Week 4 Mentor Guide

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Mentor Guideline

TEAM CHALLENGE #2 - Foundations Capstone

Mentor notes:

In this challenge, learners combine skills from previous challenges to prepare for a kickoff meeting for another engagement with Bespoke Spokes, the bicycle shop from challenge #2. The shop has had difficulty growing over the past 2-3 years and has hired the leaner’s team for 8 weeks to help them improve growth potential, as well as explore potential mergers & acquisitions (M&A) strategies.

Note that this challenge explicitly includes a meeting with their ‘client’, aka you, the mentor.

While this is a team challenge, roles are explicitly defined and learners are responsible for the following:

Role

Suggested Actions/Slides

Engagement Manager

Team introductions Project charter Presentation summary

Project Manager

Project timeline RACI Matrix

Data Analyst

A data request (ie, what information would you like to see?) Analytics insights and takeaways from week 2 exercises (What insights can you take away?)

Research Analyst

Complete a strategic industry overview of the bicycle industry, including key trends, and an overview of competitors

There are no rows in this table

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Note that if teams have fewer or greater than four participants, they can either take on extra work or double up on certain items.

Engagement Manager:

The engagement manager is responsible for team introductions, a project charter, and a presentation summary. Team introductions should cover each member of the leaner’s team with brief background details. The goal is to build confidence in your team, so they should be highlighting their teammate’s accomplishments.

A project charter is a new task—it should roughly include project objectives, scope, and responsibilities. Scope is not explicitly defined in the challenge, so leaners have the flexibility and freedom to create their own. Meanwhile, clarifying project objectives and responsibilities will require the engagement manager to research typical growth engagements. For instance, objectives could center around achieving x% top-line growth over the next 12 months, or identifying x number of potential merger or acquisition targets.

Project Manager:

The project manager’s deliverables were covered in Individual Challenge 2, so for reference, please check out that mentor guide. Like Individual Challenge 2, learner’s have quite a bit of flexibility regarding schedule—but note that the entire engagement is expected to take 8 weeks (they should be mindful of that). Feel free to direct them back to additional resources such as this

YouTube Video⁠

for more guidance.

Data Analyst:

The data analyst will be working with information they covered in Individual Challenge 1. Remember, in that week, learners were asked to propose hypotheses for improving Bespoke Spokes’ marketing efforts. In this case, they’re asked to further analyze that data to provide insights for the current project.

For instance, leaner’s may have identified certain demographics segments that are much more likely to buy expensive bikes, or discovered other interesting patterns. Insights could include expanding production of certain types of bikes, increasing marketing to certain segments, or dropping specific brands if they are underperforming.

Finally, the data analyst is also asked to make an ‘initial data request’. This sounds vague, but requires the analyst to think critically about what other kind of data may be helpful. For instance, they may want to ask about any market research regarding bike sales in the area—is there any data that extends beyond Bespoke Spokes? Who are their competitors? Have they saturated the local market? All good questions that could help inform a growth strategy.

Research Analyst:

All team members are asked to initially collaborate on strategic research, but the research analyst is required to compile the results. Strategic research is intended to cover key trends, typical business models, and competitors. I recommend learners confine their research to their local area, which will avoid running into pricy consulting reports.

For instance, research analysts could google their local bike shops, compare prices and offerings. Are there any services the shops offer that Bespoke Spokes doesn’t? (Bike repair/service could potentially be a profitable avenue). They could also look up industry-wide trends, though this may get somewhat technical with bikes.

During your initial ‘client’ interview, feel free to guide them on the items above—this is intended to be a time for them to get clarity and confirmation about the tasks!

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