To succeed in today's business environment sometimes takes human, technical or financial resources beyond the scope of your reach.

- You may be trying to access new technology.
- You may be trying to leverage your own technology or know-how.
- You may be trying to enter a new market or possibly considering going global.
- You already may be in the early stages of forming an alliance or you may have been in an alliance for years.

During the last twenty years of my career, I successfully brought to fruition a variety of licensing arrangements and joint ventures around the world. More specifically, 55 alliances in more than a dozen countries, and the one thing I've taken away from each of them is that there is one constant: change!

No matter what the parties envision from the outset, things have a way of changing throughout the relationship. Some of the key variables include: the people, the parties' positioning relative to one another, the financial structure, each party's vision of success, government regulations and the overall economy.

The better prepared you are to deal with these changes, the better your chances for success. It doesn't matter what stage you are in now! If you are going to be successful in forging, structuring and managing alliance relationships, you better understand the dynamics affecting your business and your business relationships.

To do so will necessitate that you go through the steps of developing a detailed business plan focusing on both the internal and external challenges (i.e. the changes) that you expect will impact your business during the upcoming plan period.