Business Reality
Nothing in a business fails inside one department
It fails between two. A promise sales made that operations could not deliver; a campaign finance would not fund; a hire HR could not fill in time. This session is about the seams, told by people who work on both sides of them.
The org chart shows boxes. The problems live on the lines between them.
Students are taught functions as independent subjects, so they arrive expecting problems to belong to a department. Almost none do. The recurring, expensive problems in a business sit in the handover — where one team's output becomes another team's input and the definitions do not match.
Seeing that early changes how a graduate behaves in their first job: they stop escalating within their function and start talking to the team on the other side of the seam.
Where the seams are
25 topics across 5 areas. Five handovers worth understanding.
Marketing to SalesThe oldest argument in business.5
- What counts as a lead
- Why sales says the leads are poor
- Why marketing says sales does not work them
- How the two teams agree a definition
- What good handover looks like
Sales to OperationsWhat was promised against what can be delivered.5
- What sales commits to win a deal
- What operations has to absorb
- Delivery timelines and capacity
- Custom promises and their real cost
- How the two teams negotiate before signing
Everyone to FinanceThe approval that governs all of it.5
- How finance controls spending
- What a business case has to contain
- Why proposals get refused
- How budgets are argued
- What finance needs from each function
Everyone to HRThe constraint nobody plans for.5
- How hiring actually happens
- How long a role takes to fill
- What happens when a key person leaves
- How teams plan around notice periods
- Where growth outruns hiring
How Disputes Get ResolvedBusinesses are made of people with different incentives.5
- How managers escalate
- Who decides when two functions disagree
- How incentives shape behaviour
- How management reviews performance
- What good cross-functional working looks like
Questions students get to ask
- Which department do you argue with most?
- What do they misunderstand about your work?
- Where does work most often get stuck?
- Who decides when you disagree?
- What would you change about how your company works?
- What surprised you about other teams?
How the session runs
Two or three practitioners from different functions take one situation — a large order accepted on a tight timeline — and describe it from their own side. The disagreement is the content. Students then map the handovers themselves on a second scenario.
What your students leave with
- An understanding of how functions actually depend on one another
- The handovers where work most often breaks down
- Why two competent teams still produce a bad outcome
- How disagreements between functions get resolved
- A more useful instinct for their own first job
Scheduled sessions
Nothing scheduled yet
Sessions are arranged with a college once a date is agreed. Ask us and we will find the right person for it.
A student rather than a college? See what is coming up, or ask your placement team to host this.
Problems do not belong to departments. They live between them.
Tell us who your students are and what stage they are at. Sessions are free for participants.