Overview
development 
- Strategic Problem Solving - This segment addresses complex, multidisciplinary problems that have significant bottom-line implications for clients. Such problems do not lend themselves to routinized or standardized approaches. Instead they require creativity and flexibility, supported by rigorous grounding in the facts of the situation. While understanding of the industry may be important to the specifics of each case, industry experience itself is not likely to provide the key to solving the client's business problem. Similarly, functional expertise is commonly important in shaping and testing the actions that emerge, but functional expertise alone is likely to produce sub-optimal strategies. This is Dean & Company's focus.
- Functional Specialists - This segment deals largely with problems that can be solved by the application of expertise within a particular function. Human Resource management consultants, for example, often address specific H. R. issues that cut across client organizations. Systems work including database design and implementation also falls in this category. Deep experience, the product of many years spent working with a particular class of problems, is important here.
Not all problems that are defined as functional problems, however, can be dealt with satisfactorily by functional specialists. For example, developing a manufacturing strategy, while a functional issue, may well fall beyond the limits of what a functional specialist can address. It is of no value to a client to have the finest manufacturing system in place if that system is not adapted to serving the overall business needs. Particularly where companies are undergoing competitive or environmental change, developing a functional strategy may well be a question of strategic problem solving.
- Product Specialists - This segment concentrates on the development of repeatable, systematized approaches to problems that recur across a wide range of client organizations. Examples include "Total Quality Management" or "business process re-engineering". In many cases these issues can most efficiently be addressed by an organization highly specialized in that particular area. This can be a very attractive business proposition for both client and consultant; however, it usually provides the individual consultant with a fairly narrow range of experiences.
Again, not all problems that are identified as falling within the general purview of a "product area" are necessarily best addressed by a consultant specialized in that product. For example, it is of no value to a client to have business processes perfectly engineered if they are supporting business activities that have been rendered systematically unprofitable by competitive action. Thus, Dean & Company may undertake re-engineering assignments from time to time, but they will be within the context of an overall strategy development effort rather than as stand-alone assignments in optimizing established and viable processes.
- Industry Specialists - Similarly, some issues are best addressed by organizations focused on an industry specialty. For the individual, this means dedicating a substantial part of a career to one industry, such that the depth and breadth of experience enable one to add significant value on the basis of familiarity with the other players in the industry. A drawback of this segment is that the scope of the problems that can be addressed is necessarily limited by the need for client confidentiality -- an industry specialist familiar with high level strategic issues for one client could not possibly draw upon that knowledge in serving a competitor. Thus, it is important to distinguish the need for industry familiarity, which affects nearly all strategic problems, from situations in which the critical value-added is industry knowledge. Dean & Company has extensive familiarity with numerous industries; however, our value-added is not industry knowledge but business problem solving.
Many large firms in the industry combine product, functional and industry specialties within their organizations. Many companies also claim to be active in strategic problem solving when in fact the bulk of their activity actually comes from product, functional, or industry specialization.
