ESSO (Environment Strategy Structure Operations)

The ESSO business model by Michael Lim of Bangor University has four building blocks – Environment, Strategy, Structure and Operations.

Environment: the starting point for all business models is to build a picture of the market - a situation analysis. There are various tools and frameworks that can help such as PESTEL and SWOT. The aim is to arrive at a a comprehensive understanding of customers, competitors and suppliers.

Strategy: against a background of the environments it is now possible to look for market opportunities and to determine where your company has a competitive advantage. In developing the strategy you should consider your customer base and decide whether you are going to aim broad or focused.

Structure: every business needs a management structure which could be hierarchical, flat or something in between.

Operations: businesses produce products and services and in so doing generate revenue and costs. The key aspects of the operations need to be fully understood in terms of their costs and quality relative to customers’ needs and pressure from competitors.

The blocks that make up the business model do not exist in isolation. A common link is knowledge management. This could range from know-how in people’s heads through to detailed documents and databases on strategy, structure and operations.

This framework usefully locates a company within a macro environment from which the strategy can be built based on its management structure and its operations. It would also be useful to support the framework with some customer centric models. What are the customer's needs and how are they being met in a superior way to the products and services offered by competition?

Some things to think about:

• What is it about your company and the way that you operate that gives you a competitive advantage?

• How do your operations and the way that they are managed give you a competitive advantage?

• What is it about the management structure of your company that gives you a competitive advantage?

• What knowledge do you have about the market and your processes that give you a competitive advantage?

• How attuned is your strategy to market opportunities and competitors?

• A complementary framework is the Business Model Canvas - https://www.b2bframeworks.com/frameworks/business-model-canvas. Bringing the Business Model Canvas together with ESSO framework provides a broad and depth consideration of a company and its opportunities.