It is my view that what is lacking in the delivery of commercial knowledge is the importance of business leaders (from middle management upwards through to directors) devoting meaningful time and attention to fostering workplace environments that put people first. More business owners/ managers need to truly and deeply understand that revenue and profit is actually a natural consequence of getting people relationships right…meeting customer needs, managing the work activities of internal stakeholders effectively, providing effective management, etc.
Too many businesses are still paying too much attention (time/ energy/ financial resources) to the “mechanical” disciplines of running a business (e.g. forecasting revenue, deep probing analytics, etc), when they should in fact be more focused on getting stakeholder relationships right. Customer centricity is just the start…time/ energy/ effort also needs to be devoted to cultivating positive, constructive and rewarding (mutually beneficial) relationships with employees, contractors, licensees, franchisees and suppliers. I am confident that you will be pleasantly surprised to see how your business prospers and evolves by concentrating more time/ energy/ effort on cultivating stakeholder relationships.