In your company, looking outward is nobody's job. It is whatever is left of the agenda

In your company, looking outward is nobody's job. It is whatever is left of the agenda.

In January 2023 the price per Wp started to fall. By the end of the quarter it was close to a third of what it had been. Whoever had bought volume in the previous quarter was left with expensive inventory and the certainty that competitors would receive cheaper goods first.

I froze volume purchases and started buying the minimum. I lost scale discounts and took on stockout risk. It worked, and that is exactly why it cannot be proven: an avoided loss shows up nowhere.

I did not decide by looking at the month. I decided by looking at the months before. In energy the market warns you early, and it warns you quietly.

The problem is not lack of information.

Reading the market needs to be someone's job. As long as it is a task the owner does in the gaps, between operations and cash, Business Strategy becomes improvisation.

What this costs when nobody has that function declared:

• cash finances inventory bought at the price of the previous phase
• margin disappears without anyone pointing out where
• in the medium term the company reacts to the competitor, not to the market

As long as this is not someone's function, with a name and a schedule, the company discovers the change of phase through the competitor's invoice. Who is looking at the market for you today?