:01 GMT

Major real estate developers have now made their presence felt in these growing suburban areas, pushing for differentiation and dominance as interest and excitement grows in new markets, trade areas, and upcoming economic zones.

A well-defined brand architecture is essential for businesses to grow, expand into new markets, and introduce new products while maintaining a clear and cohesive identity.

At the heart of a successful brand architecture is a strong brand strategy that aligns a company’s vision, values, and market positioning with its portfolio of products and services.

Without a deliberate and clear brand strategy, businesses risk diluting their brand identity, confusing customers, and ultimately hindering growth.

What is Brand Architecture?

A well-constructed brand architecture helps customers understand a company’s offerings and how each product fits into the bigger picture.

There are three primary types of brand architecture:

Branded House (like Apple), where all products are marketed under one overarching brand;
House of Brands (like Procter & Gamble), where each product has its own brand identity; and
Hybrid (like Google and Alphabet), which combines elements of both.

A strong brand strategy is crucial to a company’s success because it lays down the foundation for the development of products and services, and the corresponding marketing plan.

Clarity and Cohesion. A strong brand strategy ensures that the brand architecture is clear and easy for customers to understand. Without a coherent strategy, a company may introduce products or services that are inconsistent with the core brand identity, leading to customer confusion.

A well-thought-out strategy helps businesses determine whether a new product should fit under the parent brand (branded house) or should be developed as a separate brand (house of brands).

Efficient Resource Allocation. A strong brand strategy helps businesses allocate marketing and operational resources effectively. When a company knows how its various brands and products fit within the overall architecture, it can prioritize marketing investments, avoiding duplication and unnecessary spending.

For instance, in a branded house model, marketing efforts for one product (e.g., iPhone) also enhance the visibility of the overall brand (Apple), benefiting the entire product line.

Flexibility and Scalability. A strong brand strategy ensures that the architecture can evolve as the business grows or enters new markets.

Customer Experience and Brand Loyalty. A coherent brand architecture, guided by a strong strategy, enhances the overall customer experience. When customers can easily understand the relationship between a company’s products and its core brand promise, it builds trust and loyalty. This alignment reassures customers that regardless of the specific product or sub-brand, they can expect the same level of quality, values, and experience.

In summary, a strong brand strategy is the backbone of effective brand architecture. It provides clarity, ensures resource efficiency, allows for flexibility in growth, and enhances customer loyalty.

References:

*Department of Budget and Management (2023). Big chunk of DOTr’s budget for 2024 allocated to infrastructure development

Setting up a ‘Perfect Store’ for Philippine Shoppers

Wed, 04 Sep 2024 05:20:22 GMT

Route-to-Market (RTM) is critical in the Philippines where traditional trade is sizeable, requiring a massive distribution network utilizing an optimal mix of own salesforce, distributors and wholesalers.

In a market with over a million outlets for a shopper to choose from, building a Route-to-Market (RTM) strategy that efficiently delivers product accessibility is a key competitive advantage in the Philippines.

Throughout my career, I’ve witnessed diverse trade structures across Southeast Asia. On one end, we have modern trade-dominated Singapore, where a few players have omnichannel presence. In contrast, countries with large populations and wide geographies, like the Philippines and Indonesia, are dominated by traditional, fragmented trade, with small stores — such as the sari-sari stores in the Philippines or warungs in Indonesia — playing a central role. While the final RTM design varies depending on the retail landscape, certain elements are universal.

The Shopper and Your Perfect Store

It’s crucial to understand not just the target consumer’s needs but also the shopper’s needs. Keep in mind that the shopper may not necessarily be the end-consumer.

Once in shopping mode, shoppers bring a new set of requirements to the mix, forming their shopping mission. Successful brands must understand and meet the needs of both shoppers and consumers. Knowing where and how they shop will dictate your sales force structure and capabilities. Understanding shopper behavior helps define the "Perfect Store."

The Perfect Store is where optimal execution at the point of purchase meets shoppers’ needs. This involves the right product assortment, placement, pricing, promotion, and communication across the path to purchase.

In today’s crowded market where there is a proliferation of product options and merchandising collateral, shoppers often struggle to find products that best meet their needs. Effective execution of the perfect store guides them towards your products. For example, a “hot-spot” is hand level for the range targeted towards adults, while it would be much lower for those targeted towards children where the visibility generates “pester power” and influences purchasing decisions of their parents when they tag along in the shopping mission.

This concept applies online as well. Creating a Perfect Online Store involves optimizing product assortment, pricing, promotions, content, ratings/reviews, and search visibility.

Executing the Perfect Store

To consistently deliver the Perfect Store experience requires building the right capabilities to execute the necessary activities with the right frequency in target channels.

Modern trade requires a strategic approach, benefiting from joint planning processes that consider availability, customized promotions, and planograms aimed at attracting more shoppers and growing the category. Companies often service these key customers through their own sales force, supported by operations teams that ensure top-to-top agreements are fully implemented, on time at the store level. This includes core activities of availability and visibility and cycle activities like promotions and new product launches.

Traditional trade, on the other hand, is more fragmented and transactional. While the sales skill set required is more fundamental, you need a massive distribution network utilizing distributors and wholesalers. Distributors are generally better at executing the principal’s strategy, optimizing your network requires several factors: establishing a sell-out focused distributor network, where the principal has visibility of and measures what is executed in each of the distributor’s customers; investing in internal and distributor capabilities, in most cases this requires training programs and measuring distributor’s functional capabilities (e.g. logistics, selling); and building long-term, mutually sustainable and profitable partnerships.

To penetrate the market further, complement distributors with wholesalers. Historically, wholesalers relied on brand pull to drive distribution. However, some companies have successfully partnered with wholesalers, appointing them as lead stores in a specific geography. Sari-sari stores in their proximity get their "last mile" requirements fulfilled with the aid of smartphone apps. This provides the principal with visibility on indirect sales and leverages the data to further influence the wholesaler and the behavior of their "sukis” towards the perfect store guidelines. Some companies have taken it a step further by providing free training in basic business management skills such as stock control and accounting, strengthening customer loyalty in the process.

Importance of point of purchase to an FMCG

To demonstrate how crucial it is to have a perfect store, during a recent brand positioning and consumer communication engagement with a client in the FMCG industry, we rigorously analyzed the business's key drivers, issues, and opportunities as part of our discovery process. In checking the drivers impacting sales performance, we uncovered gaps in translating brand strategies into effective channel and customer plans. The execution at the point of purchase didn't fully meet consumer and shopper needs. Despite these insights being outside the initial project scope, we highlighted them to the client who immediately recognized the necessity for an end-to-end approach and solution.

To recap, here are the main principles you need to remember:

Know Your Shopper. Success hinges on understanding not just the consumer, but the shopper's behavior and needs. This insight will inform how you structure your sales force and define your Perfect Store.

Perfect Store Execution. Optimize product assortment, placement, pricing, promotion and communication to create a seamless shopping experience that meets shoppers' needs. This concept applies both in physical stores and online.

Tailored Strategies for Different Trade Channels. Modern trade requires strategic planning and collaboration, while traditional trade demands a broad distribution network and strong partnerships with distributors and wholesalers.

Simply focusing on generating sales may give you profits today, but having an RTM strategy that consistently delivers excellent Perfect Store execution at the point of purchase ensures long-term business success.

Commercial leaders — like football coaches — must be brilliant strategists and people managers

Thu, 15 Aug 2024 05:48:12 GMT

What does it mean to be an effective commercial leader and how important is the role for a company? There are lessons in the sport that has come to be known as the beautiful game.

I have been an avid fan of football for many years — the beautiful game that is loved across the world and has started to grow in popularity in the Philippines over the last decade or so. It is a game of skill and tactics played by two teams, each with 11 talented individuals and organized by a manager, the head coach, into a cohesive well-organized squad.

As I watch how top performing football clubs achieve consistent success throughout the years, I see that it has generally been due to the influence of a top manager leading the club. It is that leader who mainly spells the difference between success and failure. Even the most talented football clubs failed to achieve success because their managers were unable to make the most of the collective talent. Football is a sport where the outcome is often dictated by the weakest link in the team, unlike other sports where success is driven by stars and top-performers. Top managers raise the collective floor of their teams by making sure the weakest links are rarely exposed.

And much like in football, strong commercial leaders are the key to delivering consistent high performance in a company.

Top leaders, whether in football or business, are able to set clear and appropriate strategies that can maximize their team’s performance, ensure that the right players are placed in the right roles to execute their game plan, and develop the organization to ensure they have enough talent from among the youth group to the experienced stars.

Strategy and Planning

Good managers often have a general approach to the way they believe football should be played — and oftentimes use these tried and tested footballing ideas to guide the way they prepare their teams for the next game.

In a perfect world, these strategies will work well often. But what sets a top manager from the other good ones is their ability to also take into account the players at their disposal in the face of the tactics and players of their opposition. Assessing the state of both teams prior to their game and building a strategy to match that takes a lot of time, effort and understanding of the game.

In business, this is also very true. Strong commercial leaders are able to assess the landscape both inside and outside their organization and provide a clear direction for them on how to move forward. In an ever-changing business landscape, it is important for leaders to be able to show flexibility in their strategic planning and adapt to where the market forces are taking their respective industries.

RIGHT PEOPLE, RIGHT ROLES

While most football teams have over 20 players available for selection on a given playing day, it often falls on the manager to pick his 11 players who will be the starting lineup. They are the 11 players who will have to execute the game plan they have been practicing for days. Managers assess who has the right skill set, temperament and form to be at their best come the big game. Picking the wrong players often leads to poor execution in the field — and that spells doom for the team. They know their players’ strengths and weakness and are able to maximize the team by placing them where they will excel.

Strong commercial leaders have a similar challenge in their organizations. It is their job to make sure their team members are in the right position to execute well. Putting an employee in the wrong task or role often leads to poor execution and poor performance. No employee is the same, and neither are the tasks in an organization. You have to put your team members in a position to succeed so they can make your entire organization shine. And the top leaders are able to push and execute their strategies by finding the right people to take the company forward.

TRAINING

More than being good strategists and people-managers, the best managers in football are also the ones who are able to teach and develop players. While some clubs are able to buy ready-made superstars left and right, the majority of teams have limited resources — and therefore the only way to raise the ceiling of their team is to develop and train their current players.

Some of the best managers in sport are able to teach not just the skills and tactics a player needs, but also the approach and way of thinking to excel in the way their team likes to play.

In high performing companies, top leaders are also good mentors and coaches to their people. They are able to take the diamonds in the rough and make them shine by providing critical feedback and opportunities to hone their skills throughout their career. Most companies do not have unlimited resources — and therefore it is important to raise the floor of their organization when they can and with the manpower they have.

Whether it be in football or in business, it’s clear that what sets strong, successful organizations apart from the rest is their ability to have extremely strong top tacticians — the coach/manager or commercial leader — who can drive an organization to the next level. They provide a platform for success by ensuring that they have the right people across the organization executing the right plan.

By Timothy Go

Defining your company’s Purpose

Tue, 13 Aug 2024 05:58:57 GMT

A clear and compelling Purpose will attract customers to your products and services, and equally important, it will align and inspire your people to work collaboratively towards serving the Purpose of the business.

If your brand is positioned for everyone then your brand is positioned for no one.

A clear example of this concept is in the contrasting strategies of Apple and Android mobile devices. Apple is developed for customers who want a seamless user experience. Apple achieves this by developing both their own hardware and software and implementing stringent approvals into every app that is on the Apple App Store. In contrast, Android is software owned by Google and is free to use by any mobile device manufacturer. Google allows apps to be offered on Google’s Play Store without review. Android devices are not as seamless as Apple devices in user experience but provide great flexibility to their customers.

Both are very successful companies playing in the saturated market of mobile devices; however, both have made very unique and deliberate strategic decisions that appeal to very specific target customers rather than attempting to own the entire market.

So how does a business take the first step to determine its unique strategic decisions? It starts by defining its Purpose. It must answer the pivotal question: WHY does it exist beyond profitability?

Simon Sinek, bestselling leadership author once said, “People don’t buy what you do, people buy WHY you do it.” He continues by saying when a business is able to clearly articulate a powerful purpose, it speaks “directly to the part of the brain that controls behavior.”

This is why every Corporate Strategy engagement of Acumen begins with assisting businesses to clearly define the unique Purpose of their business. The more powerful the articulation of the Purpose of a business, the higher the chance it has to drive customer behavior to purchase their products and services. Equally important, a powerful purpose inspires and aligns employees of the business to get up every day and work collaboratively to achieve that purpose, as well as attract the specific talent who are driven and have the ability to help the business achieve its purpose.

Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak founded Apple in 1976 with the following Purpose: “Apple is dedicated to the empowerment of man — to making personal computing accessible to each and every individual so as to help change the way we think, work, learn, and communicate.” This drove several strategic decisions, including pricing. The first Apple computer, the Apple 1, was sold for $667 compared to an IBM 511 Portable Computer which was selling for $8,975. Although Apple’s Purpose has taken different forms, it’s essence has not changed. It was the beginning of Apple’s legacy of being “dedicated to the empowerment of man” and changing “the way we think, work, learn and communicate” for almost half a century. It is the same Purpose that has made Apple one of the most financially successful businesses in our lifetime.

Last year, I was part of a team of Acumen Strategy Consultants that facilitated the development of a strategic plan for a 3rd player in an industry with a highly saturated market. We started, as we always do, by facilitating a discussion on and definition of the Purpose of the business among its key stakeholders.

“Some leaders are tempted to skip this step because they find talking about these topics too fuzzy, too subjective, maybe even too emotional," says Zinnia Rivera, former President of Johnson and Johnson Philippines Inc. and Red Ribbon Bakeshop Inc. and currently a fellow Client Director at Acumen Strategy Consultants. “They prefer to get on with the hard stuff… But where and how you want to play and win in your industry greatly depends on where you want to go,” she adds.

Prioritizing the definition of an organization’s Purpose ensures that the resulting strategies and plans are anchored on a clear destination. This ensures delivery of a more compelling, meaningful, and comprehensive strategic plan that inspires sustained support from the organization and loyalty from its customers.

Acumen walks the talk: Growing professionally in a nurturing work space

Fri, 09 Aug 2024 06:06:28 GMT

One of Acumen’s associates writes about his experience working with senior consultants — and what he has learned so far.

“When praying for a job, also pray for a work environment that won’t lead to a depression, burnout, and regret.” — Gary Travis

This quote resonates with me because in one of my previous jobs, there was so much toxicity that I did not realize how bad it was until after I left.

I vividly remember the sense of relief I felt after starting my new role at Acumen Strategy Consulting, Inc. Little did I know that I would be instantly recharged mentally and valued by my new colleagues, especially the senior ones.

Your colleagues, especially the senior ones, play a big role in your work life. If the higher ups are hard to deal with — then working together can be twice as tough. You could become irritable, get burned out, feel unwell physically, and much more. In contrast, I am pleased to say that my experience with senior consultants at Acumen is vastly different.

One of the primary advantages of working with senior consultants of Acumen is learning from their extensive experience and expertise. These consultants have worked in various fields and have acquired in-depth knowledge of various subject matters. Their expertise allows them to provide valuable insights and recommendations that can drive the success of our projects.

The senior consultants at Acumen are not only knowledgeable and experienced in their fields but also genuinely care about the project team members. They foster a collaborative and inclusive work environment where everyone's opinions and contributions are valued. The support and guidance they provide have not only helped me grow professionally but also improved my overall well-being. The mutual respect and trust that exists within this team have created a positive and productive work culture.

Aside from what I have mentioned above, what makes the senior consultants of Acumen stand out?

1. THEY BELIEVE IN YOU — they show confidence in the skills you have. Being a project manager means I have to manage, lead, and brief them. Even though our skills and expertise are very far from each other when it comes to the subject matter being taught, they still believe in my project management skills and the strategies I have in place. They will listen. They trust us that our project plan and strategies will achieve good results.

2. THEY GIVE HONEST FEEDBACK — I would say that Acumen’s senior consultants really care for the company, its manpower, and for the clients. They are so much invested in your personal and career growth that they will carve out time to give you honest and constructive feedback professionally, on time, and in the nicest way possible. Because of this, I don’t feel backstabbed or betrayed. Thanks to their feedback, I am constantly growing in the career path I’ve chosen.

3. THEY ADMIT WHEN THEY WERE WRONG — This might be one of the best traits that our senior consultants have. They have the integrity and humility to admit whenever they have made wrong decisions or overlooked something. They will do their best to make up for those mistakes even if it means going the extra mile.

4. THEY LISTEN WITH EMPATHY — Listening with empathy involves more than just hearing the words spoken by others. It requires a conscious effort to put oneself in someone else's shoes, understanding their perspectives, and demonstrating genuine compassion and concern. The Acumen senior consultants excel in this skill, forming strong relationships with internal and external stakeholders. Their commitment to understanding and connecting with others is truly remarkable.

5. THEY RESPECT PERSONAL LIVES – With Holistic Wellness being one of the core values of Acumen, the Acumen senior consultants embody this. They would really encourage you to spend your vacation leave work-free. Once they know you are on holiday, they will make sure they will not bother you and they will let you enjoy your well-deserved vacation! Same thing when they know you are on sick leave, you will receive messages and prayers for your recovery. Aside from these, Acumen senior consultants treat you as a friend. They will listen when you start sharing about your personal life. They will not interfere and meddle in your personal life, but they will give advice based on their personal experience because at the end of the day, all they want is for you to feel better and to calm your mind.

Overall, working with senior consultants of Acumen can be a valuable opportunity to enhance your skills and expand your knowledge base. Their expertise, problem-solving abilities, strategic thinking, leadership qualities, and effective communication and collaboration skills make them an invaluable asset to any organization. By collaborating with these consultants, I have gained and continue to learn valuable insights, overcome challenges, and achieve project success.

In the same way, partnering with Acumen for your company’s Capability Building programs means gaining access to a network of like-minded individuals who are passionate about driving positive change. We offer a supportive and collaborative space where, together, we’ll identify your specific needs and goals, and provide personalized guidance to help you achieve sustainable growth.

By R J Rasalan

Training Worth Your Time: Bespoke Programs with Actionable Applications

Wed, 07 Aug 2024 06:16:27 GMT

At Acumen, we’re changing the game with training sessions grounded in your day-to-day work realities. By diving deep into the needs of both management and participants, we create programs that are customized, actionable, and impactful. Discover how we turn training from a chore into an opportunity to boost performance and achieve real results.

"Another training session? Do I really need this? I have so much work to do!”

Sound familiar? It’s a common thought among busy professionals, especially those who've sat through countless sessions that don’t seem to connect with their day-to-day realities. As someone deeply involved in designing these programs, I totally get it. The last thing anyone wants is to sit through training that feels like a waste of time.

At Acumen, we’re all about flipping the script on traditional training. My role as program director and content manager for our capability-building materials has me laser-focused on one goal: creating training experiences that are not only engaging but also immediately applicable. Our approach is rooted in making every module relevant, value-adding, and actionable (RVA). No cookie-cutter content here – everything is tailored to fit what each client really needs.

So, how do we make sure our training hits the mark? It all starts with a comprehensive diagnostic process. From experience, we know that understanding the perspectives of both management and participants is crucial. This isn’t about ticking a box; it’s about truly digging deep to see what’s needed.

Here’s how we get the full picture:

Skill Snapshot: We dive into the team’s current work and run knowledge assessments to see where they stand. It’s like taking a snapshot of their skills and outputs, so we know exactly what needs tweaking.

In-Action Insights: We join meetings, reviews, and presentations to watch the team in action. This hands-on approach helps us understand how concepts are applied in the real world, uncovering those “aha” moments and hidden challenges.

Self-Discovery and Assessment: We ask participants to rate their own skills, giving us a window into their self-perceived strengths and weaknesses. Often, this reveals gaps that management might not even be aware of.

Stakeholder Deep Dive: We sit down with key stakeholders to understand their pain points and expectations. This helps us align our training with the strategic goals of the organization.

All this information is synthesized to design a program that’s just right for the client. Our content, activities, and outputs are all tailored to be relevant, valuable, and actionable.

Does it work? Absolutely. In fact, 97% of participants we asked in 2023 – that’s 176 out of 181 learners – rated our modules as highly relevant and applicable to their jobs. They agreed that the courses they attended were likely to help them produce better output at work. This isn’t just talk; it’s proof that our approach to training is impactful.

By focusing on what’s really needed and customizing our approach, we ensure our training isn’t just another item on the to-do list. It’s a game-changer that brings real value and practical skills participants can use right away. At Acumen, we don’t just train – we aim to elevate performance and drive success.

By Anny Oliveros

What are the most important skills to look for when hiring a brand manager?

Fri, 26 Jul 2024 07:39:32 GMT

There are 5 core traits that make a great brand manager, including a cheerful perspective that sees consumers as real people.

“It’s so difficult to hire brand managers. How do you identify good candidates at the interview stage?”

No matter how much time you, the line manager, spend crafting the right job description, explaining your organization’s goals to HR, or interviewing as many candidates as possible, there are times when you still end up with the wrong hire.

What did you miss? More importantly, were you looking for the right things? Beyond the general qualifications of a good hire — communication skills, creativity, a can-do attitude — there are things that great brand managers do particularly well that need to be proven during the hiring process.

For 20 years, Acumen Strategy Consultants have been helping enterprises identify and develop strategic-minded marketing leaders capable of consistently delivering positive results. Here’s a list of things line managers — whether new or seasoned ones — can search and probe deeper for during the next brand manager search:

1. Consumer Understanding / Insight Generation

“Brand Managers need to first and foremost understand their customers,” says Liel Gonzalez, Client Director of Acumen Strategy Consultants. “To do this they must be able to listen and uncover expressed or latent needs/pain points that the brand can potentially address.” Know your consumer so well that you know exactly what they think, feel, and do — is your candidate able to do this?

2. Analytical Skills

“Brand Managers must be able to analyze what is happening to their business, and why, to spot issues and opportunities that need to be addressed to meet their business objectives,” Liel adds. “They must be comfortable with data and able to analyze these in a logical manner.”

Tonton Mapa, Vice-President for Capability Building at Acumen Strategy Consultants, agrees: “Brand managers regularly go through lots of information and data and need to be able to draw conclusions, make connections and come up with insights. This is why good business analysis is the foundation of effective brand management.”

How comfortable is the candidate with numbers? How well does the candidate understand the industry, their real competitors, and what their brand must do to win?

3. Customer Centricity

Beyond mere empathy and more than a skill, customer centricity is a core value. Has the candidate consistently and effectively put the customer at the center of all decisions related to delivering products, services, and experiences? During interviews, ask for instances when the candidate has put the Customer first.

4. Ability to work with and through teams

“Brand managers need to work with people from different functions and parts of the company to grow their brands,” says Tonton. "So not just teamwork but team leadership is a key strength.”

Communication skills play a big part, Liel adds. “Brand Managers typically lead their business teams and coordinate with other departments and stakeholders in the company. To be effective they must be able to communicate well and achieve a common understanding and collaboration with their business team.”

5. “Optimistic Humanity”

“This last one may sound a bit strange,” Tonton admits. “But from my experience, the best brand managers are those who demonstrate what I call ‘optimistic humanity’. They relish life, are curious and positive and naturally seek to understand people and solve their problems. Whether it is about creating new products and solutions or developing new campaigns, successful brand managers are those who remember that behind the statistics, their consumers are real people with real needs, lives and loves.”

By V anessa Bicomong

Innovation is not just about fun and creativity, it must also be strategic and relevant

Fri, 26 Jul 2024 06:22:52 GMT

Almost 90% of executives believe that innovation is essential to their organization’s success. Rightly so because innovation impacts the business in many ways.

It’s interesting how innovation has been a buzzword since the Industrial Revolution yet up to now, it has not lost its ability to elicit ooohs and aaaahhhs from people. A lot of companies would have this as part of their values, mission, and thrust as it is normally a cue for growth and modernization.

Despite the familiarity and ubiquity of the term, a number of Acumen’s clients still admit that this remains to be an area they need help in understanding, building capability for, and imbibing in their company culture.

Now before you dismiss this as just another Innovation article that talks about creativity, ideation, open-mindedness, looking at things in a new way, or, everyone’s favorite nowadays – AI, let me assure you that what will be taken up here are not JUST the usual and the givens, rather, I will talk about how innovation can be made relevant, strategic, and inspiring.

Innovation can be understood in two ways: as a process and as an outcome. In my Innovation and Design class at the University of Asia and the Pacific, I define innovation as both a process and an outcome — it is the development and introduction of new ideas, methods, technologies that give birth to new products, services, processes, user experience, and channels or touch points.

Almost 90% of executives believe that innovation is essential to their organization’s success. Rightly so because innovation impacts the business in many ways:

It creates new market spaces for companies, thereby adding revenue streams;
It keeps the company dynamic and relevant, which stops the target market from leaving the brands or the company’s user base;
It addresses inconveniences and barriers thereby improving the state of the category or industry;
It addresses business gaps or portfolio gaps in the company thereby improving or protecting revenue growth;
Increases frequency and usage of products; and
Breakthrough innovations change the dynamics of the category and enhances customer experience, resulting to heightened customer satisfaction and happiness.

Why would one then choose to be static and de-prioritize innovation?

The answer: Inertia and fear of failure.

By Chelet Tanjuatco

Some who played it safe

We see a lot of businesses fail because of the lack of appreciation for innovation. While these companies perhaps think that they are saving their companies from disaster by playing it safe, we have seen a number of examples of this that have made the rounds of business publications and university case studies.

Kodak: Kodak was the global market leader in pictures or film photography for most of the 20th century, reaching its peak in the early ‘80s. By mid-‘80s, Kodak was starting to feel the threatening presence of their competitors who started introducing new technologies. Its story was a classic tale of being too attached to or too in love with its current strength and brand identity – which at that time was FILM. In 1975, Kodak engineer Steve Sasson developed a digital camera prototype for the company but management was too scared to launch it for fear of losing shares from film to this digital product. But the digital products of competitors such as Sony were exactly what hastened Kodak’s downfall.

Blackberry: There was a time in the corporate world when Blackberry was THE issued phone of multinational companies. Most of the executives (myself included!) lived with their Blackberry phones buzzing relentlessly as they stayed connected with both work and friends 24/7! This was the start of work encroaching even on personal time such as weekends, as it was so easy to send instant messages and view and answer email messages anytime, anywhere. But Blackberry basically ignored the touch screen technology of Apple when it gained popularity in 2007, perhaps thinking that it was just a consumer trend that would not threaten their stronghold among enterprises and business executives. Theirs was a story of complacency. By the time they took the threat seriously, the iPhone was way ahead and they were struggling to launch touchscreen devices. They came up with the BlackBerry Strom and BlackBerry 10, but both were not successful in chipping off some shares from Apple and Android-powered touchscreen phones.

Toys R Us: Toys R Us used to be these giant stores where kids and parents can spend a lot of time looking for that perfect prize, gift, or treat! Mention Toys R Us to an ‘80s kid and their eyes would surely light up. It was almost like Disneyland! I think you will agree that nowadays, it does not have the same ubiquity and effect on kids and kids-at-heart anymore. While we still have some stores around here in the Philippines, it has scaled down in size and most stores in western countries have closed down. Theirs is a story of the inability to understand the changes in consumer behavior and user experience. Children of the new millennium are both big on in-store user experience and of course the digital option of availing the products. For brands that choose to keep their brick and mortar, in-store experience is crucial. Retail shops such as those of tech firms like Apple or sports stores like Decathlon have been redesigned – providing comfortable couches, browsing areas, or wide spaces for testing out the merchandise to raise the level of customer experience.

Toys R Us, on the other hand, continued on with the traditional way of merchandising and stocking of inventory. They could have taken inspiration from the Apple stores and allow the customers to test and play with the gadgets. Decathlon allows their customers to ride the bikes, jump on the trampolines, test out scooters, right inside the store.

Children were also shifting from actual toys to digital games. This does not necessarily mean ditching the actual or physical toys but rather just adding a digital interaction to it. Some toy brands, like Build-A-Bear adapted by incorporating a digital factor to it – consumers can customize online and purchase in-store or the physical toy has a virtual life online – you can feed it online, create a house for, and other simulations of real life activities.

Toys R Us did not innovate and continued to simply be a “warehouse” of toys and has actually filed for bankruptcy in 2017.

Core Principles

A lot of books and articles on innovation would be around the areas of creativity, ideation, and AI or digital technology. These are tools and executions but not the end all and be all of innovation. While these are certainly part of Innovation, and the “fun” side of it, I want to highlight STRATEGY and IN-DEPTH CUSTOMER UNDERSTANDING or INSIGHTING as important factors, especially among businesses who are focused on making their innovations count.

Our consultants in Acumen have launched new products / innovations across different categories, industries, and multinational and local brands. We have gone through different terms and processes in innovation – from the traditional ones like Six Sigma or Total Quality Management, which focused on innovating to solve a problem, to Stage Gate Model and Blue Ocean Strategy which were focused on expanding and creating spaces and then Design Thinking and Open innovation which are more customer centered and more collaborative in nature. These barrage of terms need not overwhelm you. There is a way to demystify Innovation and these terms. There are core principles that are shared by all of these models, which have withstood the evolution of terms and visual frameworks.

In all of these frameworks, these are the common core principles:

1. Clear business objectives and goals: Is it to grow the business by x%? Gain market share by x pp? Enter a new category or segment? Increase penetration or frequency?

2. Consumer Understanding: Who do we want to target? Who do we want to talk to and use our products / services? An in-depth description of their behavior, life stage, pain points, daily experiences, dreams, goals, and frustrations is indispensable. This will provide insights as to what possible spaces in their lives our innovation or brand can occupy.

3. Market and Parallel Market Scoping and Understanding: Reviewing the market performance and movement is one of the things that companies should always do to spot shifts, trends, and anticipate shifts and trends. It is important to strike a good balance of being ahead of the market and being relevant. Sometimes, some innovations came in too early and the market was not ready for it.

4. Defining the Innovation Purpose: This is the why or essence behind a company’s innovation purpose. It goes deeper than marketing or objectives of share gain, tapping new segments, or increasing frequency. It is closely linked to values of the company.

For a nutrition company, for example, the innovation purpose is to be the safe and assuring wellness partner of consumers by always providing them with easy, convenient, accessible health and wellness products, updated with the latest and safest technology. Or for a coffee brand, to be the brand that is known to delight their consumers with offerings and accessibility, thereby having the highest affinity among them. Or for a bank, it might be about being the one who leads changes in creating the best customer experience.

The innovation purpose serves as both our anchor and north star for innovation. It may be the same as the Brand Essence or a version of it. With an innovation purpose, even “blue sky” innovations are grounded on something that is consistent with the brand strategy and identity.

5. Ideation: No innovation process is without ideation. The ideation or brainstorming sessions are when we let our creativity and imagination run wild with ideas, guided by the items mentioned above: Business objectives and goals, Deep Consumer Understanding, Market Understanding, and the Innovation Purpose. It is important to have good facilitators for Ideation Sessions who can make sure ideas churned out are Fresh, Relevant, Ownable by the brand, Strategic, and has a potential to be sizeable or to gain traction right away.

6. Testing/validation: This step or principle assuages any fears of failure. This gives the companies an idea of how much of a winning concept the new idea is. It is a process of finding answers to several key questions — “What do our consumers think about it? What are the strengths and weaknesses of the concept? What is the purchase intent score of the concept tested among the target market? Do our consumers or target market believe that we our brand can deliver the promise of the concept? Is it unique? Is it fresh? These are sample questions that when answered with a positive response can give us the confidence to launch our concept.

Innovation is fundamentally about having the confidence to lead and effect change, but it should not be done blindly nor instinctively. Companies must take strategic steps to ensure that their approach to innovation will lead to favorable business results and sustainable growth.

Purposeful Cultivation

Wed, 17 Jul 2024 08:17:58 GMT

Much like tending a garden, effective training programs must fertilize potential and nurture talent that may have been lying dormant.

One of the amusing offshoots of the coronavirus pandemic is the exponential spike in plant fascination. Suddenly, everyone was a gardener or a farmer. And with the abundance of plant varieties available, it has become easy to just select and collect and collect.

But I’m sure many, including myself, learned a painful lesson — cultivating plants should be planned and organized. Otherwise, you end up with beautiful and sometimes expensive specimens that are dried, damaged, or worst of all, dead.

In Learning and Development, we face a similar situation. Organizations have recognized the impact of training on their employees and companies. And it’s easy to get sidetracked by the amount of choices out there. Sometimes the tendency is to pursue the trendiest programs at the lowest price. The caveat here is that Training Programs, if not intentional become chaotic, and unproductive and even leave organizations worse off from where they were before.

So how do we select the Learning solutions that will cultivate success?

The key is to customize. Capability building should be tailor fit to an organization’s target employees, setting, and goals.

A thorough assessment should first be done to understand existing skills, identify performance gaps, and define desired capabilities. This will lead to program design that will not only focus on content delivery but also foster the ideal conditions for learning such as business application examples, collaboration,  mentorship opportunities, and recognition.

Once the main sessions are done, learning should be maintained by having regular conversations and reviews of the skills acquired, applied, and evaluated. Essentially, it’s finding the right mix that will fertilize potential and nurture talent that may have been lying dormant.

The objective of plant cultivation is to have a healthy garden that bears lovely flowers or productive crops. Just as gardeners enjoy the fruits of their labor, organizations reap the benefits of a well-developed workforce.

Skilled and capable employees are more productive, motivated, and better suited to deal with the challenges at hand. This translates to competition, innovation, and ultimately, success of the organization in the business arena.

By F rances Fuentes-Acosta

Creating a vibrant, values-driven company culture

Wed, 10 Jul 2024 08:20:56 GMT

How do you bring an organization’s values to life in day-to-day operations? It’s a transformative process that requires commitment and strategic effort.

I was a green Learning and OD specialist many moons ago and my manager then would always quote Peter Drucker: “Culture eats Strategy for breakfast.” And that has stuck with me all throughout my career as a change agent and proponent for People development.

It emphasizes that you could have the best of plans, equipment, software, marketing campaigns, and still lose the game to the company who deliberately shapes and strengthens their culture.

Organization Culture is the set of values, beliefs, norms, and unwritten rules shared, fostered by the team that guides how they feel, think, and behave. It emerges from the moments that are celebrated to how mistakes are handled. It is borne out of who we allow in the team and the “worst” behaviors we “tolerate” and allow to stay. It is the palpable energy that one senses when they are new to the organization.

But what happens when the culture is “broken” or “toxic”? When the Values — or what we deem important do not line with the behaviors that we see?

A company can have Teamwork and Collaboration as a value, but still allow gossip, backbiting, and politicking to prevail. Another example could be saying Innovation is important but not creating the safe space to experiment, make mistakes, and iterate.

In Acumen, we aim to help our clients align their Values and their behaviors, believing that this is one of the ingredients to a high performing team.

Behavior is how one conducts oneself in response to an action, a stimulus, an environment. It is something we can observe, see, hear, and measure. Because it is observable and measurable, feedback can be factual, improvement tracked, and progress rewarded — in a fair, timely manner. In today's competitive business landscape, values are more than just words on a wall. They are the lifeblood of an organization's culture and the driving force behind its success.

But how do you bring these values to life in day-to-day operations?

Here's a step-by-step guide to infusing your values into every aspect of your organization, ensuring they are lived and breathed by every employee.

Defining Purpose and Ambition

The journey begins with defining your organization's purpose and ambition. These elements provide a clear direction and framework for identifying what you truly value. Purpose is the reason your organization exists, while ambition is what you strive to achieve. Together, they set the stage for meaningful value identification.

Identifying Core Values

Next, engage stakeholders at all levels to uncover your core values. What principles are non-negotiable? What beliefs guide your decisions and actions? Involving a diverse group ensures that the identified values resonate across the organization. This collaborative approach not only enriches the value identification process but also fosters a sense of ownership and commitment.

Translating Values into Behaviors

Once you've identified your core values, the next step is to translate them into specific, observable behaviors. Again, these behaviors should be actions that can be seen, felt, touched, heard, and measured. For instance, if one of your values is "integrity," an associated behavior could be "always delivering on promises." Clearly defining these behaviors helps employees understand what is expected of them and how they can embody the organization's values in their daily work.

Integrating Values into the Employee Experience

Bringing values to life requires embedding them into every stage of the employee experience. From employer branding and talent attraction to onboarding and training, values should be a constant thread. During the hiring process, communicate your values clearly to attract like-minded candidates. In onboarding, emphasize how these values shape the organization's culture and expectations.

Performance Management and Feedback

Values should also be integral to your performance management system. Incorporate value-based criteria into performance reviews to reinforce their importance. Train managers to provide feedback that highlights how employees' actions align with the organization's values. This not only promotes consistent behavior but also helps employees see the tangible impact of living the values.

Recognition and Reward Systems

Effective recognition and reward systems are key to reinforcing value-driven behaviors. Design programs that celebrate and reward employees who exemplify the organization's values. For example, if "collaboration" is a core value, recognize teams that achieve outstanding results through teamwork. By linking rewards to values, you encourage employees to internalize and prioritize these behaviors.

Measuring Impact

To assess the effectiveness of your efforts, establish metrics and key performance indicators (KPIs) that measure how well values are being integrated and lived. This could include employee engagement scores, retention rates, and customer satisfaction levels. Supporting these metrics with qualitative data, such as employee testimonials and case studies, provides a comprehensive view of your progress.

Bringing values to life in day-to-day operations is a transformative process that requires commitment and strategic effort. By defining your purpose and ambition, identifying core values, translating them into behaviors, and integrating them into every aspect of the employee experience, you create a vibrant, values-driven culture.

The benefits are clear: increased engagement, innovation, and retention.

At Acumen, we specialize in guiding organizations through this journey.

My experience in Organization Transformation

Thu, 04 Jul 2024 08:44:36 GMT

The term Organization Transformation was still very much alien to me when I was relatively new in the HR profession. I didn’t even realize that it was basically what I was doing when I first started getting involved in the various stages of what I know now as something transformative.

I recall as Learning and Devt Manager then as Head, then as Sr. HRBP, I participated in several divestments, mergers and acquisitions in my previous Company (one of the largest multinational companies in the world). There were factory closures, new factories being built, divesting an entire business unit, acquisition of a new business, changing the business model, setting up and closure of a regional office, and so on.

I was lucky enough to be part of an organization where the key leaders appreciate the fact that every business topic will always have a people aspect. As such, the role of HR is pivotal in all these business changes. And my key role was to look into the impact of these changes to people, organization and culture.

As in a change initiative, there will always be resistance, hence a lot of effort was placed in getting the buy-in of those being affected by change – whether the impact of the change is positive or negative for them. What I learned from my CEO was to relentlessly “communicate, communicate, communicate” the what, why and how of the change. He personally spent much of his time doing regular townhall sessions, and going around the factories and the different business units to explain the change. My role was to prepare a comprehensive communication plan that maps out the detailed strategy on how to ensure that key stakeholders and the rest of the employees are buying into the change, equipped with the correct and updated information, and properly trained if a new skill or competency is involved. More importantly, they are reassured that they are properly supported at any stage during the entire change process.

In all these, there is one learning that stuck with me up to now; In making an effort for change what needs to be highlighted especially for those identified to be resistors, is to focus on what they stand to lose if the change will not happen. In the sense that “The psychological pain of losing is greater than the pleasure of gaining something” (source unidentified). This is a stronger motivational pull than simply emphasizing the benefits of change.

Consumer knowledge is the bedrock of strong brands

Thu, 04 Jul 2024 08:27:00 GMT

An FMCG company’s marketing team undergoes consumer immersion through Acumen’s Consumer Centricity and Insight Mining program.

Brands often lose their way when they forget that the very reason they exist is to meet the needs of their consumers. After all, with no consumers, there can be no brand. That is why consumer centricity needs to be at the forefront of every brand manager’s skill set.

Let’s tackle first the question: What is the difference between a brand and a product?

A product is tangible with features, functions and specifications. On the other hand, a brand has an intangible magic: Embedded in a brand is a story, an experience, a memory and emotions that make people choose one over the other. The essence of a brand is not what the product is, but rather, how the brand makes them feel.

Assuming you are consumers of the following categories, I am sure if I ask you to think about what your favorites are, you will immediately have a very specific brand in mind: What is your favorite: (1) sneakers/athletic shoes; (2) coffee; (3) mobile phone; (4) cold beverage; (5) burger joint?

FMCG (fast-moving consumer goods) is dynamic, competitive and ever-changing. One of Acumen’s FMCG clients in the food space recognized the need to build strong brands and ensure relevance among consumers. They asked Acumen to upskill their marketing team on Consumer Centricity and Insight Mining — specifically how to create a consumer profile, conduct actual in-depth interviews with consumers and to create a complete concept statement, including an insight, a benefit, a reason to believe and marketing mix elements.

We started out by asking the participants to identify a marketing task.

A marketing task is the “Get WHO (who is your target) to do WHAT” (desired change in behavior that expresses a conversion in consumer action) in order to satisfy a particular business and marketing objective. A business objective could be to “gain 5% market share” and the corresponding marketing objective could be “acquire new users to the category and/or brand.” The marketing task for such objectives could be “get young moms aged 25 – 35 to cook with ingredient x at least once a week.”

Once we have the marketing tasks defined, the next step is to profile and understand that consumer. To do this, we asked the participants to profile their consumers in 4 areas:

Person – which includes demographic information such as age, gender and personality;

Personal context – which includes family ( for example: if target is a mom, does she have kids? How old are they?), school, work or peers;

Macro environment – this is similar to the PESTLE model, where we look at external or uncontrollable factors, like inflation, political environment or technological advances that will have an influence in purchase behavior; and

Category usage – This comprises their current relationship with the category, including the attributes they are looking for when using the products in the category, how they make decisions on what to buy, what products they are using now to solve their need (if its not our brand), and an initial hypothesis of the barriers that are stopping them from using our brand (Awareness? Price? Availability? Relevance?)

Once they created robust consumer profiles, we then asked our participants to determine what questions they have for when they go out for consumer immersion. These immersions took place in the form of one-on-one in-depth interviews. We provided the participants with a sample questionnaire, and we asked them to tailor it, taking into consideration (1) the knowledge gaps from the data they already have; and (2) add questions that relate to their marketing task.

We emphasized that the point of the consumer immersion is not to come up with ideas or to “sell” an idea that they might already have to solve the marketing task, but rather, it is to mine deeper insights, by understanding the consumer pain points and needs.

Post-consumer immersion, we took the participants through the Acumen 6-Step Insight Generator to come up with a consumer insight.

We emphasized the difference between observations and insights. Observations tend to be descriptive and state facts or what is seen, they are surface level, data-driven and focus on behaviors. Insights, on the other hand, provide an explanation for the observable behavior, offers a deeper understanding of consumer behavior that can lead to strategic implications or actions for the brand and they reveal motivations, attitudes or beliefs that drive consumer behavior.

We provided them feedback on the insights they wrote based on the following questions:

Is the insight fresh and surprising?

Is it based on not just an observable behavior, but something deeper?

Does it answer the “why?” and not just the “what?”

Is it based on a real consumer need and can the brand realistically deliver on that need?

Will it address the marketing task?

We also took them through a framework for identifying how to address the insight through a benefit statement — including both functional (what the product does) and emotional benefits (how it makes them feel) of the brand, a reason to believe (how the brand can deliver the benefit promised) and finally, the solutions, which are areas of the marketing mix they can pull to remove the benefit barriers and achieve the marketing task.

After the course, we took a post-test and compared it to the pre-test, which tested their knowledge and we saw a delta of +22% across 2 classes. Moreover, as faculty, I was happy that they rated the class 3.8 out of 4.0 in terms of the usefulness of what they learned and 3.9 on the faculty providing a safe learning space in the session.

Brands, whether in FMCG or other industries, can remain relevant and strong, we just need to ensure that brand managers always keep consumers at the forefront of all that they do, and connect with them at a deeper level through a robust and methodical consumer insighting process.

Acumen’s customer centricity and insight mining course provides them with the skills to be able to do this and I get excited when I see their communications do just that!

By Cherry Tantoco-Daniels

Where to Play and Portfolio Analysis: A blend of structure, data, and individual values

Thu, 27 Jun 2024 08:49:34 GMT

It allows for a comprehensive and balanced view of the future portfolio choices. The process systematizes what seemingly are “gut decisions” from management.

Every business wants to plan for record growth, but there’s always the tug-of-war between to what end and at what expense?

At the end of the day, however complicated it sounds, the planning and decision-making process revolves around answering two main questions — “Gusto ba natin?” and “Kaya ba natin?”

I find that it’s typically a hard conversation to ground given that: a) as much as we want to, nobody can predict the future; and b) like it or not, it involves feelings.

It’s simple in concept but in the final analysis, a company does not exist without people. And every person in the management committee has a different context and definition to answer the questions “Gusto ba natin?” and “Kaya ba natin?”

It almost ALWAYS involves deeply ingrained principles and values that drive individual personalities. Anytime that a discussion touches remotely on individual values and context, it will be a hard conversation. Emotions will always get involved.

What I find incredibly useful with the Where to Play process developed by Acumen is that it unapologetically takes into consideration the HUMAN aspect of management decisions.

The framework provides a structured approach to evaluating various opportunities starting with the creation of a customized criteria. The criteria should reflect: a) the company’s purpose, ambitions and values; and b) an amalgamation of the beliefs and values of the individuals running the company.

With consensus-building as an integral part of the process, it provides a venue to “speak now or forever hold your peace”. It allows for a comprehensive and balanced view of the future portfolio choices. The process systematizes what seemingly are “gut decisions” from management.

It is also an inclusive process that involves more than just the management committee (mancom). Cross-functional working teams are pulled in to help populate the data based on the criteria. I have worked on several projects and what I find interesting is that sharing the criteria provides the lower levels with additional insight to how the mancom thinks, enabling the teams to better predict what their bosses are looking for even well after the planning process.

The process encourages transparent communication and collaboration. It gets people to talk and listen, to effectively communicate in a safe manner since there is a framework and structure. And because it is collaborative, while consensus-building is a tall order, in the end, it results in higher buy-in.

The model is adaptable, iterative and flexible. There is no one-size fits all model that applies to all companies. It does not assume that truths in one industry apply to another industry. It can be updated to reflect changing market conditions, new information or shifts in strategic priorities.

The resulting portfolio assessment against the criteria provides for a systematic, data-based and more objective decision-making. While the tools serve as a guide, it is still up to management to decide on what to do with the opportunity.

I’ve seen mancoms prioritize the opportunities at their face value scores, but I’ve also seen mancoms still push to pursue lower-scored opportunities for their strategic value, with eyes wide open on the risks and the investment required to win in these opportunities.

In the end, harmonizing rational decision-making with human values fosters open dialogue and collaboration. This approach turns complex choices into more strategic actions, ensuring every voice is heard and aligned with the company's ambitions. This path paves the way for a more confident, unified growth.

By Trina Dumdumaya

Cooking up a Marketing Strategy

Mon, 24 Jun 2024 08:52:26 GMT

Different restaurants may serve up the same dish but the plating, accompaniments, and overall taste usually differ. Homecooked meals that are considered classic and familiar within a culture also become unique to every household — and it’s not unusual that families claim to have the best version based on secret recipes passed down for generations.

Marketing is much like cooking. It is unique to its home. It is influenced by who, how, and where we are. It's unique to what we want, what we can, and what is important to us.

So while there are basic ingredients, techniques, and tools to consider in cooking up a marketing plan for any product or service, there are several other factors to consider in ensuring a distinctive and successful campaign.

First, ask the question: What do I need?

In food, it is primarily about filling the need for nourishment, and that may be extended to indulging in a craving or simply for experiencing culinary joy. In business, marketing needs to achieve a target.

There are millions of ways to satisfy hunger as there are millions of ways to achieve a commercial target. So we look at the next question: What do I have?

When planning a meal, you must check how much money you have, what ingredients are available, what tools can be used.

Similarly in coming up with a marketing plan, you need to check your budget, who and how much talent is available, and what tools are on hand.

After those factors are determined comes the question: What can I do?

In cooking, when there is little money or limited ingredients, improvise. Adjust the recipe to what you have in order to get what you need. A slice of bread topped with ketchup and cheese could be filling enough and even satisfy a craving for pizza.

In marketing, if you cannot afford to communicate through an ad in different types of media or sign up a brand ambassador, there is always the less costly option of putting up a website and tapping different social media platforms to promote the product or service. Through this latter strategy, it is also possible to achieve targets.

Many businesses make the mistake of failing to craft their own marketing strategy, developing their own way of cooking, and making their version of a ‘homemade’ recipe.

That mistake could be because of not knowing they have to, or maybe don't want to, or perhaps don't know how to — and that could be learned, or even refreshed by those who have long been in the marketing kitchen.

In Acumen’s Marketing Excellence Program (MEP), “marketing chefs” craft a homemade recipe for and with each client’s “family” -- assessing what they need, enumerating what they have, and strategically planning what they can do based on what they have to achieve their targets. It’s a highly customized program tailored to who, how, and where the home is.

In one MEP session for a global FMCG (fast-moving consumer goods) giant, for example, even very senior brand experts were there to listen and participate.

And that is how seasoned home cooks or well-trained chefs or experienced marketers continue to excel and dish out good stuff — they don't just keep learning, they also learn from good teachers.

By Trizia Ann Magalino

Making sense of your Business Data calls for sharpened analysis skills

Wed, 19 Jun 2024 08:55:18 GMT

To make the Business Insights Academy™ training more relevant and value-adding, the participants used live business cases. That means they worked on exercises using the actual annual review of their respective operations, guided by Acumen’s seasoned faculty.

Taking stock of the company’s performance through a business review, whether annually or every few years, has always been a rather dreaded activity among corporate professionals across any industry.

That’s no surprise considering the time and effort required to gather and properly analyze data in order to unearth the critical learnings that will be used to set the direction of the company.

A business review could indeed prove to be tedious, but it is unarguably an essential exercise if a company were to remain dynamic and competitive.

The importance of a regular business evaluation has recently become more pressing, especially in the rapidly evolving financial services industry, which has been seeing exponential growth along with the rise of changing customer preferences for digital solutions that offer convenience and accessibility.

Financial institutions, for their part, have also been using digital solutions to widen financial inclusion in the Philippines.

Hence, for banking and non-bank financial institutions to stay competitive, it is important that they know which direction to take and where to invest their limited resources in. And that can be uncovered by doing a regular comprehensive and sound review of the business.

The task of evaluating the business, either for the short- or medium-term, could be made more seamless and productive with leaders and managers who have advanced business analysis skills.

Case in point, one of the CEOs of a financial company recognized the importance of setting their direction for the next five years given the volatile market environment. And he knew that a good five-year strategic plan must start with a sound and comprehensive review of the business.

Before embarking on their strategic planning session, he tapped Acumen’s Capability Building service to elevate the business analysis skills of his leadership team and their direct reports.

LIVE CASES

To make the training more relevant and value-adding, the participants used live business cases so they can demonstrate and apply what they have learned. That means the participants had to actually work on the annual review of their respective operations during the course of the training guided by Acumen’s seasoned faculty.

The Business Insights Academy™, one of the core service lines of Acumen, enables program participants through well-established modules and structured methods that are designed to enhance the ability to accurately assess business performance.

In teaching business analysis, Acumen uses proprietary tools and frameworks to help the participants analyze their businesses effectively and efficiently.

One of the frameworks used by Acumen is the BA Framework, which is developed and customized by Acumen’s faculty per client through stakeholder interviews. The use of the BA Framework, together with other proprietary analysis tools and frameworks, allows for evaluation results and insights that are operative.

To make sure that participants understand what is being taught, live business cases are used and participants present their analysis through each critical stage to the Acumen faculty, who then provide guidance on what they did well and what they can improve on. The training program itself could easily take a month or two.

Business analysis, including the development of capabilities for this data-driven task, requires team leaders who are fully invested in the activity.

Without a sound and comprehensive business review, companies run the risk of failing to define the right strategy and direction for growth.

By Benjie Jimenez

For Financial Goods and Services, more doesn’t always mean better

Wed, 29 May 2024 09:02:43 GMT

Financial industry players have been racing to offer diverse products and services, but what do consumers really need, want, and can afford?

The financial industry has grown to be a highly competitive space. Both old and new financial institutions have launched a wide variety of products to the market.

With the vast number of options, it is easy to think that there must be a perfect product for every customer profile. But is there actually a market looking to use or patronize these offerings?

Global studies have shown that the Philippines lags in terms of financial literacy. According to the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas’ (BSP) 2021 Financial Inclusion survey, only 2% of Filipinos were able to correctly answer the six basic financial literacy questions.

How can you convince someone to buy into a product or service they know nothing about?

In most cases, you can’t.

Lack of interest is driven by a lack of knowledge and while it may sound obvious, an idea this straightforward is often overlooked by highly transactional and product-focused companies looking to expand their businesses.

In the process of deciding which segment of the population would make the most sense in growing their numbers, simple questions such as “Does my customer know what I’m selling?” or “Does my product actually solve their problems?” easily fly under the radar.

Placing the customer at the center was a key imperative in developing a new market entry strategy for one of the oldest Philippine financial institutions.

DISCOVERY

For Acumen’s client projects, discovery and baselining are among the most crucial phases. For this engagement, that meant developing a deeper level of understanding not only of the business, but also of its customer base beyond what could be extracted through internal numbers and sheets.

Through structured conversations with consumers, they were able to determine a key barrier that was consistent across the subsegments of a broader market — financial education.

Stemming from the insight that Filipinos in different demographics struggle with financial literacy, Acumen identified three underlying core principles most relevant to a specific target segment. From there, the consultants came to the conclusion that it would be best to condense the product line-up into two products. These products made the most sense in the context of the segment’s true financial capacity while supporting their short- and long-term aspirations.

The assessment results allowed the brand to clearly articulate the value of their product to the new consumer segment. Further, the recommended distribution channels and market strategy positioned it in the spaces that would naturally build brand trust and credibility among potential clients.

Similarly, this process of customer profiling also allowed Acumen to provide insights for product prioritization to one of the six Philippine digital banks.

For most tech companies, creating product roadmaps and prioritizing which features must go live is often a difficult discussion. The possibilities are truly endless, but the key question lies with the consumer: Which features are actually most relevant to them?

By building a solid understanding of consumer behavior, beliefs, and sentiments, Acumen not only identified the most significant features for customers but also mapped unique use cases for each. Armed with the insights from the discovery phase, the company’s strategists were able to clarify the types of users that needed to be engaged with for product concept testing.

In the end, instead of simply providing the client with a list of winning concepts, Acumen delivered more actionable output. This included comprehensive consumer profiles, in-depth insights into why each feature resonated with the consumer, and even an Acquisition-Adoption-Advocacy funnel which mapped how to optimize each feature based on the consumer’ perceptions and motivations for use.

At a time when there appears to be unlimited choices, financial service companies need not compete in terms of the quantity of products they offer. It is more about relevance and practicality.

Meeting the customer’s needs and providing value is easier said than done. But having a fuller understanding of a customer’s pain points and motivations is the best way to transform how a company engages with the market.

From short, one-off transactions, companies can build long and meaningful relationships that give them the opportunity to offer solutions that actually translate to business growth.

Dedicating time and resources to obtaining a deep familiarity with consumers is the best investment a financial business can make because at the end of the day, how do you expect to sell products to a customer you don’t understand?

Marketing Excellence: Capturing Customer Insights and Creating a Common Language

Wed, 29 May 2024 08:59:26 GMT

Acumen’s approach starts with understanding stakeholder needs, assessing participants’ competencies, and tailoring the syllabus to the client’s brand purpose and values.

Tony, head of marketing communications for a large local bank, oversees the review and approval of briefs from various product managers, ensuring that excellence standards are maintained across the bank’s many divisions.

As such, he finds himself spending an inordinate amount of time editing these briefs to become clear and inspiring; time he cannot afford given all his other responsibilities.

Tony is not alone. The challenge he faces resonates with many marketing executives who, in informal conversations, have voiced their concerns and even frustration over the time spent developing their team’s technical skills in marketing.

Recognizing this need for skills development among their managers, the bank tapped Acumen to customize a Marketing Excellence Program that they can adopt as part of their own marketing academy.

Acumen’s approach starts with understanding stakeholder needs, assessing participants’ competencies, and tailoring the syllabus to the bank’s brand purpose and values.

Using these foundational information, the Capability Building Program was designed beyond basic brief writing to cover such areas as:

Defining business vs. marketing vs. communication objectives
Customer profiling and generating insights through research and Acumen’s proprietary 6-Step Insight Generator™
Proposition and marketing plan development
Creating a common language
Agency briefing and copy evaluation
Campaign monitoring

Participants engaged in theoretical and live case studies, leading to significant improvement in their post-test performance, particularly in developing insights and customer-centric propositions.

“Both the content and faculty allowed us to understand the framework to be better in capturing the customer insight to get the proposition statement closer to the customer’s truth. This will benefit me as a program/product owner,” said J.B., one of the program participants.

They also had a chance to actually present their briefs to the agencies working on these products. Agencies, for their part, praised the bank marketers’ ability to profile target customers and write insights in customer language.

“We learned important concepts that help us do better marketing communication plans — zeroing in on topics that marketers are usually stumped with consumer insights, the differences between business, marketing and communication objectives, how to write a good proposition statement, etc.,” said another participant, T. I.

Feedback from participants underscored the program’s effectiveness in enhancing marketing communication skills, with commendations for its relevance, educational value, and practical application to their roles.

“The syllabus was good. Whether it's someone whose knowledge just needs refreshing or someone new to marketing, the learnings learned from this program are invaluable,” T. I. said.

“It provided the fundamentals to digital media marketing that whatever new technologies and tools come our way, the thinking is rooted on the rigor and basics of media strategy and planning,” T. I. added.

Other participants like J. A. also appreciated the program’s structured approach and the opportunity it provided for them to speak a common marketing language.

At the end of the program, Tony lauded Acumen for its collaborative approach, openness to ideas, and deep understanding of both training and business needs.

“Acumen is a strategic partner for bridging the bank's marketing vision and the team capabilities through bespoke L&D (learning and development). Acumen was able to share their expertise with our employee participants and positively contributed to their individual development,” he said.

Encouraged by the program’s success, the bank is considering rolling out the initiative to a wider audience of managers, a recognition of Acumen’s role as a trusted partner in fostering marketing excellence.

By Liel Gonzalez

How to analyze your business effectively

Mon, 06 May 2024 03:10:40 GMT

Business analysis has always been a dreaded activity—especially among marketing practitioners. This is not surprising considering that a lot of marketers are right brained people. Being creative and artistic, they would more intuitively spend their time brainstorming and creating innovative ideas to entice consumers to use their brand. However, as marketers and sales people develop plans, a constant underlying question on their mind is: “Will this idea work and build the business?”. This is an important question to ask—even more so now that the market is so volatile due to the pandemic and businesses just cannot afford to waste resources on plans that do not work.

The key to developing good business strategy and plans are anchored on sound business analysis. While a few businesses might get lucky to come up with an enticing consumer plan without the benefit of doing any business analysis, this type of risk-taking usually does not work. Businesses that take this kind of risk tend to end up wasting valuable resources, stagnate, and eventually start losing revenue and market share. Conversely, businesses that take a more informed and strategic approach to these plans through business analysis are able to uncover and capture better opportunities.

What is Business Analysis?

Business analysis is:

the fact-based understanding of the business…
to uncover the real reasons behind its performance…
in order to develop plans to grow the business

These 3 parts guide how one should approach business analysis.

In Acumen, we use the W8 framework as a guide in doing business analysis. The W8 framework is also divided into 3 sections, namely:

What is happening?
Why this is happening?
What now?

How to do sound Business Analysis?

1. What is happening?

SITUATIONAL ANALYSIS

To define what is happening, one does a situational analysis by asking the key questions on WHAT, WHEN, WHERE, and WHO using available business and consumer data.

In this section, it always starts with the main business metrics of revenue, market share and profit. Using revenue as an example for our WHAT, one can assess its performance by understanding what drives it, such as:

WHEN: revenue performance over a time period
WHERE: revenue performance within an area, channel, segment, and category
WHO: revenue performance within a consumer segment

It is quite important to do the analysis all the way to the WHO as they are the brand’s source of revenue. Throughout the analysis, it is also important to explore the performance across all available segments in the WHEN, WHERE, and WHO as this helps in identifying segments where the business is growing or declining.

OVERALL ASSESSMENT OF THE KEY METRIC

Once the situational analysis is complete, one should do an overall assessment of the identified business metric by:

Describing its overall performance (e.g., growing, stagnating, declining)
Identifying the reasons behind this performance
Capturing key findings on what are and are not working

DEVELOPING THE PROBLEM STATEMENT

The key output of determining what is happening is an IDENTIFIED PROBLEM STATEMENT that captures what the business should prioritize by understanding further and then acting upon. The problem statement should be targeting to address the metrics that have the biggest potential to impact and grow the business.

It is important to remember that in crafting the problem statement related to revenue and market share, it should always include the WHO (or the consumer), as they are the ones that need to be influenced and convinced to use the brand. In addition, a problem statement can either be a good problem or a bad problem.

A good problem harnesses one’s strength or capitalizes on an opportunity, such as: “How can the brand sustain or even accelerate its growth in consumer segment A.”

A bad problem necessitates the need to fix a current business issue, such as: “How can the brand arrest the decline of its user base in consumer segment A.”

Once you have an identified problem statement, you are ready to move on to the next section of the W8 framework.

2. Why this is happening?

In this section, one does a root cause analysis by unearthing the MANY WHYs, the DEEPER WHYs, and the REAL WHYs. To be efficient in the analysis, the IDENTIFIED PROBLEM STATEMENT is what will be subjected to the root cause analysis.

UNDERSTANDING THE KEY DRIVERS THAT INFLUENCE CONSUMER BEHAVIOR

In Acumen, we have a tool that facilitates the WHY analysis called the Business Drivers Map. The business drivers map helps to form a comprehensive understanding of the consumer by determining the key drivers that influence their behavior in using the brand. Hence, what one should do is to assess the brand performance across the identified consumer behavior drivers.

ANALYZING MARKETING MIX EFFECTIVENESS AND UNDERSTANDING MARKET FACTORS

The next step is to assess the effectiveness of the brand’s marketing mix or its controllable factors (7Ps) in delivering the desired consumer behavior drivers. It is also important to see the impact of market factors that affect performance or the brand’s uncontrollable factors (5Cs). The result of this analysis is a list of issues and opportunities across the consumer behavior drivers, the brand’s marketing mix and its market factors.

In Acumen, we use a clustering technique which enables one to group issues and opportunities together to formulate key strategic themes. The key output of this section is a list of strategic themes which enables one to have a deep and insightful understanding of the identified problem statement.

3. What now?

IDENTIFY AND PRIORITIZE STRATEGIC IMPERATIVES

To determine the actions that the business must take, it is important to identify the key strategic imperatives that would address the identified problem statement. Using the strategic themes as inputs, imperatives which can address one or more of the strategic themes can be carefully identified.

Once the imperatives have been identified, these are then subject to prioritization by using criteria that scores each imperative by its the commercial potential, consumer impact, and resources required to implement.

Once this section is complete, teams can confidently move to develop each of these ideas into something that is creative and relevant—knowing that they are anchored on important consumer needs and are likely to make a significant impact in building the business.

Acumen have successfully used this business analysis process in helping our clients develop their short, mid, as well as long-term strategies, identify new marketing innovation, turn-around a declining brand, successfully enter new categories, transform their business, and build their organizational capability. You, too, can grow your business effectively, efficiently, and with confidence amidst a challenging market environment by starting with sound business analysis.

By Benjie Jimenez

Using sound business analysis as the key to unlocking good business strategy and plans.

Selling to the foodservice channel

Sun, 21 Apr 2024 05:44:04 GMT

Being able to effectively communicate how your product can provide a solution for foodservice operators will require a certain amount of training for the sales person to be effective in detailing.

The foodservice market is back on track after being one of the industries hard-hit during the pandemic. The comeback of major players and growth of new chains contributed to Philippine foodservice revenues an estimated $10.4 billion in 2022 and is expected to surge to $16.1 billion this year, based on Philippines Foodservice - Market Share Analysis, Industry Trends & Statistics, Growth Forecasts (2024 - 2029), Mordor Intelligence Feb 2024.

These growth numbers provide a glimpse of how the foodservice segment remains to be a dynamic and fascinating channel.

The vast array of food offerings and service differentiation allows suppliers to be creative in becoming partners of foodservice operators. With the continuous growth of the industry, catering to these operators has become competitive as every supplier tries to call on the same people in the same food chains. Identifying the right influencers and decision makers within the foodservice operation, establishing that contact and finally getting into a conversation with these people with their busy schedules will be the first hurdle.

The delivery of exactly what the foodservice customers need can begin with bucketing them by sub-segments — Hotels, Caterers, Canteens, Quick Service Restaurants, Full-Service Restaurants, Bakeshops, etc. However, the driver for each operator will be different, taking into consideration who the key decision makers are, the menu items they offer, what culinary trends may be applicable to them and ultimately, how your product will add value to their operation. Being able to communicate how your product can provide a solution for them will require a certain amount of training for the sales person to be effective in detailing features and benefits.

While some basic sales fundamentals may be the same for retail and foodservice, selling and marketing to foodservice operators require a clear understanding of how each channel operates, who their target market is, their target food cost, their buying cycle and how they prepare their menu offerings. This knowledge should be a primary focus when training each sales personnel in the route-to-market model employed by the supplier.

Since cost is a top-of-mind consideration, having a basic knowledge of food costing is a useful skill that allows for a productive conversation with the operator. Foodservice suppliers are expected to show a profit story to the operators not just by offering a lower priced product but how it can contribute to the efficiency in food preparation, thereby increasing the margins of their menu items. These efficiencies and convenience may come in terms of product formulation, packaging, yield and overall product quality.

Quality is a non-negotiable goal of a foodservice operator, and while a good product is the main selling point of a foodservice supplier, SERVICE is equally important and oftentimes, becomes a deal breaker.

Before the pandemic, price and quality were the primary reasons for buying a product. However, during and immediately after the pandemic, PRODUCT AVAILABILITY and CUSTOMER SERVICE were the top considerations of purchasers when choosing what product to buy and where to source it from, based on a study conducted by Acumen. This pushed foodservice suppliers to review their route-to-market strategies and delivery services of their distributor partners to make sure operators can have easy access to their products when needed.

This is where foodservice distributors come into play. Delivery of goods to foodservice operators is mostly done thru distributor partners within a target area. The ideal food service distributor can carry a vast number of products from food ingredients to kitchen essential items, offering a whole basket of goods to the foodservice operator. This helps strengthen their relationship with the operator as a “one-stop-shop” and becomes more efficient for both the operator and the distributor in delivering their orders. Foodservice operators like the idea of ordering from one provider with a good track record in delivery services and price offerings.

One final point towards being a preferred foodservice supplier is being able to effectively communicate how your brand and product fits well into the account’s operation and how they get real value out of the partnership. The key is to make sure that the operators are aware of how good your brand is and how they can increase usage across their menu.

By Lana Paruñgao

Turning A Weakness into A Strength, A Brand Recovers Market Share

Fri, 26 Aug 2022 03:10:09 GMT

In a business environment that’s becoming more and more competitive because of the democratization of a lot of things, the proliferation of options that face the consumers makes it hard for brands to own a large part of the market and to sustain leadership for a long time.

Heritage brands and long-time market leaders are always prone to losing shares to competition or new brands in the category. This is true due to several reasons: 1) they have been so used to being number 1 that they lost the urgency to move with the times and keep themselves updated with what’s happening in the competitive landscape, 2) they have grown accustomed to what’s been working and have not moved to change their message or how they reach their consumers, 3) as market leaders, they have the biggest share of the pie, therefore the one that stands to lose the most to aggressive newcomers.

Has your company ever lost valuable customers? If so, you know that the experience can be quite painful. In this case study, we will explore how our client Tanduay was able to regain lost customers and thrive once again. We will outline the steps they took and the results they achieved. So, if you're looking to recapture a lost customer, read on!

Client Profile: Tanduay

Tanduay Distillers, Inc. is the oldest subsidiary of the Lucio Tan Group. It is one of the biggest rum brands and has a 99% share in the Philippine rum category. Tanduay produces a wide range of rum products and a variety of distilled spirits. In addition to its wide range of products, Tanduay is also known for its high quality and competitive prices.

Tanduay is more than just rum. It's a national icon that represents the best of what Filipinos stand for: honorable, brave, resilient, dedicated and most importantly respect for elders and family values. These characteristics have made Tanduay what it stands for today. Not only is it the choice drink for any celebration, but it has also become a part of who we are as people.

The Challenge

When the alcoholic beverage company Tanduay engaged with us, they needed to regain lost business. The challenge was to turn around the decline and the goal was to regain growth for Tanduay. We devised a plan that would help them to achieve this. First, we conducted market research to understand the current landscape. We then created a marketing campaign that would raise awareness of the brand and generate interest. Finally, we implemented a sales strategy that would help to increase revenue. Thanks to our efforts, Tanduay was able to regain their lost business and achieve growth once again.

Our Game Plan

Our game plan consisted of 3 phases: situational analysis (phase 1), brand positioning and packaging development (phase 2a), marketing plan development (phase 2b), and implementation (phase 3).

In each phase, we helped the client ask the right questions and helped them answer these questions. Acumen's role was to conduct a Comprehensive Business Review leading to Issues/Opportunities. We designed, supervised and analyzed the following: comprehensive need states research, product tests, and a series of qualitative research on product, packaging and advertising. We came up with a Comprehensive Relaunch Plan that aims for (1) Stronger Brand Positioning and Advertising and (2) Cohesive Portfolio Strategy to maximize growth and cover white spaces.

For Tanduay to regain its business, it needs to strengthen its value proposition, not by changing the product to target the dominant brand's users, but by having a distinct and relevant positioning to a chosen target market who continues to value a strong drinking experience and by using a portfolio approach (i.e., several brands) to compete against the newer brand. We have looked at the following products in Tanduay's existing portfolio and reviewed the role of each Tanduay variant.

By Chelet Tanjuatco

Our Learnings

During our focus group discussions, we have discovered that drinking is an indispensable part of the Filipino social weave. Filipinos love drinking in order to relax, to bond with friends and to have fun moments together.

We have also found out that there has been a major market shift in the past years where gin and rhum lost shares and brandy became the dominant choice across all regions. The dominant brand became successful due to its tapping of latent consumer needs, changing consumer expectations on what a strong value proposition is. The dominant brand that emerged redefined what value is - right price, right hit, most acceptable taste, minimal to no hangover and an enjoyable bonding experience. It has a very high product appeal, delivers an ideal drinking experience and the pricing is just right.

Meanwhile, Tanduay's value proposition is that it has a slightly cheaper price, strong taste and strong hit. Tanduay's alcohol strength is the main reason for shifting, the drinking experience is less than ideal and even more so, the hangover after-effect.

Our Recommendations

The Acumen team recommended to relaunch Tanduay with a clear target market focus and a long-term brand vision and identity, a media strategy that properly supports the Brand Identity with the right split between thematic and activation support and a Strong, differentiated brand-building advertising. Its core brand identity and proposition must be relevant, unique and capitalizing on the brand’s strengths. The extended identity must include assets built through the years.

The Outcome

The consulting engagement with Tanduay resulted in a business turnaround in both revenue and share growth. Acumen, as retained consultants, is tasked to (1) assist in the launch of a new brand to cover white space and to (2) build capabilities of marketing team. Acumen continued to work with Tanduay as their trusted consultants, helping them navigate the ever-changing landscape of the alcoholic beverage industry. Thanks to Tanduay’s partnership with Acumen, they are on track to reach their long-term business goals.

“Tanduay is already Number 1 worldwide in the rum category. We would like to thank and acknowledge Acumen for being part of this success.”

— Paul Lim, Marketing AVP, Tanduay

Acumen’s Commercial Strategy roadmaps are customized and designed using data and comprehensive insights, and developed through a rigorous and holistic process. Contact us today for more information.

People Pivot: Sustaining the Transformation in a Remodeled Filipino Workplace

Mon, 25 Jul 2022 03:09:26 GMT

In designing the workplace of the future, CEOs and other corporate leaders must keep in mind that having an agile people strategy is equally critical as having an agile business plan.

Beyond react and response

In the Covid years and during the immediate aftermath, companies went through what experts call the four stages of pandemic response and recovery: React, Respond, Redesign and Redefine.

By Cherry Tantoco-Daniels and Andrea Oliveros

Local and global business leaders have recognized in the last decade or so—amid high-speed technological developments and the Covid disruption—the importance of establishing a sound people strategy to ensure a company’s sustainable growth.

This is especially true for digital-forward organizations whose people-first mindset have been acknowledged as a critical success factor.

The COVID-19 pandemic, a most unexpected global event, triggered the need for companies to revisit their business strategies and models, work modalities, and their human resources.

By now, most businesses have adjusted to the new normal borne out of the pandemic, and chief executives in the Philippines are among those who are optimistic about revenue growth in the short- and mid-term as shown in the PwC-Management Association of the Philippines 2023 CEO Survey.

Under this new normal, workers must be constantly given opportunities to reinvent and level themselves up if a company were to secure its revenue targets and achieve its overall ambitions.

Earlier interviews by Acumen Strategy Consultants with a number of organizational leaders indicated that many companies appear to have parked themselves within the Respond stage given the uncertainty of things to come.

But now, with the emergence of what we can call a renewed business as usual, corporate leaders must carry on armed with key learnings from a global health crisis that shocked and crippled a world that was in the midst of making major digital strides.

These learnings are underpinned by the basic insight that in a crisis and change scenario, you go back to basics and the foundations of an organization must be solid to survive.

As we plan for the future, a review of these learnings and the organization's foundations are critical to establishing the right strategy for our people.

Three Challenges

Global experts who were ahead in the recovery journey pointed to three challenges and considerations in the Redesign and Rebuild stages.

Challenge 1: Revisiting our beliefs given the new employee realities to protect and strengthen culture

This is a challenge because increased employee fragmentation and unconscious bias are expected by-products of the prolonged pressure and many changes. Because of this fragmentation, policies are no longer one size fits all. The pandemic prompted a deeper “humanization” of the employee and a significant divergence of needs and motivations.

As a company, the impetus is to bring up the right beliefs, values and norms that will cultivate the corporate culture needed for business growth.

How do we do this?

Corporate leaders must listen more deeply to truly understand different employee needs and what drives them.

Once we understand, we need to reflect and review what matters to the company, what matters to employees, and what these mean for the prevailing corporate belief system.

Challenge 2: Finding the balance between wellness and productivity given the new work modalities

This is a challenge because, again, it is no longer one size fits all.

Furthermore, the emergence and abundance of virtual roles have created new career paths and opportunities for many.

Companies now have to be intentional in developing their ‘Employee Value’ proposition to acquire and retain talent.

This means putting a strong focus on employee experience as productivity comes with engagement and worker satisfaction.

What is required nowadays is listening often through more frequent dialogue with employees.

A wider array of choices must also be put on the table such as the

personalization of benefits and providing the option to create bespoke wellness assistance programs.

Corporate leaders should also aim for sustainable productivity, which means easing the pressure to be overly productive everywhere and all the time.

Challenge 3: Defining and building the team of the future—employee, leader, manager—finding the right mix for your human capital to ensure positive business performance

This posts a challenge because of two things. First, everything is evolving. While role names may be the same, expectations, ways of working and skill sets needed to succeed are not. And secondly, in this empowered and hybrid workplace, where there is little interaction beyond the immediate team, it will be the middle or line manager who will spell the difference between engagement and attrition.

Setting teams up to succeed takes several steps: Reassess, Retool, Re-skill.

The new ways of working and value delivery will require a reassessment of the organization’s design criteria and structure to ensure teams are set up effectively to support the company’s new strategies and plans.

As roles and expectations evolve, so must people’s capabilities. Soft skills related to managing change and flexibility such as intellectual curiosity, critical thinking, strategic decision making, innovation, communication and collaboration are must-haves moving forward.

This needs to be done mindfully, in a deliberate system of retooling so members help rather than burden teams.

In designing the workplace of the future, corporate leaders must keep in mind that having an agile people strategy is equally critical as having an agile business plan.

Redesigning policies, the workplace and workplace etiquette will be a continuous trajectory rather than complete inflection.

Having a test, learn, adapt mindset will be important in this continuing journey of transformation for everyone.

Acumen's tools and competency will take you on a step-by-step process that will bring to light the unique key aspects that will help you set up a company that is well-grounded and dynamic. To learn more about Acumen's Organization Transformation service, contact us today.

De-mystifying Brand Strategy: What Needs to be Done Before Spending Millions in Advertising

Thu, 21 Jul 2022 03:09:06 GMT

Search for definitions of Brand Strategy on the internet and you would typically get these statements: “Your brand strategy defines what you stand for, a promise you make, and the personality you convey.” “A brand strategy is a formal plan used by a business to create a particular image of itself in the minds of current and potential customers.”

When people hear the word “Brand” they automatically associate it with the visuals, campaign, tagline, image, promos, etc. While it is true that this is certainly the most well-known part of it, there is so much more one needs to know, understand, and manage beyond this. People who manage and grow brands know that a BRAND is a BUSINESS. So, when you say Brand Strategy, you actually mean Business Strategy. When you look at it from this perspective, then suddenly Brand Strategy takes on a much wider and expansive scope than communication or campaign materials. That’s why Brand reviews are not just limited to Brand image scores – which is usually just 1 out of the 4 or 7 Ps Marketing .

David Aaker is one of the proponents of Brand Strategy that went beyond the visuals and campaign. He introduced these principles in the 1990s with his book “Managing Brand Equity” which eventually led to the discipline of Strategic Brand Management – wherein the company maps out the brands’ contribution to total company’s long-term competitive strength and profitability while regularly tracking and measuring its Brand Health or Brand Equity.

The following are the factors that we need to consider in building a brand:

The Role it Plays in the Company

For a brand to thrive, it must know its place in the company portfolio or the company vision. What is the strategic intent of the brand? How much should it contribute to the total company revenues and profitability ?

Here are some examples of the different brand roles (Aaker, 1996) in the company:

Flagship Brand – the one expected to be the main revenue contributor for a company; usually a leader or a strong player in the category it plays in . It is also usually the biggest contributor to profitability.
Flanker Brand – the one expected to address other needs or evolved needs of the category that are not properly addressed by the Flagship brand. A company can have multiple flanker brands to ensure that sales and shares remain within the company and are not shifted to competitors
Energizer Brand - a sub brand or endorsed brand that significantly enhances or energizes the main brand / mother brand because it is innovative or because it rides on a popular or up and coming trend
Silver Bullet - a sub brand or endorsed brand that is developed to strengthen the mother brand by extending it to other segments of the market (e.g., premiumizing it or massifying it) or any way that helps sustain the relevance of the mother brand.

The Brand’s Business Ambition and Goals

Given the role of the brand in the company’s portfolio, the brand manager and brand director should set the right ambition and business targets for the brand. This includes the financial goals for the brand. These goals and targets should be hinged on a thorough understanding of the company’s performance and vision, the brand’s key business strengths and weaknesses, and a good knowledge of the market and competitive landscape. These three things are crucial in setting the brand business ambition and goals.

The Role it Plays in the Minds and Hearts of the Consumers/Customers

This is more commonly known as Brand Positioning. In developing the brand strategy, one must know the following:

The current positioning of the brand – How do customers see it? How do they feel about it? What is the role of the brand in their day-to-day life?
What positioning should the brand own for it to bring in revenues to the company?
Can the brand effectively own the positioning it aspires to own?

These questions can only be answered properly if we know the drivers and barriers to preference or purchase, which are typically mapped out in the Customer Journey.

The Market and Competitive Landscape

The understanding of the market and competitive landscape is not limited to just their shares and brand positioning – which is what we usually get from “competitive reports”. A more comprehensive approach is required if you are to develop a long-term strategy for the brand. One needs to look at the business performance of the top players and the capabilities of their companies, look at the performance of the total category and identify the drivers of growth. The insights and information that one gets from this kind of analysis leads to a better differentiated and more relevant message and activities from the brand. It also leads to setting the right ambition and goals that will ensure that the brand will thrive.

The Marketing Mix

The full marketing mix is a big part of the brand’s business plan as this mix takes care of ensuring that the brand is made available and bought by the target market.

A comprehensive mix would consider the following:

Product : How will our brand drive differentiation through its product or service? What should our assortment be? What features and services should we have?
Price : How do we drive value to our customers? What are our key pricing principles?
Promotions : What should we communicate? Where should we communicate? How should we say it? What are the crucial touchpoints?
People : How do we bring to life the brand proposition in our employees, staff, etc.? How do they become ambassadors of our brand?
Process : What are the key principles to ensure a delightful customer experience? How do we bring to life the proposition in our process?
Physical Evidence : What type of environment should we build to bring to life the brand promise?
Place : Where can customers avail themselves of the service and products? What is our location strategy?

Those are all the things that we need to consider when we manage a brand. For a Brand Strategy to be hard-working and effective, we need to start looking at a brand as a business. What good is branding if it won’t build and sustain the brand’s business? That is why it is so important to have the Brand Strategy down pat before even thinking about logo, brand identity or communicating or advertising externally – all of which entail significant resources. In other words, being sexy is not enough. To develop and sustain a successful brand, one has to look at the big picture objectively and without any biases or pre-conceived assumptions. Ask the right questions, set the right goals, analyze relevant data and, establish the strategic imperatives. That’s how you build your brand strength from within – thorough understanding that leads to a clear and sharp strategy- only then can the externals and tangibles be business building and relevantly sexy.

By Chelet Tanjuatco

Are Strategy Consultants Worth Your Investment?

Mon, 11 Jul 2022 01:59:43 GMT

Acumen’s President and CEO shares her thoughts on strategy consulting—with a view from both sides of the fence and how to break barriers for a more productive and meaningful collaboration.

There comes a point in the corporate life of CEOs—whether an old or new hand in the company—when significant shifts or disruptions affect their business and they are compelled to rethink their growth plans and ambitions.

Tapping outside help to draw up a renewed or new business strategy roadmap is one way forward, and it is important to understand how to make the most out of that investment.

In the past three decades of my professional life, I have been on both sides of the fence: a client of consultants, and a consultant myself servicing clients. The switch from client to consultant has been an eye-opening experience— and I’d like to share some perspectives on how to engage with them.

My first encounter with a consultant was during my time at Coca-Cola, where engaging external consultants was common practice.

We needed to predict future revenues to guide capital investment and other strategy decisions. Our consultant developed a demand model based on numerous sets of data. It helped us predict sales based on the actions we will take. It looked like a giant calculator with algorithms in the background and a nifty interface where you input your assumptions.

Overseeing strategic planning then, it was an important tool for me to have a systems view of all the factors that drive consumption and demand—these two are different, by the way—and to simulate the impact of strategy choices.

Another consulting engagement I vividly recall is when our regional team for BPW Asia, the joint venture of Coca-Cola and Nestlé, needed to generate innovation ideas. We flew in a team from the US to run a workshop for us. I still laugh at the memory of the out-of-the-box concepts we generated then. When I found out though how much these consultants cost, I wondered how we could have made the fees worth it.

Fast forward to today, more than 20 years after I made the switch and over a decade now leading the firm, I can say that investing in and engaging strategy consultants could be made worthy of every peso if you understand the factors that determine a successful collaboration.

A big factor is client profile.

CEOs and other leaders in their team can themselves assess their own profile.

Client Profile 1: Seasoned Commissioners. This client type already see the value in hiring high-caliber consultants who bring external, unbiased points of view and can challenge elephants in the room.

Given their exposure to different types of consultants, they need to focus on identifying the most cost-effective options for their specific need on hand.

Thus, the starting point to making an engagement truly worth it is to have a very clear brief that will answer such questions as:

What is the overall challenge?
What are the key business questions?
What are the outputs expected from the consultant?
What is at risk if you don’t engage external help?

Answering these questions can help assess the value of what is truly at stake.

You’d have to make sure that those who pitch their consulting services have the expertise and track record to answer your brief.

The possible trap that you need to watch out for are those who cannot distinguish between the output you truly need versus what’s just nice-to-have.

The best way to illustrate this is when they recommend that you buy a luxury SUV when all you need for now is a simple sedan.

Therefore, a clear brief will allow you to find the most effective and cost-efficient consulting firm that suits your requirements at hand.

Client Profile 2: Unmoved Inertia. They recognize they have unexpected challenges but believe that they can solve the issues themselves. They have yet to recognize the need to hire external consultants.

For this set of clients, outsourcing a consultant is simply not worth the time and money, as they are not ready. They will only be motivated to seek external help when a major, earth-shaking, black swan event happens in the business. At that point, engaging consultants become worth it if they choose a firm that can right-size the problem and start (and end) only where the client specifically needs help on. A clear brief remains crucial and casting the net wide in search of the right consultant partner to work with is a must.

Client Profile 3: Uncertain In-betweeners. They sense the need for external advice, but they haven’t pinpointed yet exactly where their gaps or issues are.

This type of clients are the most vulnerable because professional services firms would tend to fit the problem into their canned solutions — “If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail,” as the saying goes.

Therefore, hiring a strategy consultant whose approach is to start with a thorough, data-based diagnosis of where the client’s biggest problem could be is critical. Sans this discipline, the clients may end up paying for services that will not really address the issue—leading to not just wasted money but also invaluable time.

Given their exposure to different types of consultants, they need to focus on identifying the most cost-effective options for their specific need on hand.

Thus, the starting point to making an engagement truly worth it is to have a very clear brief that will answer such questions as:

What is the overall challenge?
What are the key business questions?
What are the outputs expected from the consultant?
What is at risk if you don’t engage external help?

Answering these questions can help assess the value of what is truly at stake.

You’d have to make sure that those who pitch their consulting services have the expertise and track record to answer your brief.

The possible trap that you need to watch out for are those who cannot distinguish between the output you truly need versus what’s just nice-to-have.

The best way to illustrate this is when they recommend that you buy a luxury SUV when all you need for now is a simple sedan.

Therefore, a clear brief will allow you to find the most effective and cost-efficient consulting firm that suits your requirements at hand.

Client Profile 3: Uncertain In-betweeners. They sense the need for external advice, but they haven’t pinpointed yet exactly where their gaps or issues are.

By Pauline Fermin