STRATEGIC PLANNING | Bellwether Law

Strategic Consulting

STRATEGIC ANALYSIS & PLANNING

Bellwether Law's strategic consulting extends beyond legal and regulatory issues, to cover those general categories typically assumed by strategy and/or management consulting firms.

What differentiates Bellwether from these various consulting firms is a strategic approach incorporating insight from a diverse legal practice experience, and the skills developed through that experience.

Keys to Successful

Strategic Planning & Analysis

1. Versatile Research & Quick-Study Mentality

2. Analytical Approaches with:

(a) Intellectual Curiosity; and

(b) Healthy Skepticism

3. Being Creative, Ideal, and Pragmatic

ISSUES MANAGEMENT

Navigate Regulatory & Legislative Risks
Find Regulatory & Legislative Opportunities
Policy/Legislative Development & Analysis
Issue Advocacy, Framing and Positioning

STRATEGIC COMMUNICATIONS

Business-related (press releases, business plans, PR)
“Government Relations” & Political contexts (companies, associations/ coalitions, campaigns)

BUSINESS PLANNING

Development or Growth strategies
Products- or Services-related
Operations-related
Organizational or Structural

# 1 ensures research as needed, in different directions, across topics;

#2 ensures continued questions as needed, and solutions vetted for weaknesses.

#3 promotes the best solutions (any context)

With Issues Management, PR, and Strategic Communications, the right legal know-how and skills create distinct advantages. From substance to strategy, these matters fall fundamentally in Bellwether's wheelhouse.

On the issues at hand, whether regulatory, legislative, and/or policy, this means insight not only from a versatile experience across legal and regulatory frameworks, but also from challenges navigating numerous complex, novel, and untested issues across that range. See Bellwether’s Compliance & Regulatory Practice).

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Strategic Planning hinges on:

first, data gathering and issue-spotting, analysis; and
second, analysis and critical thinking underpinning issue framing, concept messaging, and advocacy solutions.

For these skills, there is no better training ground than litigation: from fact investigations, to developing roadmaps and narratives, to complex briefing.

Transactional analysis, due diligence, negotiations, and regulatory-compliance strategies are close seconds; and perfect complements.

On business planning, Bellwether's strategic insight draws from economic research, financial analyses, competitive analyses, and studying specific business strategies across industries and markets, which includes working with engineers and business teams at General Motors, chief scientists at Honeywell, procurement and sales executives at The Hershey Company, among others.

Issues Management: Policy, Legislative & Regulatory

Issues Management, the core strategies, planning, and analysis cover two fronts:

(1) Proactive Risk & Opportunity Strategies

Legislative and Regulatory issue-spotting designed to avoid potential harms (or facilitate remediation) and seize competitive or market opportunities.

(2) Proactive Development & Advocacy Strategies

Policy/Legislative Development and Issue Advocacy (framing, positioning) to influence governing regulatory and statutory frameworks.

Successful strategies often mean finding clarity in the gray areas under regulations and policies—particularly in cases of new technologies and innovation.

But also more generally, legislative, regulatory, and policy landscapes remain both complex and ever-changing.

Bellwether's regulatory and policy experience can deliver crucial advantages over consulting outlets relying on purported strategies and contacts alone.

And litigation experiences (and related, e.g., in strategic messaging, below) are boons to any advocacy, from developing policy and legislative proposals to framing and positioning.

COMMUNICATIONS & MESSAGING

Bellwether brings specific experience advising global companies on public-relations strategies, message substance and timing, crisis communications, government collaboration, re-branding efforts, among related issues.

SUCCESSFUL STRATEGIC MESSAGING

well-researched narrative
vetted themes
clarity around those themes
technical issues made accessible
tailoring to specific audience(s).

There is an art to developing narratives and themes, wordsmithing for different audiences, and crafting the communication. And in this strategic field more than others, reiterative experience cannot compete with versatile experience.

Whether companies, campaigns, associations, or others, Bellwether's approach to strategic messaging draws on deep history with the strategies and creativity necessary to distilling vast records and assembling narratives, crafting arguments, and devising strategies in various contexts:

litigation briefs and client memoranda;
negotiation strategies;
expert reports presenting industry analyses;
white papers on constitutional/regulatory/legislative issues for public consumption;
include the more traditional press release, newspaper piece, government overture, and related;
various other contexts (depositions, board presentations, court hearings)

With advantages over traditional approaches to strategic messaging, the experience also affords Bellwether’s broad advisory scope:

Companies on the range of business-related communications;
Companies, Associations / Coalitions, and/or Campaigns in the “Government Relations” and Political contexts

BUSINESS PLANNING & STRATEGIES

The fundamental elements to business planning and strategy are: (1) information gathering and analysis; and (2) strategic outlook & approach.

As to each element, Bellwether brings experience and skills that are distinctive versus other consulting firms.

Bellwether's approach combines traditional analyses, with perspectives, insights, and processes formed initially in scientific research, and developed through experiences in litigation, transactions, and regulatory contexts.

Industry, market, company, product research/analysis is primary in commercial and regulatory litigation, and common in other contexts: knowing the facts means improved legal strategies:

various company valuations and industry analysis in M&A or litigation damages.
Whether antitrust, transactional, or regulatory matters—due diligence involves research and fundamental analyses across industries, markets, customers, competition, etc.
Due diligence or fact investigations span contexts and issues (e.g., R&D, procurement, customer care, quality control, marketing, consumer surveys, etc).

Summary:

Business Strategy Areas

PRODUCTS & PORTFOLIO

development or launch strategies, portfolio optimization or expansion,

ORGANIZATIONAL

alignment, efficiency analyses, reallocating resources, capitalization strategies, etc.

MARKETING & ADVERTISING

campaigns, branding strategies, messaging, audience capture, etc.

OPERATIONS

reducing steps and costs, maintaining or improving quality, increasing both flexibility and productivity, etc.

GROWTH

new markets, acquisitions, increasing overall capabilities, competitive advantages, etc.

A multidisciplinary approach brings distinct advantages to insight and perspective, but most significantly, to analytical skills and processes; particularly as to:

deconstructing problems;
vetting solutions;
developing and testing narratives vs. theories vs. arguments;
distilling vast records for concise explanations;
selecting effective modes of communication.

And with any given SWOT analysis, Bellwether is also equipped with broad knowledge of regulatory regimes and frameworks—which may inform, issues like: how the FCC, FTC, or SEC might react to new technology; how the FDA might test track a new drug; or how NHTSA may handle a model of driverless car.

Through experience, skills, and knowledge, Bellwether brings advantages over the traditional consulting approaches.

Bellwether commits to pitching what these advantages can mean for your company - and let you decide whether you like what you hear.