that adds points to your current growth rate?
for mid-market businesses.
- Growth Experts
- Unique Methodology
- Proven Results
Check out our TED talk with over a million views...
for mid-market businesses.
OUR POINT OF VIEW
Traditional responses to low revenue growth are not effective.
Common tactics may treat symptoms but ignore the disease. That’s because they are based on emotions and intuition rather than data.
We are different. We have lived the growth challenge complexity and invented a new methodology to cut the Gordian growth knot and deliver sustained growth.
We call it A4 Precision Alignment™
SERVICES: WHAT WE DO
We help CEOs of technology and services companies with at least $10 million in revenue grow their top-line faster. For that, we:
- Determine the root cause of slow growth via unique tools and exhaustive analysis of relevant business data.
- Build your Growth Playbook that attacks your specific growth inhibitors.
- Augment your team: provide leaders who can drive the implementation of your unique Growth Playbook
WHY WORK WITH US?
Three reasons to engage with us:
We are accomplished business leaders and experts on revenue growth.
Our uniquely effective approach.
We deliver.
WHY SHOULD YOU BELIEVE?
Because it works: we have accelerated growth for a variety of companies across industries, stages and geographies.
On average, our clients uplifted their growth rate by:
Don't take our word for it, take a look at our work and what clients have to say:
- Case studies
- Customer quotes
- Endorsements for our book
BUSINESS ALIGNMENT SCORETM
Are you ready to grow your top-line?
If you are a CEO, GM of a Business Unit, or responsible for a P&L with at least $10 million in revenue, take ten minutes to answer 12 questions. You will receive a free, customized and confidential report that will show your BAS (Business Alignment Score™) and that identifies major gaps and growth drivers.
Getting your business aligned, both externally and internally, is the only way to realize your growth potential.
“Effective, practical and very insightful – The BAS tool is a must for any CEO!”
“Loved the report from Blue Dots. It totally validated our growth initiatives moving forward.”
“It was so insightful. I asked other CEO peers to do it.”
“Received important new insights in exchange for 10 minutes of my time.”
“This is a great way to succinctly confirm our internal view and where to focus.”
“Many thanks for that little gem and compliments for a thought-provoking exercise.”
OUR BLOGS
Why knowing the “Market Truth” is so critical?
A few years ago, my great partner, John Orcutt, told me something that stuck with me. The story goes that John heard a priceless …
Growing revenue is like drinking: it must be done responsibly!
I believe that over the past few years, some in the venture capital industry, particularly here in Silicon Valley, have been doing a disservice …
We rewrote the book on growth, literally
Our book Aligning the Dots describes in detail how our data-driven methodology works. It showcases some of the uniquely revealing tools that we have developed and includes 20 case studies that illustrate the power of our new approach.
Are you ready to grow your top-line?
What do you do to outpace the market and grow faster than your competitors? Aligning the Dots provides a clear answer to that deceptively simple question. It introduces a new paradigm. It’s our universal, data-driven, and prescriptive methodology, called A4 Precision Alignment™, designed to accelerate any business.
HAVE A QUESTION? INTERESTED? GET IN TOUCH...
We’d love to hear from you. Please reach out to us via email.
You can also sign up for our monthly Blue Dots Partners newsletter below:
HOW IT WORKS
The big insight
During our careers leading, advising, and growing dozens of companies, we discovered a fundamental insight. We realized that:
When a company becomes misaligned with its market, friction is introduced, which negatively affects business momentum. The business machinery and the gears start to slow down. Market share erodes. Customers are not buying at the same rate, are not as excited about the product and are not consuming at the same pace, because something, somewhere, got misaligned.
This insight lies at the heart of why and how companies succeed. The questions now become: How do you realize the perfect alignment?
The A4 Precision Alignment™ framework is a new way to approach, measure and correct misalignments between any business and its affinity market. External alignment is based on the four axes, dubbed A1, A2, A3 and A4, and eight dots. The two sides of each of these axes, represented by two dots, have to be perfectly aligned in order to maximize the growth rate of the compa
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Alignment Axes
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Customer
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BUSINESS
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Goal
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A1
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Pain
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Claim
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Real painkiller
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A2
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Perception
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Message
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Compelling Story
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A3
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Purchase
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Sale
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Frictionless transaction
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A4
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Delight
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Offering
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Insane delight
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Four axes of alignment
Measuring alignment
This new paradigm has been successfully tested and applied bymany CEOs, general managers and business owners to an array ofchallenges in multiple industries, resulting in significant quarterlyand yearly revenue growth. Some simply wanted to maintain theirrevenue momentum; others were suffering from aggressivecompetition and were forced to cross the growth chasm. Somewere missing their sales plans; others had experienced aflattening top line and were chasing the next S-curve in the hopesof reigniting their growth engine.
The power of this transformative approach is in the fact that alignment along each of these four axes can be accurately measured on a scale from zero to five by a simple yet comprehensive methodology that illuminates the path of growth. This is done by capturing, measuring and analyzing mismatches between the prospect or customer’s view and the company’s own view, using the tools and techniques described in this book. The four measurements become the construct of a web diagram that looks like this:
The Business Alignment Score™ (BAS) describes how well the business is aligned with its market. A perfect alignment would be scoring at 100%.
Developing the Growth Playbook
These measurements reveal unique insights into areas of weakness that are the cause of misalignments and are responsible for slowing top line growth. These insights form the basis for developing a Growth Playbook, which is a concrete plan of action for the CEO and the management team. It provides a roadmap, a set of executable actions, all defined within the Feasibility Envelope.
One of the key advantages of the A4 approach is that the four axes are independent from each other, meaning that one can take action to realign one axis without introducing misalignment on any of the other three axes.
In order to execute the Growth Playbook, the organization must be aligned as well. Internal alignment is a different challenge that is addressed first by solid leadership that establishes and enforces a strong culture and second by a mission, a cause, a set of beliefs and inalterable convictions that define why a company does what it does beyond just creating value for its shareholders or making money.
The A4 Precision Alignment™ methodology is a new lens through which the challenge of revenue growth and relevant actions can be brought into focus. It demonstrates how the complex puzzle of alignment, which often eludes even the most experienced management teams, is solved by developing a clear blueprint, so that everyone knows what to do on Monday morning when the clock chimes eight.
CASE STUDIES
Select one of the case studies:
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Alignment Axes
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Customer
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Bunisess
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A1
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Pain
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Claim
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A2
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Perception
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Message
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A3
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Purchase
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Sale
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A4
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Delight
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Offering
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A1 PAIN ⟷ CLAIM ALIGNMENT
Playbook and Result
Context
Client was an international B2B software company with a recurring SaaS business model, losing revenue momentum.
Data analysis
Reviewed key business metrics, studied 84 months of invoicing history, defined a relevant customer segmentation framework and applied our Engagement Triangle tool
Insights
Realized that the pace of new client acquisition was good, but there was no real growth in average monthly bookings and a devastating churn rate with 70% of customers lost in seven years, representing 57% of total billing. We conducted a series of lost customer interviews and realized that Pain and Claim were misaligned for certain customer segments. We then found out that lost customers had some common attributes—a signature. We designated them the Red customers and used the signature to characterize them.
Growth Playbook
We studied the current pipeline and realized that 40% of the prospects in the pipeline carried the same Red signature. We took these prospects out of the pipeline and asked the sales team to stop selling to them. Conversely, we were able to define a different set of characteristics for the Green customers, the ones who were loyal over a long period of time and had a much better Pain ↔ Claim alignment. We used that insight to redefine the Green prospects. We instructed the lead generation team to qualify only leads with the Green signature to provide the salesforce with a much better pipeline of highly qualified prospects
Results
In Q1 2016, we implemented a detailed lead generation program exclusively focused on Green prospects, with rigorous pipeline management. That year the company delivered its best year ever in its 14-year history. During the two following years, the company generated record revenue, with much higher morale in the lead generation and sales teams
A2 PERCEPTION ⟷ MESSAGE ALIGNMENT
Playbook and Result
Context
Company was selling outsourced low-cost leads for the banking industry.
Data analysis
Analyzed a broad array of business data: financials, customers touchpoints, competitive metrics. We interviewed 75 customers and developed a MECE competition segmentation of all customers.
Insights
We discovered that the problem was a misalignment between the Perception and Message. It turned out that the value proposition was not inexpensive leads, but the speed and volume at which quality leads were delivered. In other words, it was not lower cost, it was faster speed.
Growth Playbook
We retooled the message around a new expression of the Claim centered on sales acceleration, not lower cost. We built a brand architecture pyramid with the company logo on the top, and various layers going down the pyramid: the company name, the brand essence, the positioning, the brand personality and the foundation or base—the reasons to believe in the brand. Based on this brand strategy, we developed new marketing and sales support material, and launched a new website with customer testimonial videos
Results
The lead-to-sale time was improved by 52% for our Client, with the new disciplined sales culture that we fostered. The company achieved its best results the second quarter after implementation and was closing multiple six-digit deals in less than three quarters. The new value perception spurred an 18% increase in revenue, since the new time-to-market claim had a much higher resonance with prospects
A3 PURCHASE ⟷ SALE ALIGNMENT
Playbook and Result
Context
Company was selling a popular service to 12 million consumers over the Web through three large partners.
Data analysis
Analyzed key business attributes driving customer acquisition via these indirect channels. We mapped the competitive landscape, precisely measured the customer acquisition cost at an average of $48.06, established a new customer segmentation and evaluated an alternative partner ecosystem that would yield a 23% conversion rate.
Insights
We learned that the largest partner threatened to pull the plug on the entire market, which would have triggered a stunning loss of 55% of annual revenue. That partner indeed stopped its activity in the space just a year later. We needed to act fast as we anticipated the dramatic shift.
Growth Playbook
We decided to sell via new channel partners with complementary services targeting the same end prospects. We recrafted the value proposition to accommodate this new channel strategy with a redefined product offering supported by flexible fee-based packages. We built a new partner-driven business model to generate a five-times-per-customer revenue increase
Results
We reversed a looming loss of 55% of the top-line revenue to a 16% growth. The company generated additional revenue of $32.5 million based on the new business model. Consequently, the company strengthened its category leadership position, yielding significant shareholder value creation
A4 DELIGHT ⟷ OFFERING
Playbook and Result
Context
Enterprise software company suffering a substantial revenue growth decline that started in 2012.
Data analysis
Conducted 90 current and past customer interviews, ran deep analysis of the customer retention cycle and evaluated the level of perceived delight through the entire product consumption.
Insights
A careful analysis of the interviews revealed that the expected delight versus what the customers received was grossly misaligned. We also realized the company wasn’t focusing on managing and growing revenue within the existing customer base. Sales compensation was rewarding hunters, not farmers, and revenue growth suffered because of the loss of too many unhappy customers that were discovered too late.
Growth Playbook
We developed an early-warning system based on behavior signals that predicted a calculated probability of churn. We crafted and implemented an action plan for high-risk customers as well as structured account planning and retention programs. We aligned sales compensation to support a “no churn” policy and established metrics for installed based growth.
Results
After implementation, customer retention was the highest ever in the history of the company, with almost no churn during the two years following execution of the new program. Within 90 days, installed based revenue grew 35% quarter- over-quarter by focusing on existing customers’ needs and opportunities. The fundamental issue was lack of care, not so much the product offering. By changing the expectation, the results were substantial. It would have been a lot harder, in terms of timing and costs, to change the product.
THE BLUE DOTS TEAM
Blue Dots has assembled a team of accomplished business leaders and experts on revenue growth.
Founder and CEO
Partner Team
For each project, Blue Dots draws from its deep bench of successful operating executives, who are highly experienced in the domains, markets, and functions most relevant to the engagement.
A4 METHODOLOGY
SEE PROOF POINTS
CUSTOMER QUOTES
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We hired Blue Dots to focus on top-line growth for a $12B revenue publicly traded company. We were impressed by the quality of their work and the value they brought to our project.
Alec Hudnut
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I hired Blue Dots to help validate the Pain we are focusing on and our unique Claim and to make sure we are in alignment with the relevant market segments we are targeting. The senior Blue Dots team conducted a rigorous data analysis based on market feedback from our customers. Their insights and recommendations brought focus and clarity and helped us take appropriate actions for sustained growth.
Eric Meier
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We were introduced to Blue Dots by the “10X CEO” organization and quickly engaged with them on the development of a Growth Playbook to accelerate our top-line growth for the next three fiscal years. Blue Dots deployed a team of five senior partners and conducted deep data analysis, they were meticulous like fine watchmakers. To establish “Market Truth,” they interviewed current, former and prospect customers. In a very collaborative way, they successfully delivered a very detailed, actionable, and impactful Growth Playbook that is now our blueprint to execute our ambitious growth plan. I would strongly recommend Blue Dots to any CEO who is looking for a clear path to grow faster and better.
Mehdi Daoudi
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We hired Blue Dots to help us optimize our pricing, which is part of the Claim in Blue Dots’ A4 alignment methodology. The Blue Dots team ran some rigorous data analysis and segmentation and talked to a number of our customers. They came up with a new pricing approach that is sensible and that enables us to cover a large spectrum of customers. We are now implementing it and are confident that it will remove friction in our sales motion and accelerate our top-line growth.
Jeevan Kalanithi
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Working with Blue Dots was gift at a key moment in time for me, as the new CEO. It gave my Executive Team an understandable and actionable framework and lens through which we could all examine the business, and then align our efforts to build the next chapter for CognitiveScale and accelerate our growth.
Bob Picciano
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We hired Blue Dots after an important and strategic acquisition. We wanted to make sure that the combined company would be well aligned with the target market segments. Their data-driven A4 Alignment methodology is exactly the prescription we needed to scale and drive accelerated growth. The Blue Dots team held in-depth customer and internal interviews, and then, based on their findings, developed a detailed growth playbook for external and internal alignments which we are now in the process of implementing. My management team and I are confident that we will execute our growth plan and create significant value for our employees and shareholders. I would highly recommend Blue Dots to any CEO who wants to grow faster.
Ben Lee
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As the long-time leader in patent litigation risk and cost management, RPX already had a strong track record. But, like most companies, we wanted to grow even faster to better serve our existing and prospective members. Blue Dots’ independent, objective analysis brought a sharp focus to areas where we could advance our business development, client relations, and data/analytics functions in very impactful ways. Blue Dots also identified a significant new growth opportunity that we are now pursuing. The Blue Dots team worked on two projects for us. They were honest, direct and flexible, integrating well with our management team without distraction.
Dan McCurdy
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We asked Blue Dots to conduct an in-depth A4 alignment assessment for our healthcare software business with the goal of identifying focal points for our next phase of growth. After a comprehensive examination of our business and extensive research with customers, Blue Dots pinpointed several key, prescriptive approaches to leverage our market position and strong customer alignment to continue accelerating revenue.
Martin Ambrose
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We hired Blue Dots to help us with our aggressive growth plan for the next three years. The Blue Dots team focused on two strategic alignments: Pain ⟷ Claim and Purchase ⟷ Sales and gave us comfort that we were on the right growth path. They brought a unique perspective on our business plan, based on their powerful and rigorous data-driven alignment methodology.
Patrick Quinlan
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We were impressed by the data-driven and analytical work that Blue Dots delivered. It greatly helped us refine our Claim and insure an optimal alignment with our customer’s Pain for our next generation product.
Jérôme Lecat
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Ron Sege
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We worked with Blue Dots exploring how to best expand our revenue beyond our core markets. The team we worked with did a careful analysis of how to frame and segment the market and a deep study of the competitive landscape in these new markets. Their objective and data-driven advice helped us make some strategic decision that positively impacted the growth of our business.
Marco Landi
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The Growth Challenge program offered by ACG Silicon Valley was terrific! As a rapidly growing enterprise software company we constantly are looking to gain greater insights into market leadership, positioning and go-to-market strategies. The Blue Dots Partners were knowledgeable, creative, and a very experienced team. The A4 Precision Alignment™ framework they use is really well done. I can't thank ACGSV enough for the support and the Growth Challenge session.
Andy Duncan
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Blue Dots helped us align our market message. Their methodology was based on detailed customer interviews and data analysis that revealed important attributes about our business, which our joint team leveraged to strengthen Daitan’s positioning. As a result, our growth rate significantly improved the year following and continues to do so today.
Augusto Cavalcanti
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We hired Blue Dots to figure out how we could grow Nearsoft faster. The Blue Dots team looked at patterns in customer data and conducted some deep customer interviews. As a result, Blue Dots figured out a segmentation of our customers with different pains that we were able to match with the right set of offerings. This helped us grow the business and successfully sell Nearsoft.
Roberto Martinez
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Blue Dots approach to revenue acceleration was based on a deep and complex data analysis of millions of customers who enjoy our services. I was impressed by their rigorous data-driven and honest approach. Their work helped us better understand segmentation across various user clusters related to Blue Dots fourth axis of alignment.
Gabriele Ottino
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We engaged Blue Dots to help us rethink our sales structure in the face of a rapidly changing industry. Blue Dots has become a core resource for CreditSights, helping us design and implement a series of highly successful growth initiatives that have more than doubled our top-line growth rate in 2018. Their people coupled with their data-driven methodologies have made a major impact on all aspects of our business. I highly recommend them to any CEO who is committed to accelerating revenue growth.
Peter Petas
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We enthusiastically hired Blue Dots to help align our sales & marketing efforts with our vision and execution. Thanks to a rigorous data analysis, they were able to come with a clear definition of the Pain we address and our unique Claim. Their work has produced some real positive impact on our entire sales approach and as a result, we have observed tremendous traction in new customer acquisition.
Nicolas Stehle
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Blue Dots helped us with their proprietary methodology focused on their A3 alignment axis. They recommended a re-tooling of our business model, moving from directly charging our consumers to leveraging a set of strategic partners. They helped with the execution and as a result helped generate a more cost-effective and significant revenue stream.
David Stewart
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Blue Dots was instrumental in better positioning our offering and articulating our messaging. Their work, based on the analysis of a number of deep one-on-one interviews they conducted, was of high quality. As a result, we were able to better align our messaging with our target markets.
Swamy Viswanathan
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Blue Dots helped us with our go-to-market strategy and sales process. They spoke to all our current customers, analyzed our pipeline and made some important suggestions and helped us improve our lead prosecution and sales process.
Michael Barrett
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We hired Blue Dots to leverage their alignment methodology, as we are experiencing a phase of tremendous growth in our business on the path to $1 billion in revenue. The process was very well managed and efficient. The Blue Dots team delivered a concrete, actionable and pragmatic set of recommendations that were eye-opening and very much helpful to me and my management team.
Alain Harrus
Praise for Aligning the Dots
Engaging, profound and thought-provoking, Philippe Bouissou is so passionate about relating strategy to growth to execution. Aligning the Dots illustrates the science he is bringing to these relationships.
BRACKEN DARRELL
“A captivating read introducing new principles for successfully growing any company.”
GORDON SEGAL
Transformative and brilliantly constructed. Aligning the Dots is an extraordinary journey into the world of top-line growth. The stories are captivating, the methodology is insightful and the results impressive. I wish I had read this book decades ago. I highly recommend it.
SHELLYE ARCHAMBEAU
“Philippe Bouissou provides a powerful and inspiring roadmap for accelerating the growth of your business. His alignment framework will help countless companies and leaders. Truly worth reading and applying!”
HUBERT JOLY
”Bouissou is one of the smartest guys in the Valley. His groundbreaking framework to understand and drive GROWTH will produce supercharged results.
RANDY CHESLER
“The growth methodology introduced in Aligning the Dots is a concise yet powerful way to drive growth by aligning your business’ products and services to address customers’ pain points and delight them. Very insightful and pragmatic book by Dr. Bouissou.”
LIP-BU TAN
“Bouissou’s background as a successful entrepreneur, first-class investor and theoretical physicist enabled him to come up with a powerful methodology for growth. To be read and applied by any CEO, General Manager or business owner.”
PASCAL CAGNI
“In Aligning the Dots, Philippe Bouissou reveals a data-driven approach to solving the revenue growth problem. The unconventional concepts in this book will show you how to align your company and achieve unprecedented growth.”
MAYNARD WEBB
“Aligning the Dots offers a new systematic methodology for optimizing resource allocation towards long-term profitable growth. Philippe Bouissou’s engaging style uses a combination of personal anecdotes, scientific analogies and relevant case studies to convey his message of alignment. While the target audience cuts across the broad business community, I find the methodology to be most directly relevant to young technology startups who have very little margin for error in their business model.”
ERIC BENHAMOU
“Every executive intuitively knows the importance of aligning what a company sells with what its customers want, but few executives actually know how to do it right. In his smart, new book—Aligning the Dots—business growth expert Philippe Bouissou presents a simple, but powerful framework for building alignment along four critical business axes. No matter what size your business or what industry you’re in, Aligning the Dots is the playbook you need to spark revenue growth right now—and well into the future.”
PETER ECONOMY
“Aligning the Dots offers a precise, logical way to understand how the fundamental drivers of business work, and how to align your company with them for long-term success. It’s the rare book that combines a comprehensive science of how business works with dozens of practical tips that any leader can apply.”
CHRIS YEH
“I’ve seen so many businesses struggle as vision and expectations of entrepreneurs and company operators are out of sync with the customer or the marketplace. Aligning the Dots provides an articulate, pragmatic and innovative framework for solving these misalignments. It is a resource that can and should be referenced repeatedly to help pressure test strategy and plans for the competitive edge that derives from precision alignment.”
LORI BUSH
“Genius often creates out-of-the-box thinking. Aligning the Dots makes you think differently and that makes it powerful. Any business should understand and use these concepts.”
NOLAN BUSHNELL
“Aligning the Dots is essential for CEOs to grow their business. It’s a brutal reminder to measure relative market share and align your business plans based on it, lest perish. Philippe offers compelling examples from which to learn.”
RAY LANE
“Aligning the Dots provides powerful rules and principles for growth: understand what market you want to go after, obsessively align your offering to that market and make sure your stakeholders are also aligned internally behind a purpose and a strong set of values. As a former CEO of a global brand, now backing startups in seed stage, I totally connected with the content of the book. It is truly an inspiring read for all who are motivated to grow their business.”
ODILE ROUJOL
“Philippe Bouissou’s methodology of external alignment on four axes, coupled with internal alignment, for me, is unique, transformative and consequential. It will be recognized as such in the world of business literature similarly to Michael Porter’s book, Competitive Strategy. I would advise any business leader, CEO, entrepreneur, business owner, board member or investor to read it and learn from it.”
JOHN DEAN
“While Aligning the Dots won’t make it magically easy, Bouissou’s A4 Precision Alignment™ methodology and compelling case studies will help you avoid the critical misalignments that keep many companies from achieving their full growth potential.”
DRUE FREEMAN
“An insightful and valuable read. Leaders from the boardroom right down who are committed to growth will benefit immensely from the powerful approach and pragmatic suggestions made throughout this book.”
ANITA SANDS, PH.D.
Pages from Aligning the Dots
