The Challenge:
A global supplier of flavors to the Food industry was facing increasing customer purchasing power, and the threat of becoming commoditized. The organization therefore sought to change the nature of its customer relationships. Critical success factors included a Key Account Partnership approach for its top 10 global customers, and the development of cross-functional 'Key Account Teams' to serve the target customers. This modified approach required that new capabilities (skills, processes and behaviors) be developed throughout the organization.

The Approach:
Market Edge worked with the client to define the capabilities necessary to deliver the strategy. These included traditional skills (e.g. negotiating win–win solutions) and new capabilities (for instance building shared scorecards). Market Edge conducted an assessment that compared required capabilities with the current abilities to generate a gap analysis. A corresponding development program was designed and delivered to the Key Account Teams.

The Outcome:
Each Key Account Team participated in a series of workshops, learning ways in which to apply new process and skills to target accounts. When the program concluded, each team had begun the implementation of a specific Key Account Partnership.