
Growing Prosperity: Developing Repeatable Models to Scale the Adoption of Agricultural Innovations Excerpt for One Acre Fund This excerpt is from a larger study co-authored by Bain & Company and Acumen in November 2014. It is a portion of Chapter 4, “Repeatable Models: The key to achieving ‘good scale.’” The chapter discusses the elements of Repeatable Models, which are key to pioneer firms’ ability to achieve sustainable growth and encourage mass adoption. One Acre Fund is profi led as a company that is building its own Repeatable Model to ensure the Four A’s of adoption (Awareness, Advantage, Affordability, Access) are in place as they grow, putting them on the path to “good scale.” To read more of the full report, go to www.growing-prosperity.com. Vikki Tam is a Bain & Company partner based in New York. Vikki leads Bain’s Global Development practice and directs the fi rm’s global partnerships with Acumen and Endeavor. Previously, she was a partner in Bain Greater China and based in Shanghai. Chris Mitchell is a Bain & Company manager based in London. Chris is a leader in the Global Development practice and focuses on Bain’s work on sustainability and corporate responsibility. Fernando Martins is a Bain & Company partner based in São Paulo. Fernando is a leader in the Agriculture and Global Development practices and has worked with many agribusinesses and development agencies in South America and sub-Saharan Africa. Sasha Dichter is Acumen’s Chief Innovation Offi cer and is based in New York. Sasha is responsible for increasing the impact of Acumen’s work through the spread of ideas and investment in leaders. Tom Adams is Acumen’s Director of Impact and is based in London, leading all of Acumen’s global work in impact. Previously, Tom led DFID’s private sector and climate change teams in Ethiopia. Noor Ullah leads Acumen’s efforts in the global agriculture sector and is based in Karachi. Siddharth Tata is a member of the portfolio team of Acumen India and is based in Mumbai, where he leads their work in agriculture and education. The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation works to help all people lead healthy, productive lives. In developing countries, it focuses on improving people’s health and fighting hunger and poverty. In the United States, it seeks to signifi cantly improve education so that all young people have the opportunity to reach their full potential. This publication is based on research funded in part by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. The fi ndings and conclu- sions contained within are those of the authors and do not necessarily refl ect positions or policies of the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. Great Repeatable ModelsSM and Repeatable Models® are registered trademarks of Bain & Company, Inc. Net Promoter® and NPS® are registered trademarks of Bain & Company, Inc., Fred Reichheld and Satmetrix Systems, Inc. Net Promoter SystemSM and Net Promoter ScoreSM are trademarks of Bain & Company, Inc., Fred Reichheld and Satmetrix Systems, Inc. Copyright © 2014 Bain & Company, Inc. All rights reserved. “Complexity is a silent killer of profi table growth. Successful companies build a ‘repeatable business model’ that produces continuous improvement and allows them to rapidly adapt to change without succumbing to complexity.” —Re pe atab il it y: Buil d Enduring Busine ss es for a Wor ld of Co nst ant Ch ange By Chris Zook and James Allen Photo credit: One Acre Fund credit: One Acre Photo The foundations for repeatability very challenging markets and starting from a smaller base of customers. Our goal is to provide the leaders Bain & Company has been working with high-performing of pioneer fi rms with a way to think through and discuss companies across a range of industries and countries their path to good scale with their management teams, for decades. This experience has helped us identify what frontline personnel and investors. is required for companies to sustain their success over time. As outlined in the article “The Great Repeatable Building and executing Repeatable Models: Business Model”36: A four-step process Really successful businesses build their strategies on a few 1. Focus: What is your “core,” and how should you vivid and hardy forms of differentiation that act as a system prioritize your growth options? and reinforce one another. They grow in ways that exploit their core differentiators by replicating them in new contexts. The core. As simple as it sounds, a Repeatable Model And they turn the sources of their differentiation into routines, starts with articulating a business’s core from two per- behaviors and activity systems that everyone in the organi- spectives: which markets you will serve and how you zation can understand and follow. Powerful differentiations plan to succeed. The fi rst requires strategic choices about deliver enduring profi ts only when they are supported by “where to play”—which customers, products, regions, simple, nonnegotiable principles and robust learning systems channels and value-chain activities the company will that drive constant improvement across the business. focus on. The second refers to the few (usually four to seven) distinctive assets or capabilities that are at the As we interviewed management teams at the 11 case- heart of a company’s differentiation. Examples of these study companies, we found that those who were success- could be scale and cost leadership, proprietary intellectual fully pursuing sustained scale were implementing aspects of Repeatable Models. In this section, we lay out the elements of Repeatable Models, having tailored the framework for agricultural pioneer fi rms operating in 2 | Growing Prosperity: Developing Repeatable Models to Scale the Adoption of Agricultural Innovations | Bain & Company, Inc. Really successful businesses grow in ways that exploit their core differentiators property and technology, superior customer experience cency moves shows that the further an adjacent growth and loyalty, speed of new product innovation, marketing opportunity is from your core, the less likely you are or supply-chain management. Essentially, this step defi nes to succeed. If a new proposed area of your business the parameters of the fi rm’s addressable market: the will require you to sell to new customers in new geog- target customers for which a pioneer fi rm is optimized raphies through new channels, and if doing so will require to deliver on the Four A’s. your staff to develop new capabilities, then the odds of success decline signifi cantly (see Figures 15 and 16). Penetration. A pioneer fi rm should focus on penetrating This is all the more true when pioneer fi rms have had and achieving full potential in its core market. Within to overcome numerous financial, logistical and HR the parameters of a core market, there is generally a obstacles to establish operations in the fi rst place. large degree of sharing of customers, costs, channels and capabilities. This shared platform helps drive scale 2. Embed: Have you established the routines and culture economies and customer advocacy, which, in turn, to consistently translate your strategy into action? strengthens the fi rm’s competitive advantage. In markets where pioneer fi rms operate, it may be challenging to Hardwiring. The strategy of the business should be accurately assess their penetration of the addressable translated into clear activities through to the front line market, because good market data can be hard to come and consistently executed. Frontline routines have to by. However, even rough estimates on a village-to-village be codifi ed, and employees need to be effectively trained basis can contribute to this base knowledge of how success- to ensure that operations are effi cient and the customer ful the firm is in a given region. To be clear, by “full experience is consistent. This requires near-constant potential” we mean the optimal performance that can management focus on making sure employees know be expected for the delineated market, not the complete what the company stands for and are able to execute coverage of an entire customer base. the routines that make up the company’s operations. Ongoing training and reinforcement help make this Adjacency growth. Pioneer fi rms should evaluate ad- goal achievable. jacency options based on their proximity to the core. Bain & Company research across 154 companies’ adja- Chapter 4 | Repeatable Models: The key to achieving “good scale” | 3 Market entry routines. Ensure that your teams under- tiation into a few prescriptive statements that all employees stand how to calibrate the pace of expansion and how can understand, relate to and use as a reference point to enter and activate new markets. As mentioned, the for making trade-offs and decisions.”37 Particularly given agricultural pioneer fi rm’s path to scale has to be con- the vulnerability of pioneer fi rms’ customers, it is crit- quered village by village, region by region, country by ical that the company make very clear the ethos that should country. Geographic expansion is fraught with challenges. inform employees’ actions.38 Differences in tribes, languages, social customs, regu- lations and ecological conditions are just a few of the 3. Adapt: Have you set up the feedback and learning variables that can make success in a new area diffi cult systems to continually adapt and innovate? to achieve. So, pioneer fi rms must develop and execute routines that guide market entry at all levels: metrics Voice of the customer. Set up customer feedback systems that trigger consideration of expansion, methodology to ensure that the Four A’s are continually and optimally for evaluating the attractiveness of a new market and addressed. Like any business, pioneer fi rms need to keep an approach for entering and activating a new market the customer front and center.
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