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Guest lecturing
I have spent more than thirty years in industry, over twenty of them in senior management, in speciality chemicals, polymers, materials, distribution and the circular economy. I offer schools and universities sessions built on these situations, so that participants work on real decisions.
Approach
Each session starts from a situation I have handled as an executive or on an assignment, with the published figures. Participants follow the six steps of my consulting engagements, from framing the question through to implementation, and build a first usable result in class, for instance a pricing model, an EBITDA bridge, a deal thesis or a first 100 days plan. Plant, capacity, sales channel and cash constraints are taken into account from the diagnosis onwards.
In programmes for executives (EMBA and executive education), the work concentrates on trade-offs and the decision, and participants may bring their own company's figures. In MSc and specialised master's programmes and with final-year engineering students, it concentrates on building the model and on data rigour, using a dataset prepared for the case.
Modules
Each module can be delivered as a guest session of two to three hours or form part of a longer course. Each case links to the corresponding reference.
Domain:Strategy
Question:How do you set a ten-year direction when the sector, the technology, the regulation and the value chain are all new to you?
Cases:Soleil Metals (OCIM Group) and the ten-year strategic plan for DOMO Chemicals' Nylon 6 business.
Result produced in class:A strategic diagnostic and a ten-year roadmap, in no more than ten pages.
Domain:Organic and acquisitive growth
Question:Where is margin lost between list price and realised price, and how can it be recovered without losing the customer?
Cases:Clariant, in polymer additives and speciality waxes, and Solutia, now Ascend Performance Materials, in polyamide 66.
Result produced in class:A pricing model and a customer profitability analysis, in a spreadsheet.
Domain:Organic and acquisitive growth
Question:Selling direct or through a distributor, who creates the value, who captures it, and at what cost?
Cases:Aceto, Nexeo Solutions and Palmarole.
Result produced in class:A value chain analysis by channel and the recommended channel architecture.
Domain:Organic and acquisitive growth
Question:What makes a good acquisition and a successful sale, and where is value lost between letter of intent and integration?
Cases:DOMO Chemicals' acquisition of Solvay's polyamide 66 business, the target search for Michelin and the sale of Bosc & Izarn.
Result produced in class:A deal thesis, a due diligence plan and an integration plan.
Domain:Transformation
Question:Where does the profitability gap come from, and which levers close it fastest without hurting cash?
Cases:Clariant, Nexeo Solutions and Unnox Group.
Result produced in class:An EBITDA bridge and a working capital diagnostic.
Domain:Transformation
Question:What should you do, and avoid, in the first 100 days of taking charge during a leadership vacancy or after a change of ownership?
Cases:Bosc & Izarn and Palmarole.
Result produced in class:A first 100 days plan.
Domain:Innovation
Question:When does a technology become a profitable business, and what must be proven before investing in industrialisation?
Cases:RB Process and DOMO Chemicals.
Result produced in class:An industrialisation business case.
Practicalities
These sessions are aimed first at programmes for executives (EMBA and executive education), then at MSc and specialised master's programmes and at final-year engineering students in chemistry and materials.
A session can take the form of a guest session of two to three hours, a one-day module or a course of 12 to 24 hours over several sessions. For a first collaboration, I suggest a guest session on one of the seven modules.
Sessions can be given in English, French and Spanish, on site in French-speaking Switzerland, France and Spain. For Latin American programmes, they are given online, in Spanish and Portuguese.
My career and the responsibilities I have held are set out on the About page, and each case is described in the References.
For a company, the executive workshop. The same work can be done with an executive committee, on the company's own figures. It then takes the form of a one-day executive workshop, which is part of SCORA's consulting.
SCORA. Outside schools, I work with industrial companies in interim management and strategic consulting, through SCORA.
A first conversation makes it possible to choose the module and format that suit your programme. It commits you to nothing.
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