- Mevin Anenden, Logicalis
Customer facing operations professionals are some of the most commercially valuable colleagues in any organisation. They understand the processes, the systems, the client relationships and the day to day commercial reality of the business in a way that many of their more senior colleagues often do not. They are consulted by clients when things go wrong and are involved in tenders and proposals. They understand where the most common challenges lie and they make the business work.
They are often overlooked for progress despite genuinely deserving it and they’re often under-consulted when big decisions are made despite being extremely well placed to know likely pitfalls.
There’s no formal qualification path for operations professionals in the way that there is for colleagues in finance and HR. Direct experience typically plays a lead role in development and so capabilities accumulate unevenly and incompletely over time. This means that the business acumen and commercial confidence that makes senior people around them sit up and take notice often hasn’t had the time and opportunity to take hold.
This programme is built around changing that by giving you, a customer facing operations professional, the commercial language, business understanding and confidence to a level that reflects the genuine value you bring.
You will benefit from this programme if any of the following feel true:
> You know your business well but want the business acumen and commercial language to communicate that knowledge more effectively to the people who make decisions about your future.
> You want to develop the confidence to engage at a senior level with clients, prospects and internal stakeholders rather than being the person who delivers while others get the credit.
> You play a role in tenders, proposals or client presentations and want to think and communicate more commercially in those contexts.
> You want to be seen as a genuine business partner rather than an operational resource.
> You want to develop the business development mindset that helps you identify and articulate commercial opportunities when they emerge in your day to day work.
> You feel you deserve more recognition, more progression and more commercial influence than you currently have and want a practical way to develop what is needed to make that happen.
> You have never had a formal business or commercial qualification and want to develop that grounding deliberately rather than allowing it to accumulate slowly, unevenly and probably incompletely, through experience.
A thought provoking experience
A complete self-contained experience designed to be finished in a single sitting or broken into manageable chunks on mobile.
Short Focused Video Lessons
Stories, practical business teaching, immediately applicable techniques, real-world observations and reflective questions. Each video under five minutes, most under two. Around 2.5 hours total. Mobile enabled. Filmed across multiple locations. Each video either teaches, provokes or challenges.
Live Online Forum With Rob
A group session led directly by Rob Evans where you bring your specific situations, commercial challenges and your questions about engaging more effectively with clients, prospects and senior stakeholders. Direct access to someone who has worked operationally inside 150+ businesses worldwide and understands the commercial value of the operations professional better than most.
Practical Ways Of Thinking
Activity Model Acumen™️ for understanding any organisation quickly. Plain language financial literacy. A framework for conscious business leader relationship building. An introduction to PPMCleadership™️ as a lens for understanding the organisations you work within and alongside. Practical approaches to thinking and communicating more commercially in internal and external contexts. All immediately applicable.
A deliberate journey
Where You Begin
Your Role
The programme begins by establishing a way of thinking about your role that reframes everything that follows. You are not simply an operational resource, you are running a one person business within your own organisation, with investors, customers and a value proposition. Be clear on the commercial value you create in your role.
Understanding Any Business Quickly
The Business Ecosystem And Commercial Context
A practical approach to reading any new business environment quickly. How businesses are funded, structured and organised along with the seven activity types that shape how different businesses operate, influence what their leaders care about and underpin the ability to ask questions that demonstrate genuine commercial curiosity rather than a scripted discovery process. A shortcut to commercial credibility that can then shine through in dialogue, tenders and proposals.
The Financial Foundation
The Language Business Leaders Use
A plain language overview of financial statements, how budget approvals work, how investment decisions get made and how business leaders are assessed by the people above them. The goal isn't to make you a finance expert but to ensure you feel comfortable enough in dialogue with senior colleagues.
Thinking Commercially In Operations
Identifying And Articulating Business Opportunities
A practical approach to adopting a business development mindset that helps operations professionals identify commercial opportunities in their day to day client and stakeholder interactions. How to think about client conversations not just as service delivery moments but as relationship and opportunity development moments. How to communicate the commercial value of operational improvement in terms that land with business leaders.
The Relationship Approach
Conscious Business Leader Relationship Building
A simple and practical approach to building genuine relationships with the business leaders you interact with. Built around positive engagement, genuine commercial curiosity, a partnership mindset and a willingness to resolve that goes beyond the immediate. A way of thinking about c-level interactions that makes relationships naturally more valuable and more trusted.
The Rest
Stories, Observations & Objective Questions
Much of the programme moves through a series of short focused videos, each one a story with a point, an observation from the real world or a practical technique drawn from more than thirty five years of operational experience across 150+ businesses. Each video ends with one or more questions directed at your specific situation and your relationships with others, internally and externally.
Where You Arrive
Clarity, Challenge & Next Steps
The programme ends with a challenge. What have you concluded? And what are you going to do differently?
A Note On Format
Every video in this programme teaches, provokes or challenges. You can complete the entire programme in a single sitting or in fifteen minute chunks on your phone. When you're done you'll see your role, your organisation, your target businesses and the quality of your engagement with greater clarity.
'This isn't training in a traditional sense. It's a structured journey of practical teaching, objective reflection and immediately applicable thinking.'
Clarity Focus
This programme helps you see clearly where you are alongside the teaching it provides. Most development starts with answers, this starts with questions. It helps you understand your current situation, your capabilities and your commercial contribution. That clarity makes everything land with more specificity and usefulness. It’s built for operations professionals who already know the business and want to further develop their business acumen alongside their knowledge.
Real Approaches From Real Operational Experience
Every technique in this programme is drawn from direct experience and observation across 150+ businesses worldwide. Among frameworks covered, Activity Model Acumen™️ and PPMCleadership™️ are not borrowed models given new names. They are original and developed from identifying the recurrent ingredients in successful individuals and teams and observing where people often come unstuck.
Designed To Be Genuinely Enjoyable
Short sharp videos filmed across multiple locations. Personal stories, practical techniques and reflective questions throughout. Around 2.5 hours total. Mobile enabled and consumable in fifteen minute chunks. The more enjoyable the experience the more likely it is to positively change how you actually lead.
Direct Access To Rob
Every programme includes a live online forum with Rob Evans directly. A live group conversation where you bring your questions and challenges to someone who has been in the room with many businesses worldwide and will engage with your specific reality rather than a generic answer.
- Mark Graham, The Counselling Foundation
- Chris Griffiths, Travel A La Carte
Highly Experienced, Practical, Operationally Grounded
Rob Evans has spent more than 35 years working operationally inside 150+ businesses worldwide, with C-suite and project roles spanning operations, finance and general management, involvement in over 50 acquisitions and a nomination for CFO Of The Year in South Africa while serving as CFO of a $6.5bn revenue group.
The operations function sits at the intersection of operational delivery and strategic contribution. Rob has observed that intersection closely across more organisations and cultures than almost any development provider can claim. Everything in this programme is drawn from that direct operational experience which includes serving as COO in multiple international groups.
Based on 35+ years working inside 150+ businesses worldwide, its not theory. It's what Rob observed working and where he saw folks come unstuck.
- Yvonne Chin Irving, CET
- Extract From Corporate Stock Exchange Announcement
- Mark Graham, The Counselling Foundation
For customer facing operations professionals who want to be seen as genuine business partners
> Operations professionals who interact regularly with clients and want to develop the commercial confidence and business acumen to engage at a higher level.
> Operations professionals who play a role in tenders, proposals or client presentations and want to think and communicate more commercially in those contexts.
> Any customer facing operations professional who feels their commercial knowledge and client relationships deserve more recognition and more career opportunity than they currently receive.
> Organisations who want their operations teams to be more commercially aware, more client focused and more actively involved in identifying and developing business opportunities.
You'll find our work guiding you to comprehensively examine how you think about your role, how you equip yourself, how you approach your work with prospects and customers, how you operate internally, how you communicate and how you adapt. Our material is designed to facilitate your considered and candid reflection. We share the lessons of our experiences and reflections illustrated with personal stories, examples and other relevant commentaries. We help you relate this material to your situation through our use of carefully crafted questions. Our goals are to provoke thought, to help you analyse your situation, to help you find ways to enhance your commercial and operational contributions and to equip you with tools and methodologies you can apply throughout your career.
You proceed at the pace that suits you best. Within the material many questions are posed for reflection relating to how you approach your career, work and professional development. You take whatever time you wish to devote to reflection on each question as your value comes from utilising the programme as best suits you.
We want you to succeed and success comes from action. All of the material is immediately available on purchase and remains accessible to you for 30 days. We encourage you to commit to moving ahead with your programme as soon as practicable after you've made the decision to participate. Your value from the programme will come from the steps that you take arising from the thoughts that emerge and decisions you make as you engage with the programme. The sooner you engage the sooner you will realise the benefits for you.
Yes. Every month we hold a live, invite only, one hour, online Q&A forum to provide you with the opportunity to raise any questions you have on the material. You will be invited to three monthly sessions scheduled following purchase. We will send you the invitations via the email address that you supply on purchasing your programme. We vary the times and days of the week on which forums are held to allow you the maximum opportunity to attend at least one of the three sessions to which you will be invited.
Yes. Our programme is business focused and every organisation is in business. Business principles apply whether you work for a 'for profit' organisation, a public sector body or a 'not for profit'. Each has investors, customers, employees, suppliers and other partners and stakeholders. Each organisation has to deliver some blend of experiences and solutions to its customers and in so doing it is seeking to deliver a return to its funding providers, a return that could be in a financial form or in the fulfilment of obligations.
We have developed the tools and methodologies we share based on the lessons of our own operational experiences. We have intentionally developed them to be straightforward and memorable for your day to day use. The tools we share include Activity Model Acumen™️, B2BcxoSelling™️, PPMCLeadership™️ and a range of other practical operational aide memoires. All are designed to be simple enough to remember and are immediately applicable in your role.
Everything included. We find participants who engage quickly get the most from the programme and the forum access is structured to support this.
Around 2.5 hours of short focused video lessons
Mobile enabled, watch in chunks of 15 minutes
Practical business teaching
Reflective questions throughout to personalise the learning to your specific situation
Ways of thinking you can use immediately
Action oriented - 30 days to complete videos before forum
Direct answers to your specific questions and situation at live online forum session led directly by Rob Evans