Strategic alliances are for many companies an absolute requirement in today's global marketplace. They're also a pain to negotiate and manage. No wonder then that the folks at Harvard Business Press decided to tackle the topic in their latest pocket guide:
Strategic Alliances: Three Ways to Make Them Work. To write it, they turned to Steve Steinhilber, vice president of strategic alliances for Cisco Systems Inc., who talks about how to develop the framework and relationships that are the foundation of any successful partnership and how to manage complexity in a thick alliance portfolio.
Protecting intellectual property is a major consideration for companies considering a strategic alliance, and as Steinhilber notes, thinking through how IP will be used in the partnership has to be done before an agreement is finalized. What IP will each partner contribute, for instance, and how will it be used? Who will own technology that is jointly developed and how will new products that result be branded? Partners that fail to discuss these openly and honestly are sure to face headaches in the future.
Steinhilber also addresses the challenges of managing an alliance portfolio. This is always difficult, but the complexity grows exponentially when alliances span different business sectors. "The problem is that strategic partnering decisions are often made by business or alliance leaders with knowledge in the relevant market. But because of their narrow focus they may be completely unaware of any impact their decisions might have on the broader cross-company relationships," writes Steinhilber. "Part of your role is to head off these potential conflicts."
And in Strategic Alliances, Steinhilber offers practical advice on how to do just that and plenty more. - Suzanne Stevens
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