Level
Strategy development for a new global conservation business
After crafting the name and top-line brand positioning for the new conservation business Level, we worked with them to refine their overall business strategy.
Collaborating with the owners in London and Tanzania, we developed routes to market and enabled the team to craft a bold plan that defined where they would play – and how they could win.
In 2022 we worked with the founders of the successful carbon-credit business Carbon Tanzania to create Level, a new brand that would act as a vehicle for the founders’ plans to develop, sell and manage community-based conservation projects beyond carbon and beyond Tanzania. Since then, the Level team had been reviewing exactly how they should engage with the market for nature-based climate solutions and therefore how they might run their business. When Level told us they were looking for support to refine their business strategy, we were enthusiastic to help.
Examining the present and imagining the future
We started with our B2B Reinvention model, an approach to collaboratively crafting a strategy that focuses on creating meaningful choices for a business. At kickoff, we reviewed the successful strategy for Carbon Tanzania and then worked to define their new ambition, challenges and opportunities clearly. In our first workshop in London, we explored the nature-based solutions market, reviewed the competitive landscape and mapped supporting partners and networks. This allowed us to write a simple but bold strategic question we could take into our next phase of work.
Then, to Tanzania. At a coffee plantation outside Arusha, we convened for two days to imagine ways Level could answer their own carefully considered “how might we” question. We facilitated the workshops with openness, honesty, and creativity and collaborated with Level to ideate bold versions of their future. Of a handful of possible routes brainstormed, three were chosen to focus on for research and testing.
Validating possibilities and building confidence
After an excursion to the Yaeda Valley to experience the beauty of Carbon Tanzania’s flagship project landscape, we moved from uncertainty to clarity by validating the routes, working out which would provide the most value to Level’s customers and stakeholders. Validation combines market insights with client stakeholders' input to clarify conditions, test assumptions and start putting numbers into each possibility. It’s a process of building confidence and determining viability – shaping the case for the route forward.
In our final workshop in London, we reviewed the results of our research and assessed confidence around each route. We landed on two complementary offers that capitalise on Level’s project development expertise and ability to determine the impact of nature-based projects. Within weeks, Level was in the market with its first biodiversity credit offer to develop projects that channel funds from those committed to addressing the climate and biodiversity crises to those whose stewardship protects natural resources. At the same time, they could promote a new approach to evidencing and communicating the demonstrable impacts of their own and others’ nature-based solution projects on community wellbeing, wildlife and climate resilience.
Strategy on a page
The final output of our Reinvention process is the strategy report that outlines how decisions were made and includes the final, polished language and strategy on a page, ensuring Level had the tools to communicate its new approach effectively to employees, partners and investors.
On the same level
Jo Anderson, CEO at Level, says:
“We launched Level, our global conservation business, knowing we had the expertise and network to deliver value through nature-based solutions. Through the Reinvention process, The Frameworks helped us boldly and creatively ideate possibilities for how to shape our offer to the market most effectively. Their guidance, collaboration and know-how helped us achieve clarity and confidence, resulting in a clear, bold strategy for the business.”
.webp)