The biz of Biz Ops (4)— evolution of the engine
In the introduction post about this series, I compared a Biz Ops department to a tuned Mini. A Mini with the kind of engine that allows it to be more agile, fast, and precise. Vroom vroom vroom!
Just like in cars, a Strategy / Biz Ops function won’t look the same in different companies, and will evolve with time, to serve its company in the most appropriate way. What parts you put together, what you optimize for, and how you grow the function, will depend on your needs. You are the engineer, and your Biz Ops function is the engine: tune it for the context and conditions you are driving through.
And yes yes, a metaphor is great but what does it mean? Here is a generalization — I hate them but it will have to do for the purposes of this post — for what this evolution could look like. The following description is veeery broad, and that’s on purpose. What I describe is an array ofoptions. Here’s the kicker: you get to choose what works!
So here we go…
There are roughly three stages of development for Strategy/Biz Ops across its three main responsibilities of a Strategy/Biz Ops department (if you need a refresher on those, click here):
🥚 — the Foundation stage — Biz Ops is small, tight, and works primarily to make the founders of a start up more effective. You don’t need to do “strategy”, but you do have to validate it. This requires one or two people, one who’s been there / done that, and one who is analytical and eager to get their hands dirty. Across the three functions of Biz Ops, you can start by laying the following foundation:
- (1) Data & Market Intelligence: focus on the data. Become the single source of truth for the org. Create useful data visulaizations (dashboards) with interconnected tools (to other orgs).
- (2) Business Analytics & Performance: create the initial cadence and templates for Weekly/Monthly Business Review. Lead the review. With the rest of the senior leadership decide the North Star metric.
- (3) Business Expansion & Scale: start by validating the business model, and testing what pricing and structure works. Ensure PMF is really there. Drive the decisions about which ICPs to tackle first (in conjunction with Sales). Start light, then iterate.
🐣 — the Formation stage — the needs of the business are further fleshed out and specific sub functions emerge. For example, a B2B SaaS business might need another person or two focusing on RevOps, and Enablement. Or a person for Pertnerships (intergation / affiliate etc). Or a person for data analytics. The general theme of this stage is adding dedicated resource to the pressing business needs and forming sub functions.
- (1) Data & Market Intelligence: building on the previous stage, make the data live and on demand, and train the people who need to know how to use it, how to use it — it will be relevant across product, sales, marketing etc. Get an Analytics Engineer that goes beyond the obvious metrics and can create unique insights from seemingly uncorrelated data.
- (2) Business Analytics & Performance: as the business grows the WBR will turn into a Monthly Business Review (MBR). Prepare for it, and lead it, the format should be established based on learnings from the previous stage. Begin to link clearly the business strategy to the goals of each org through OKRs for each function (product / sales / marketing etc). You can tie those targets to individual leaders’ performance and track with the tools used by your PeopleOps team.
- (3) Business Expansion & Scale: PMF work should be done. Pricing becomes its own funciton to ensure continued excellence and handle increased level of optimization. Construct the RevOps fundamentials ( skills and tooling). Pick up Partnerships work if needed. Expansion in new verticals might emerge. Assess, and recommend. You might also start eyeing M&A opportunities, so you need to get a Corp Dev specialist (a strategic one). They should work with Finance closely. Expansion work begins to look interesting! The key is not to overhire.
🐥 — the Reformation stage — at some point all the various things your Biz Ops department does become a whole lot: you tapped into all types of data (x Finance / CX / UX / Product / Sales etc), RevOps, M&A, geo expansion, product expansion, you set goals and helped yearly planning, and more. Some of those functions, might be able to perform better (operationally, strategically) under dedicated functional leadership. That’s when the time is to get them VP leadership and / or spin them off into the org in a reformed state:
- (1) Data & Market Intelligence: having a centralized data and intelligence function drives communication and operational efficiency. You can solidify with a senior hire who can further drive analytical excellence, and a full team. Depending on the org structure, this unit should stay within Biz Ops / COO office.
- (2) Business Analytics & Performance: continue the work on business analysis and proactively spot early signs of trouble. Work through Quarterly and Yearly planning as needed. Productise Biz Ops — develop all the playbooks and processes for other functions’ working with your department formally.
- (3) Business Expansion & Scale: some sub functions, which are complex and might benefit from other communication lines, should take on a new shape and / or reporting line. For exmaple, RevOps might be better off under a global commercial C-level. CorpDev might move into a strategic finance function in the CFO office. Regardless of what gets spun out and how, always remain a communication channel (a person, or a system, or both) that feeds into Biz Ops.
This is one example, going through all the responsibilities of Biz Ops, what could happen as you evolve a Strategy/Biz Ops function. What actually happens depends on the business, its sector, sales motion, country of origin, tech stack and a whole host of other things.
I am laying out a picture with a lot of breadth, but the key is not to do it all at once.
Tune your engine. Don’t blow your engine.
— — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — — —
I hope you enjoyed this post in the Biz Ops series, and if you have any questions or comments, you can ping me on LinkedIn.
