Read the full script of Module 8, Episode 2 of the Global Growth Master Class below. Want to get certified on global expansion? Simply click here to access the complete course today.

Once you have created a balance between localization and complexity, it’s about scale. As Global Class Companies transition from planning and market entry to market growth, company leaders must pay specific attention to creating momentum in order to reach global scale.

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To achieve global success, it's not enough to rely on a strong team, product, and company culture alone. As a company grows and aims to scale into multiple markets, it must shift to an adaptive support model that can handle the complexities of global expansion. The most successful companies don't just focus on entering and succeeding in a single market; they strive for global penetration. To achieve this, effective processes and structures are needed to support and manage localizations, while also setting guardrails to minimize complexity and enable scale.

Processes are critical to managing the transition from market entry to growth and laying the foundation for scale. This becomes even more crucial when a company decides to shift from operating in multiple countries to operating globally, where they must determine if their solution is universally relevant or limited to specific markets. 

Investing in these structures, which fall under the Org. Premium category helps reduce the overall localization premium or complexity associated with entering more markets.

WARNING - Balancing Process with Flexibility 🚨

Establishing structures and processes is crucial for enabling momentum and scaling in a rapidly growing organization. However, if not implemented properly or in excess, these structures can have the opposite effect. It is important to have a clear rationale for each process and constantly monitor its effectiveness to avoid the negative effects of bureaucracy. Overdoing may control complexity well, but it also runs the risk of hampering growth.

When your company is expanding, it’s natural to think about all the processes you want to adopt to be globally functional and support worldwide operations. You should be aware that companies can make the mistake of pretending they are bigger than their true size, adding extra layers of bureaucracy and steps to check data when they aren’t really needed. Processes for a ten-thousand-person company and a company with two hundred people are different. The former needs much more structure and process than the latter. If you don’t keep this in mind, you risk implementing unnecessary processes that add complexity and hinder growth. The process should enable, not hinder. It should empower instead of unfocusing. 

How can the frameworks discussed in this course be Momentum Builders that enable market entry and scale?

Here how these frameworks either provide structure and process or should be paired with processes to be put to effective use, progressing the company through global growth.

• Organizational Readiness & Global Readiness Score - To generate the required momentum for scaling globally, it is crucial to perform an organizational capabilities assessment, the one we developed being the Global Readiness Assessment [IMAGE: Global Readiness Score + link] to gain insights into potential obstacles that may arise when entering international markets and during the transition from achieving company-market fit in a single market to scaling the organization globally in multiple markets. This is a critical stage where the complexity can escalate to an unmanageable level, and inherent biases within the organization become more evident, making it challenging to align people, teams, systems, budgets, and resources. By adding structure to the internal evaluation with the Global Readiness Assessment and other questions teams should ask themselves before market entry (as outlined in Module 4), companies can identify and fill gaps to be prepared to expand to new markets. 

• Interpreneurs - Companies can identify and nurture the Interpreneurial talent companies need to succeed in global markets, as highlighted in Module 3, by building Hiring guidelines including a list of questions to ask candidates applying for jobs and programs to help interpreneurials at the company connect and exchange best practices. This could be in the form of a formal employee group, and by highlighting Interpreneurial thinking and actions in internal communications

• Global Class Team Building Framework - Also detailed in Module 3, the Global Class Team Building Framework can help leaders ensure that all of the characteristics local teams need to succeed are present in each local team. This framework can be a checklist so that leaders can actively fill in gaps and seek people with missing characteristics

• The 4 Commitments for Successful Global Growth - Putting effective structures and processes in place can also support each of the Four Commitments for Successful Global Growth, detailed in Module 4. By aligning resources and improving communication, there can be greater clarity and coherence across a distributed footprint, while trust becomes stronger and HQ feels more comfortable granting autonomy. Additionally, implementing these structures can help accelerate iterations as part of the global agile process. Transitioning from market entry to market growth requires a joint effort between local market teams and headquarters. Effective processes and structures, which require resources, are necessary to support scale and an increasingly distributed team, while limiting complexity instead of creating more of it.

• The Autonomy Curve - The Autonomy Curve provides guidance for determining the appropriate level of autonomy for each local market to achieve momentum. OR The Autonomy Curve (as described in module 3) provides a framework for developing appropriate structures and processes that align with the level of autonomy required for each stage of expansion. 

• Feedback Loops/Two-Way Innovation - Outlined in Module 2, Two-Way Innovation and Feedback Loops are key parts of the “Communication and Clarity” Commitment, of the 4 Commitments for Successful Global Growth. Strong communication, and in particular Feedback Loops, is what enables Two-Way Innovation where best practices can be taken from strategies implemented in local markets and there are processes in place to 

• Localization Discovery - Localization Discovery, detailed in Module 5, The comprehensive list of stakeholders, a centralized place to take notes, and a key set of questions to answer (many standards and some unique to the market) all create structure around market evaluation and selection

• Agile/Lean Methodology - As we have discussed, Global is the New Agile, and leveraging the core principles of lean, like iterating and pivoting instead of iterating instead of sticking to the roadmap helps minimize cost, increase speed to market, and helps facilitate finding product-market fit in new markets.
  
  The global layer that focuses teams on managing complexity also provide structure for strategy development and decision-making. Moreover, the Global Agile model provides structure and a step-by-step process for internal alignment, market evaluation, strategic plan creation, and more. 

• Localization Discovery - Localization Discovery, detailed in Module 5, The comprehensive list of stakeholders, a centralized place to take notes, and a key set of questions to answer (many standards and some unique to the market) all create structure around market evaluation and selection.

• Business Model Localization Canvas (BMLC) - The BMLC, introduced in Module 6, helps create structure around the process of translating the validated operating and go-to-market models in the initial market into hypotheses for how the business will operate in a new market. The BMLC tracks key insights for each of the Premiums that become the foundation for your strategy for each market as you take your validated model through the Government Regulation and Culture filters. The structure can also help you track the iterations you go through for each Premium as you uncover what model works in the market.

• Localization Premium Analysis (LPA) - The LPA, discussed in detail in module 7, is useful for communicating the localizations required to succeed in an international market. It can be used as a comparison tool, evaluating how the anticipated localizations compare to the actual localizations made to get traction in a market. It can also help prioritize which markets to go into

• Linked Markets - Introduced in Module 5 and discussed further in Module 7, putting structure and strategy around taking advantage of Linked Markets, through using the LPA, teams can build momentum by adding structure to how the scalability of localizations are evaluated and tracked

• Total Cost of Entry (TCE) Formula - The TCE, detailed in module 7, helps companies map out the costs associated with required localizations, adding structure to the budgeting and planning process. Localizations uncovered through the BMLC process and mapped out in the LPA can be put into priority tiers and implementation stages to fund expansion efforts in a more structured manner

In addition to the frameworks and structures outlined above, we will discuss other crucial Momentum Builders to implement within your organization to accelerate market entry and market growth to help your company reach Company-Market Fit in many global markets, including:

• Global Growth Pitch Deck

• Global Growth Playbook

• Localization Resource Team

• Job Function Pendulum

Now, let’s dive into each of these in more detail in the videos that follow.
NOTE: Don't miss out on the next episode! If you want to continue learning about global expansion strategies and dive deeper into the course material, simply click here to access Module 8, Episode 3 of the Global Growth Master Class.