Ready or not, today’s organizations are entering a new era of constant disruption. From technological shifts and climate change to social instability and global megatrends, companies must navigate a turbulent landscape. For Debswana, a diamond mining company with a 55-year legacy, this is the moment to reimagine its future. Drawing inspiration from Louis Gerstner’s ‘Who Says Elephants Can’t Dance’, Debswana should start considering how to leverage its extensive human capital and operational experience to explore new revenue streams, including consultancy services, much like IBM’s reinvention in the 1990s.
The Wisdom of Experience
Throughout its history, Debswana has developed expertise in areas such as geology, mining, comminution, concentration, recovery and sorting, engineering asset management, residue disposal, operational efficiency, risk management and sustainability. This wealth of knowledge positions Debswana not only as a leader in mining operations but as an organization that can offer valuable insights to others in the industry. However, moving forward in such turbulent times will require challenging long-held assumptions about how Debswana makes money and delivers value. With 52% of companies that were on the Fortune 500 in 2003 no longer in existence, the urgency to innovate and adapt has never been greater. Like the elephants in Gerstner’s metaphor, Debswana must learn to “dance” by leveraging its strengths and exploring new opportunities.
Transforming Knowledge into Consulting Services: Reinventing Value Creation
Business model reinvention is about more than cutting costs or tweaking operations—it requires radically transforming how a company creates, delivers, and captures value. For Debswana, this reinvention journey could involve transforming its role from a traditional diamond miner to a consultancy service provider. By doing so, it would move beyond solely extracting diamonds to become a knowledge provider, offering advisory services and operational guidance to other players in the mining sector.
Drawing from its 55-year legacy, Debswana could diversify its revenue streams and mitigate risks associated with the volatile diamond market. This pivot to consulting, akin to IBM’s shift under Gerstner, would open up new ways to serve customers and provide products or services to adjacent markets.
Debswana’s consulting offerings could be structured around its core strengths:
- Geological and Exploration Expertise: Advising on efficient resource identification and extraction, drawing from decades of experience in navigating complex geological challenges.
- Operational Efficiency & Cost Optimization: Sharing best practices for maximizing productivity and cost efficiency, critical in any mining operation.
- Sustainability and Corporate Social Responsibility: Providing insights on environmentally sustainable mining practices, ethical sourcing, and community engagement—meeting the demand for responsible mining.
- Regulatory Compliance: Guiding companies through regulatory landscapes, offering expertise in safety protocols and environmental compliance.
By exploring consulting, Debswana could apply its core strengths to build services that not only support adjacent markets but also provide solutions that are widely needed across different groups of mining clients.
Embracing the Dance of Transformation: Challenging Assumptions & Building New Products
As the reinvention imperative takes hold, it is tempting to start by looking internally at existing strategies and operating models. However, the most important question for Debswana is whether it can invest in innovations that may initially cannibalize its core offerings while still achieving growth and meeting financial targets. This requires an ambidextrous approach—balancing exploitation of current opportunities with expansion into new ones.
By developing consultancy services that are inherently extensible to adjacent markets, Debswana can ensure its initial offerings solve problems that are widely shared. This means developing services that can be modified to meet the needs of various customers without significant additional effort. For example, insights into operational efficiency gained in diamond mining can be easily adapted to other forms of resource extraction.
Like Gerstner’s approach to transforming IBM, Debswana’s reinvention will demand a shift in culture and mindset. Employees will need to pivot from traditional mining operations to consulting roles, focusing on client relationship management, business development, and knowledge transfer. Such a shift will allow Debswana to become both an authority in its industry and a source of innovation for its clients.
Capitalizing on Market Trends: Consultancy as a Path to Long-Term Viability
The pressures facing the mining industry, including technological disruptions, regulatory complexities, and sustainability requirements, create a demand for experienced consulting services. Debswana’s vast operational excellence and market knowledge gives it a strong competitive edge to provide these services. Furthermore, venturing into consulting allows the company to diversify its revenue sources, minimizing its liquidity challenges resulting from diamond demand and price cycles, and ensure its long-term viability.
By adopting a business model that extends beyond core diamond mining, Debswana can avoid the fate of many companies that fail to innovate in the face of market disruption. This strategy will help the company not only to grow its investor value but also to contribute to sustainable and efficient practices across the mining sector.
Conclusion: Making the Case for Consultancy
Business model transformation requires a willingness to reimagine how value is created and delivered. Large organizations such as Debswana with a treasure trove of knowledge and data do have an opportunity to not only demonstrate their agility and responsiveness but to also diversify and scale their product offering by venturing into consultancy. By challenging assumptions, embracing change, and leveraging its human capital and accumulated knowledge, Debswana would not only be transforming its business model but also ensuring its relevance in a dynamic marketplace.
With the right vision and commitment to innovation, Debswana can move beyond traditional mining operations to serve as a strategic partner to the global mining industry. By leading with its strengths and adapting its expertise to new markets, Debswana has the potential to dance its way to a transformed future—ensuring its continued growth, relevance, and leadership.
Just some food for thought!