This article highlights five results from the Q4 2022 data cut of allianceboard’s Alliance Management Digital Maturity Index™:
1. Less than one-third alliance leaders are happy with the state of digitization
2. Most organization’s digital tools provide inferior alliance reporting
3. Alliance value-add: a mystery among executives?
4. High turnover, considerable admin burden means effective use of resources is essential
5. Digital maturity enables an organization to seize new partnering opportunities
1. Less than one-third of alliance leaders are happy with the state of digitization
Digitization is a key business imperative, yet alliance management continues to lag behind other business functions. Only 27% of index participants are satisfied with their digital tools for alliance management, and nearly half are not.
Figure 1: “Our organization has the technology in place to manage our alliances efficiently.”
Source: allianceboard Alliance Management Digital Maturity Index – Q4 2022 results
2. Most organization’s digital tools provide inferior alliance reporting
Easy and quick reporting options are essential to always have the latest information and insights on hand. Yet only 27% of index participants indicate that their organizations have the digital tools necessary to allow the alliance management team to easily report on individual alliances, on all alliances for any given partner and across the entire alliance ecosystem of all partners.
Figure 2: “Our organization's digital tools allow the alliance management team to easily report on individual alliances, on all alliances for a partner and on the entire alliance ecosystem.”
Source: allianceboard Alliance Management Digital Maturity Index – Q4 2022 results
3. Alliance value-add: a mystery among executives?
Alliance management plays a strategic role in any organization with a partner-centric business model, being seen as an enabler for growth, strategic agility, operational excellence and other C-Suite imperatives. The majority of participants in the allianceboard Digital Maturity Index remain ambivalent about whether their organization’s executives clearly understand the value that each alliance provides to their organization.
Figure 3: “Our executives clearly understand the value each alliance provides to our organization.”
Source: allianceboard Alliance Management Digital Maturity Index – Q4 2022 results This could mean any number of things, ranging from the executive team having access to insufficient information, to alliance management not fully understanding what data the executive team considers in order to determine value and ROI of strategic alliances, to overall poor communication. Whatever the reason, there is a great opportunity for improvement by digitizing alliance management operations.
4. High turnover, considerable admin burden means effective use of resources is essential
Staff turnover has always been high in alliance management functions, yet the alliance management profession has seen exceptional turnover since 2020. 52% of respondents report that they spend more than a quarter of their time following up with internal stakeholders to obtain status updates and more than 24% on updating spreadsheets, dashboards, and presentations. We suggest that a high admin burden on well-educated and experienced professionals could be a big contributor to high turnover. All of this leads to increased risk and poor use of resources. Besides freeing up alliance managers to do the things they were hired to do, new alliance management team members are much more effective sooner, when all relevant information for each alliance that they inherit is available in real-time and at their fingertips. Digital tools could support these highly skilled alliance managers and experienced employees to focus their efforts on delivering results with their alliance partners. Figure 4a: “What percentage of time do you spend on manually updating spreadsheets, reports, dashboards and presentations for your internal and external stakeholders?”
Figure 4b: “What percentage of time do you spend on following-up with your internal stakeholders to obtain status updates (email, messaging, meetings, etc.)?”
Source: allianceboard Alliance Management Digital Maturity Index – Q4 2022 results
5. Digital maturity enables an organization to seize new partnering opportunities
With an increasing share of growth and innovation being dependent on alliances, an organization with a more digitally mature alliance management function is enabled to seize new partnering opportunities, while minimizing risks related to existing partnerships. While companies have invested in partnering capacity, firms remain underinvested in digital infrastructure for alliance management. Organizations leading in both partnering capacity and alliance digital infrastructure outperform laggards by 47%.
Figure 5a: “All relevant stakeholders have a clear view of all risks and associated management plans related to each alliance.”
Figure 5b: “Our alliances deliver on their intended value within expected timeframes.”
Figure 5c: “Organizations leading in both partnering capacity and alliance digital infrastructure outperform laggards by 47%. “
Source: allianceboard Alliance Management Digital Maturity Index – Q4 2022 results
Key takeaways for alliance managers
1. Only 27% of organizations are satisfied with their digital tools for alliance management. Organizations that have digitized their alliance management function are reaping the rewards because their alliances outperform those of organizations that are lagging in digitizing their alliance management function.
2. Investments in partnering capacity and alliance digital infrastructure lead to 47% better alliance management outcomes.
In digitally mature organizations, alliance teams have information at their fingertips, allowing them to focus on delivering outcomes, rather than wasting effort on routine administrative tasks.
3. Senior executives and alliance partners are empowered with the information they need to identify risks and make strategic decisions to deliver better results and in a corporate function where turnover is notoriously high, the right infrastructure can help new alliance managers become effective faster.
About the allianceboard Alliance Management Digital Maturity Index™
In the summer of 2021, we created the allianceboard Alliance Management Digital Maturity Index™ to analyze how partnering capacity and alliance management digital infrastructure affect four key alliance management outcomes.
Our index helps understand how partnering capacity and digital alliance management infrastructure drive four key alliance management outcomes: - Strategic agility
- Value realization
- Risk management
- Operational efficiency
Would you like to participate? Simply follow this link or scan the QR code. https://www.surveylegend.com/survey/-Mcmt9GpoBRKtSkZPg6e
Book your allianceboard demo at www.allianceboard.com/demo or follow the QR link.
