by Adam L Stanley | May 4, 2017 | Leadership, Quotes and Inspiration, Relationships, Teamwork
Be in it to win it or leave the race.
Nothing good comes from being in the middle of the road. It’s funny we often take for granted little things that have overarching meanings in our everyday life. Take driving. Learning the rules of the road and using them keeps us and others safe while sending a clear message about the direction we’re traveling. What happens when we forget these rules? Ever seen the person flying onto an on ramp and merging into traffic without signaling? Or the person who wants to straddle the line on a thin dual-direction road? On the road and in life one thing is clear: you cannot both be coming and going at the same time. We can do either but the rules of the road force us to make a choice.
And in our career, what happens when we refuse to choose? Many believe we can straddle the professional line without anyone noticing. With one foot in our current role and the other waiting for the next best thing, we remain unaware that our ambivalence reeks.
It is important that we pick a side.
PICK A STRUGGLE
Adam wrote a blog a while back that was titled Don’t Miss your Bernie moment. The message was in general for leaders of organizations that have gone through major periods of change. The Bernie message was one of transition. It was saying to his supporters that the time has come to move on, united against a common evil, and rally together on a new shared mission. That blog was for leaders at the top of newly merged or fundamentally changed organizations. And it should absolutely resonate for many of you out there.
But there is another message and this is for everyone in the organization under such leaders. And the message is basically that once a leader has articulated the new shared vision for the organization you have a decision to make. Either align with that leader and support the mission, helping to drive the continued success of the organization. Or decide that this mission is simply not yours and move on. You need to pick a struggle. You need to pick a side. Just like being in the middle of the road while driving is not a viable option, being in the middle of the road as a member of a team is unacceptable.
Let’s be clear here. We are not at all saying that adherence to the mission of an organization requires a level of abject acceptance of any decisions that are made and any directions that are delivered. The value you bring to an organization is of course diversity of opinions and the ability to provide input into decisions driving the future of your organization. Never change that. However, there is a base level of acceptance that is required of any player on a major team.
Adam is a very big fan of Arsenal Football Club and anyone who knows the English Premier League teams knows that to some extent each team is fundamentally different than other teams. Their leaders are different and their style of play are also different. If someone joins Arsenal, the expectation is they will bring new talent, new ideas, and new strength to the club. However, they will still play under the style and direction that has been developed over dozens of years. They cannot come in and try to be a rock superstar constantly fighting against the leadership or their fellow team members. It simply does not work.
So, you’re at a Crossroads. You joined the company and you worked for a particular leader for years. You respected that leader and admired his or her vision for the future of the company. You now have been placed under a new leader and you dislike your new mission.
It is time to decide.
Our advice for you:
1) Consider what makes you happy at work. Be very honest and open with yourself. Be sure that you are not letting personal friendships or biases get in the way of sound judgment. I have worked for people who are fantastic people that I truly respected and I liked. But they were not always aligned with me strategically or going in the direction that I actually thought was best for our company.
2) Ask lots of questions and truly get to know the new leader. If you suspect there is a fundamental misalignment with your view of strategic direction for the company, do your research. List out your perceived differences and ask questions that get to a point where you can confirm one way or the other. You may actually be surprised both at your misunderstanding of the misalignment or in your leader’s interest and ability to change based on strong feedback
3) Check the grass on the other side. Research other players in your industry and see if they are going in a fundamentally different direction. It could be that your ideas are not aligned with the way the world is shifting. You could be the one on the wrong side of the road. And hey, we’ve all been wrong sometimes. This exploration of the other side will also help you and your decision to stay or leave for another company. If, after all, other companies in your industry will be going in the same direction, you might be left all alone.
4) Change your way of thinking. Adam wrote a blog on Allies on a Tour of Duty, about investing in talent for the long-term. The concept there was around each role being a different opportunity for you to build on particular skills and learn new ones. Never considering that any would be permanent. Change your way of thinking so that this new strategic direction under this new leader is another Tour of Duty. It’s an opportunity for you to prove that your intellect and your skills are transferable and can be applied under different fields of battle.
5) Determine your time horizon. There is a particular amount of time that you will wait it out and try to make it work before one of two things happens. Either you will become so despondent and disengaged that you will be miserable at work and miserable to work with. Or, your performance will suffer and your contributions will decline and instead of leaving on a high you will leave with an impression a failure. When not happy at work, your performance will suffer and your reputation can as well.
6) Just Leave. If you’ve come to the conclusion that it’s simply not going to work or you don’t want it to then you should do yourself and the organization a favor and respectfully exit. Fortunately, we are not tied to any one company and where we decide to work is a choice. Choose to be solid teammate and manager, productive and most of all happy…elsewhere.
Choose Your Side
Staying in the middle of the road is not good for any players involved. Your leadership will be disappointed in your performance and your attitude. Your peers will notice your lack of Engagement. And those that do not know you well will brand that as part of your personality and your skill set. And you will be unhappy and feel increasingly disengaged and alone. That is a position that no one wants to be in at work. Therefore, we encourage you to pick a struggle. Pick a side.
Let us know what you think. Have you been in a situation where your colleague was clearly straddling the middle line? Have you managed someone like that?
Be well. Lead On.
Adam
This blog was coauthored with Apriel Biggs-Coker. These are our views and not necessarily those of the company.
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by Adam L Stanley | Mar 21, 2017 | Leadership, Technology
My #Soapbox: Finding Talent Today
Technology has made many things about our lives better. As a geeky, technology evangelizing, digital dude, I would say technology has made MOST things better. We have quicker communication (sometimes I wish this was not the case). Some work processes are more effective (sadly not all). We can keep costs down in businesses. Scale happens faster. Connections with clients are richer. Analytics more powerful in decision making. And technology has touched essentially every industry. Customer demand shifts, competition from just about everywhere, and an increasingly challenging operational and regulatory environment mean that every company, from the most “manual” to the most high tech are all in essence technology companies. Every business is a technology business now.
One issue, though: technology doesn’t seem to have made recruiting that much better. And, unfortunately, in many companies talent acquisition does not seem to have caught up with the skills that modern businesses need. CIOs out there: How many of your wish lists from your teams still include lots of “old skills”?
Many companies still hire a lot off of competence metrics. Just peruse a list of openings on LinkedIn and dozens of them still list long bullets that would have been on job descriptions 10 years ago: where you went to school, what you studied, years of experience, how much you know about x or y. Makes perfect sense and may not change anytime soon for a lot of our roles. But competence is becoming overrated as a hiring driving force. We live in a VUCA business environment — volatile, uncertain, complex, ambiguous — and technology has allowed executives to open up revenue streams they never thought possible. Priorities and objectives can switch on a dime in some companies. We don’t necessarily need the most competent financial guy in history; we need a financial guy who can switch between different approaches as it’s called for.
In short: less bullet points, more real people with curiosity and skills. What skills? I have a short list and welcome your ideas.
Skills for the Digital Era
1. Analytics: All businesses are running on data now, or trying to. Unfortunately, the talent for understanding, analyzing, and presenting data hasn’t kept up with the need for data-driven decision-making in businesses. This is hitting CEOs hard: as CIO Magazine noted, over 60 percent want to do more with data, but don’t have the right people on board. It’s 2017. Every hiring process needs to have a data analysis component somewhere. Hiring the right one can be tough.
2. Accept inevitability of artificial intelligence: It will probably take your job, or a part of your job, someday. But for now we are taking the last major Industrial Revolution and going through another one, but the new one is compressed into the life span of a dog. You can’t hire people right now who have their heads in the sand about this. Maybe they don’t know how to code robots. That is fine. But they need to know this is coming and need to understand what it will mean for business models.
3. Be at least decent presenting: It’s shifting a bit with a more remote workforce, but we still get ideas/pitches across via presentations. Many people are terrible at presentations but techies tend to be even worse than normal. Not every job needs effective presentation skills, but we should be evaluating candidates based on how well they can get across an idea. If you can’t get across a simple idea or advance a concept, what value will you ultimately be to a business? Especially when, again, every business is a tech business.
4. Understand mobile and targeting: You might think this is just for marketing roles. It’s not. The greatest promise of mobile is that you can find specific consumers literally in the palm of their hand. 2017 job candidates should understand the scale/scope of mobile, how mobile works as a targeting device, and what the hiring company’s business model could/should do with mobile. They may not drive the strategy on it, no, but if they don’t understand it, they’re going to enter the role a few steps behind. And this is not limited to consumer businesses.
5. Demonstrate intellectual curiosity: I am amazed at how many people recruiting for roles today are concerned about “job hoppers” and, perhaps related, how many companies do not encourage continuous movement within a company. IBM, despite recent financial challenges, has created a culture that encourages and almost requires regular movement. For those of you who exercise, you know that half the battle is about continuously “surprising” your muscles, switching it up so your body never gets complacent. Your brain is the same and if a company does not commit to providing you opportunities to stretch and grow it, you will get bored. So shouldn’t every interview include questions that probe intellectual curiosity? In an era where 90% of the world’s data was created in the last two years, I want people that are fascinated by change, not just accepting of it. I blogged a while ago about Hiring for Character and Values. And one of the main targets was the curious.
Let me know what you think. What do you view as key to hiring in this digital era? How do you build the best teams around different types of team members?
Be well. Lead On.
Adam
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by Adam L Stanley | Feb 21, 2017 | Leadership, Life, Relationships
“Too often, companies fail to cultivate relationships with key decision-makers until a crisis hits, at which point it’s too late. Know the cell phone numbers of such people so that you can call them on Sunday night in real time, not after the fact on Monday morning.”
— Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, Former Secretary-General, NATO
Make friends before you need them
I guess this is the easiest way I can say this: you either want a life connection or you don’t.
I wouldn’t say that I’m a “networker” per se, although some people observing me might think I am. Rather, I like to forge long-term connections with people around shared interests — and only some of the time is that standard business. Much more of the time, it’s food, wine, theater, technology, or other passions. Hopefully, you have read my blog on this topic: Aim for life connections instead of networking.
The thing that bothers me in any discussion about relationship-building or standard networking is that often, the lesson seems to be that you connect with people when you need them. I disagree. I don’t want to be called when you need me if you had no interest before that. You either want the life connection or you don’t. It’s not contextual to “I need something now.”
The executive recruiter who placed me in my current role is the same recruiter who placed me in my role at Aon several years ago. He periodically checked in on me and had set a recurring event on his calendar marking the anniversary of my Aon start date. Just over three years ago, he reached out to me on this anniversary and we arranged a breakfast. That breakfast led to the introduction to, and unlikely connection with, my current company. It came as a result of a life connection – a relationship – not because I was looking for a role.
I have other recruiters in my “network” who call and email aggressively when they are trying to fill a role, yet never reach out in between. And how many emails do I get from people who worked for me years ago saying something like “Hi, I know it has been years since we have spoken but I am now looking for a job. Can you help?”
Or how about those family members or friends who don’t reach out to you for years, then one day, ask for money or favors? It happens far too often. Thus, my rant.
Make friends before you need them.
People want to feel needed and loved all the time, and not simply when you want their help or need something. And by “people,” I would definitely include myself.
But how do you do this? Here are a few tips.
Always use social media cheats.
Facebook and LinkedIn remind you of special occasions and make it very easy to say happy birthday or congrats to peeps in your circle. Use them. This is a great, quick way to say hello and it keeps your name fresh in their minds. Use the “you might know” feature too. Every social platform has a variation of this. It turns out that your high school football teammate married someone who works at a company you admire. Reach out immediately. Don’t wait until you decide to pursue a job at that company. By that point, it’s too late.
Buy stamps and custom note cards and use them.
I bought each of my nieces and my nephew 36 thank you notes and urged them to use them throughout the year. That is less than one personal note each week but likely about 34 more than they sent last year. Email is easy and crowded. Online billing and electronic advertising have resulted in snail mail being predominantly political crap and charities. Take advantage of the gap and send a personal card. The average white collar professional gets 120+ emails per day; often it feels like more than that. Email gets lost. A card will not and will ultimately mean more than a few email lines or something on Facebook.
Pick up the phone instead of flipping your middle finger.
Commuting is not fun. More than half of Americans spend at least 40 minutes in their round-trip commute. Nobel laureate Daniel Kahneman and his team found that people find as much happiness in commuting as they do in housework. That pretty much means that the commute stinks.
Do you have to drive everyday and often get stuck in traffic? Use that time for calls NOT related to work. Talking work AND dealing with stress, unless you REALLY like your job, will increase likelihood of road rage. Call someone funny that you haven’t heard from in years. Call the woman you heard started an amazing company this year. Call your allegedly best friend you have likely only touched via texts for at least a week. If you are on a train for your commute, commit to handwriting a note or sending an email to someone with whom you have not connected in 6 months.
Say yes more.
Saying yes to more opportunities opens up a world of new life connections, allowing you to expand your world beyond the immediate circle. While sometimes this may mean going beyond that with which you are normally comfortable, it will open you up to more people who you may be able to help and who may be able to help you. Plus, it helps you live a more optimal life.
Go to those reunions. Accept random coffee requests. Return the call of those headhunters and agree to exploratory interviews. Think about how many work events you go to because you feel you have to. Make at least a similar amount of time available for yoga, small venue concerts, and that pottery class you considered twenty years ago. Actually talk to the parents waiting with you when you pick up your kids from school or attend the soccer match.
Taking a risk and doing something different can be both liberating and empowering. If you normally hesitate when asked, for example, to volunteer for something, saying yes might lead to rewarding personal and professional results today and later on when you need help.
Maintain an events and occasions calendar.
This can be especially relevant if you change jobs frequently. Use Google or a private email server for this given birthdays are for life. Record special dates of coworkers, former coworkers or cool people you meet. Don’t be creepy, but sending a note that says “Hey. Just realized the annual blah Blah blah event is coming up. It was such a pleasure sitting at the table with you and Sally last year I thought I would reach out to see if you were attending this year. Want to join me again?” Simple and not creepy.
Call someone today.
When a job comes up or there’s a chance to start a new company or any other opportunity is “public,” it’s already too late. The core people are already known and in the system contextually. When you need help, or are in the midst of a crisis, it is so much harder to find help in the moment. If you want to be one of those core people for any opportunity, or to be able to connect with help in a crisis, you absolutely need to make friends before you need them.
Be well. Lead On.
Adam
Adam L. Stanley Connections Blog
Technology. Leadership. Food. Life.
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Related Posts:
Change while times are good
Aim for life connections instead of networking
by Adam L Stanley | Jan 24, 2017 | Leadership, Teamwork
I’ve fallen and I can’t get up
Many of my American readers will have seen the commercial with an older woman who has fallen in the bathroom and needs help. “I’ve fallen, and I can’t get up,” she calls out. Luckily, she has Life Alert, a device that allows customers to, in the event of an emergency, simply press a button on a small pendant and call for help. The commercial’s premise is that because this woman had thought about her weaknesses BEFORE she had the fall, she was able to be rescued and live to tell her story.
When do most businesses try to change, or shift something up? (A new revenue stream, new reporting structures, reduction in headcount, etc.) Usually — not always, but definitely the majority of the time — change management efforts come when the company is doing poorly. When things have fallen and they can’t get up! This is logical. Usually change is a reaction to less-than-expected performance, or the belief that the company needs to be shaken up to get back on track.
I came across this thought from Trevor Edwards, the President of NIKE Brand, recently. It speaks to the same idea:
“Most change is driven by poor performance, but rather than waiting for a crisis — consider disrupting the status quo when the numbers are strong. Trying to revamp your business in a crisis can lead to bad decisions. Your thought process will be clearer when things are going well.”
I couldn’t agree more. I also think it applies to both personal and professional life.
Making changes in your personal life
Personally, a lot of people try to make changes when they feel they are at rock bottom. They’ve lost a job, a relationship has ended, a family member or friend dies suddenly, and emotions send them grasping for change. But when you make a change at that point, you’re entirely reacting to the most recent negative event. If you got fired for a specific performance issue, you may over-focus on correcting that performance issue as you look for new jobs. But you may have been great at that aspect of a job; the evaluation may have been subjective, or you may have really been terminated to help the company meet a growth target. Likewise, running away from a job, or any other relationship, because things are bad can lead to a disastrous “boomerang” effect. You may hate the new [fill in the blank] more than the former.
Negativity reduces context. That’s a good reason to consider personal improvements when you’re already feeling good about life. It will give you more perspective.
Applying this to companies
On the professional front, I use the term “tour of duty” a lot. It’s a different way of thinking about the standard employment contract. Basically, you are bringing people in for specific jobs. They do those jobs and they either roll off or they transition onto another team/project. Josh Bersin, a people development thought leader, calls this a “team of teams” approach. You see it commonly in the military and in the consulting industry, and it’s becoming more commonplace elsewhere.
It makes sense because oftentimes, job roles are very unclear. They’re clear at first — the hiring was a response to an immediate need of a hiring manager — but after that need becomes less of a priority, the person hired is still on the books. Sometimes, they can become a 8-to-10-year employee and not have a clear role for much of that time. This limits flexibility of the organization. You can’t do strategic pivots, and you can’t do effective change management, if you have a lot of people locked into intractable, potentially unnecessary roles.
The elephant in the room here is terminations. When we talk about companies changing in the bad times instead of the good times, usually the main way that happens is terminations. These happen for a variety of reasons: companies trying to clear money to prove growth, trying to deal with a performance issue that’s been lingering, or a host of other financial reasons.
Regardless of why the company is embarking on terminations, it’s almost always a bad play. Research has shown layoffs don’t have short or long-term benefits. They’re simply just a reaction to a bad revenue cycle.
If you consider the approach of “change while times are good” and you structure your hiring more as “tour of duty,” I think a lot of these issues can be alleviated. Sadly, the nature of most companies these days isn’t to reward employee longevity. So from an employee side, loyalty has been declining for years as people think they may be better off thinking as independent contractors moving from one project to the next.
Consider the example of Jason Fried, the CEO of Basecamp. They were doing super well in 2014, onboarding 100s of new clients every day. He still decided to radically shift the company and its reporting structures, saying at the time:
“Change is great – as long as it’s not forced change. Forced change is often resented change. When you’re forced to change because things aren’t going well, you’re often rushed and unhappy. When you decide to change when things are going great, you can do it on your own schedule and your own way. That’s what we decided to do – we decided to make this change right now while business has never been better.”
Amen, sir.
Top 3 reasons to change while times are good
Busy executives, especially those who are driving innovation in the digital economy, will continue to struggle with organizational change in the midst of transformation change. BUt the fact is, they are completely interdependent. You cannot lead a major business transformation without a people transformation and vice versa. So, constantly looking at your organization and looking for ways to restructure, rethink, reduce, and redeploy will make you more successful.
In short, there are three major benefits to changing while times are good:
- Priority of focus: The changes occur on your time/schedule, as opposed to a rushed process to meet certain accounting goals.
- Sensitive to employees: Changing in boom periods allows for thoughtful change that’s ultimately considerate of individual impact.
- Smarter: When you change in a good cycle, the decisions will be better and rooted in a clearer thought process.
I know this isn’t always possible, and sometimes in the good periods you just want to ride the train of revenue growth and not think about what can be changed, but I hope the above is a compelling context for why your best quarters are exactly the time to shake things up.
Be well. Lead On.
Adam
Adam L. Stanley Connections Blog
Technology. Leadership. Food. Life.
AdamLStanley.com
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Related Posts:
Disruption: Thinking like our ancestors
Innovations that are Changing our Industry
Disrupters learn from the losers
Riding a wave of change
Yet another blog about Change!
by Adam L Stanley | Nov 21, 2016 | Leadership, Technology, Vendors and Partners
Information-based analytics trump Big Data
I don’t use the term “big data,” which long ago became an overused buzzword anyway along with its cousin “The Cloud”. It’s not that I dont think data is important. Its just that Big Data by itself is like a basket of whole wheat flour without eggs, butter and milk. Just like you can’t eat just the flour, you can’t consume Big Data. You need a recipe to take the raw ingredients and a means to transform it into something yummy.
Recently, the Altus Group CRE Innovation Report showed that 89% of the firms surveyed faced major impediments to collecting and utilizing data to drive improved asset and investment management decision-making. This is in line with previous research that big data may actually be slowing down decision-making, as opposed to making it more effective.
The No. 1 goal of any CIO right now shouldn’t be achieving some big data-tied deliverable. It shouldn’t be implementing a massive data warehouse or finding a big data platform that can gather millions of information points for future analyses. Rather, it is about being smarter. One of my mentors, another executive at Cushman & Wakefield, says that an organization is often like a large brain using about 10% of its capacity. Harnessing the power of the rest should be the goal of any analytics program. So much of the information you really need for effective decision-making lies in the heads of thousands of professionals in dozens of different offices (or homes … or coffee shops … or cars) all over the globe.
The primary goal of a CIO, then, is finding ways for those professionals to come together, share the information they have, and solve complex problems. That may well involve a platform approach, but it’s not necessarily a big data platform.
I prefer to start with the questions, as most good strategy does. In our business, it all begins with: What are some of the models we might be able to build that help our clients more effectively manage their real estate assets? Once we have the right questions defined, we build the data models and refine existing — or create new — data collection mechanisms. In this way, instead of “big data” we can focus on “information-based analytics” that more immediately drive value in decision-making.
Silos are a large part of the problem
The Altus report found a lack of integrated data approaches. 80% of firms surveyed said their business could eliminate or reduce data silos through better integration and standardization. Four out of every 5 people complaining about silos, especially in an era where firms compete largely on data, is a very telling number. But it is also a sad reality. Many organizations are formed from a series of acquisitions. Over time, legacy systems build up and a patchwork quilt of interfaces is developed to keep them humming in unison.
But these patchwork quilts do not have to constrain or define your analytics strategy and practices. Instead, I try to think like a startup. Startups often gain that disruptive edge because their decision-making is better and faster, and they can move to market (and refine once there) quicker than an enterprise, legacy company. In the course of this happening, startups are often building their own analytic systems — as opposed to relying on third-party vendors. Why can’t this happen in legacy companies? The reason you hear most is “process”. And that is in fact a major problem. Sometimes we let process overwhelm actual notions of productivity, which is a bad play for all involved. Process should only exist to better business performance, not to hinder it or run your people in circles.
Data integration and standardization is obviously a challenge for firms, but the bigger challenge is a concept we don’t discuss as much: data model and taxonomy standardization. If one business unit thinks in terms of cost per square utilized foot and another one thinks cost per square gross foot but both simply refer to their data as cost per square foot, the analysis will be off because the data is off. Disparate systems with a common data taxonomy can get you pretty far. On the other hand, one global system with multiple data taxonomies can lead to bad analysis. You may have won the battle but you will lose the war.
This may sound corny, but it’s totally true: data is power, but only if used for good. Stephen Dubner, famous from Freakonomics, has been discussing this idea for years. We have a tendency in business towards more, more, more, but in this case it doesn’t work. That’s another reason I don’t like the term big data. Just collecting data essentially for the sake of having it, with no end goal in mind around improved decisions or processes, is complete folly.
The challenge for our industry is this: how do we take the lessons of the investment shops, insurance brokerages, and even the residential real estate business and translate it into what we do, while at the same time not losing the connection with tremendous local leaders?
I think we’ll continue to see more approaches around data — look at a model like Zillow and the amount of data they crunch — but my hope is that this idea of “big data” fades into buzzword obscurity and we focus on the right things at the CIO level. We should be connecting stakeholders and moving towards information-based analytics.
Be well. Lead On.
Adam
Related Posts:
Disruption: Thinking like our ancestors
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Adam L. Stanley Connections Blog
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by Adam L Stanley | Oct 24, 2016 | Leadership, Technology
Technology leaders must think like Disruptors
A decade ago, the five most valuable companies on the S&P 500 were Exxon, GE, Microsoft, Gazprom, and Citigroup. Now? It’s Apple, Alphabet (Google), Amazon, Microsoft, and Facebook. Things change. And they change fast. And many technology leaders are not ready for it. In some ways, none of us are.
Amazon is maybe the ultimate disruptive company; it essentially ushered along a completely new way of thinking about commerce. But interestingly, before Amazon started there was another disrupter called Webvan. In 1999, myself and a group of fellow Wharton MBA students in an e-commerce course won a prize in a contest sponsored by Salomon Smith Barney. (There are so many elements of irony in this but I will save that for another blog.) Our topic? Webvan vs Albertsons: How e-commerce will disrupt brick and mortar grocers. Our conclusion was that the bricks would always be around to some extent but that everyone would become more comfortable with buying groceries online thanks to Webvan. We were right about some of that! More important at the time is that the now defunct brand sponsored our $1000 per team member prize!
Perhaps the ultimate success of Amazon is the fact they learned from the mistakes of their Webvan predecessor. Webvan is the best example of a company that tried and failed at a bold attempt to disrupt a stodgy industry. It raised $375 million in its IPO, achieved a peak stock market value of $1.2 billion, then flamed out spectacularly before filing for bankruptcy in July 2001.
Facebook completely disrupted how we think about relationships and staying connected to friends and family. But before them there was MySpace. Google and Apple, in their own ways, did the same for accessing and sharing information. But they borrowed heavily from the playbooks, both winning and losing games, of Alta Vista, BlackBerry, and Apple 1.0 (remember Jobs was fired by Apple?)
In my career, I’ve met plenty of leaders and managers — up through the executive level — who absolutely think disruption isn’t real, or won’t come for them. And I have met several techies and startup guys who are on their 10th attempt and think everything is ripe for disruption. They are both wrong to some extent. There are some industries that are just begging to be disrupted: real estate title companies and public education come to mind (sorry if the latter offends).There are certain industries that would be a little bit harder to disrupt. Airlines come to mind, because the cost of entry is massive. But … you could argue Southwest disrupted the airline industry to some extent. Their stock is still mostly hot, too.
The reality is that anything CAN be disrupted. Mind blowing statistic for amateur corporate historians: 88% of the 1955 Fortune 500 doesn’t exist anymore. You can argue that 1955 was a long time ago and business models are obviously very different, and you’d be right — but you’d also be proving my point. To quote Varsity Blues, a B-movie that came out right around the time Webvan was imploding: “Things change, Mox.” We’re all candidates for disruption to some extent.
That is going to require a new way for technology leaders, CIOs, CTOs, and others with decision-making oversight to approach their day-to-day jobs. What might that look like? Here are six ways I see it shifting.
Scenario planning: We will constantly prepare for disruption or downturns by thinking through our potential reaction to certain market events. We’ve ideally been doing this for years, but too many CIOs are still spending part of their supposedly strategic time just putting out fires.
New business models. We must continue building a closer relationship with the business units. We can’t be seen as “IT” or “infrastructure.” It needs to be baked in. My current team is talking to as many external clients as we can, along with our colleagues, so that we better understand demand. We must continue to think about new ways of working and new business models for delivering services.
Experimentation. We must be comfortable with taking risks and failing fast. We must try out new things and not be afraid of the possibility of experimenting and throwing away. The best unicorns started off as 10, 20, 30, or 150 failed ideas. If you want a good read on making (tons of) money despite massive failure at some points in the past, check this out from HBR.
New org model. We must cease the “us” versus “them” thinking that has corporate IT and the business operating as separate entities. We are partners driving value. It’s that simple. I disdain the use of the word “The Business” as “Clients” of IT. We are all colleagues working together to drive value for external customers and profitable growth for the company.
Invest in talent. We must begin to compete for the software engineers, user experience designers, and innovators that are currently going to the startups and the more Innovative companies. In order for us to change we must invest in new talent as well as training our existing talent to think differently. This is hard for many technology executives who came up in a world where products and processes were paramount to people.
What else would you add about how technology leaders in enterprise can think differently about potential disruptive forces?
Be well. Lead On.
Adam
Related Posts:
Disruption: Thinking like our ancestors
Riding a Wave of Change
Innovations Changing Our Industry
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4) Change your way of thinking. Adam wrote a blog on Allies on a Tour of Duty, about investing in talent for the long-term. The concept there was around each role being a different opportunity for you to build on particular skills and learn new ones. Never considering that any would be permanent. Change your way of thinking so that this new strategic direction under this new leader is another Tour of Duty. It’s an opportunity for you to prove that your intellect and your skills are transferable and can be applied under different fields of battle.
Technology has made many things about our lives better. As a geeky, technology evangelizing, digital dude, I would say technology has made MOST things better. We have quicker communication (sometimes I wish this was not the case). Some work processes are more effective (sadly not all). We can keep costs down in businesses. Scale happens faster. Connections with clients are richer. Analytics more powerful in decision making. And technology has touched essentially every industry. Customer demand shifts, competition from just about everywhere, and an increasingly challenging operational and regulatory environment mean that every company, from the most “manual” to the most high tech are all in essence technology companies. 
1. Analytics: All businesses are running on data now, or trying to. Unfortunately, the talent for understanding, analyzing, and presenting data 
4. Understand mobile and targeting: 
5. Demonstrate intellectual curiosity: I am amazed at how many people recruiting for roles today are concerned about “job hoppers” and, perhaps related, how many companies do not encourage continuous movement within a company. IBM, despite recent financial challenges, has created a culture that encourages and almost requires regular movement. For those of you who exercise, you know that half the battle is about continuously “surprising” your muscles, switching it up so your body never gets complacent. Your brain is the same and if a company does not commit to providing you opportunities to stretch and grow it, you will get bored. So shouldn’t every interview include questions that probe intellectual curiosity? In an era where 90% of the world’s data was created in the last two years, I want people that are fascinated by change, not just accepting of it. I blogged a while ago about 
Use the “you might know” feature too. Every social platform has a variation of this. It turns out that your high school football teammate married someone who works at a company you admire. Reach out immediately. Don’t wait until you decide to pursue a job at that company. By that point, it’s too late.
On the professional front, I use the term “tour of duty” a lot. It’s a different way of thinking about the standard employment contract. Basically, you are bringing people in for specific jobs. They do those jobs and they either roll off or they transition onto another team/project. Josh Bersin, a people development thought leader, 
Top 3 reasons to change while times are good
I don’t use the term “big data,” which long ago 
This may sound corny, but it’s totally true: data is power, but only if used for good. Stephen Dubner, famous from Freakonomics, 
Perhaps the ultimate success of Amazon is the fact they 
In my career, I’ve met plenty of leaders and managers — up through the executive level — who absolutely think disruption isn’t real, or won’t come for them. And I have met several techies and startup guys who are on their 10th attempt and think everything is ripe for disruption. They are both wrong to some extent. There are some industries that are just begging to be disrupted: real estate title companies and public education come to mind (sorry if the latter offends).There are certain industries that would be a little bit harder to disrupt. Airlines come to mind, because the cost of entry is massive. But … you could argue Southwest disrupted the airline industry to some extent. 
Experimentation. We must be comfortable with taking risks and failing fast. We must try out new things and not be afraid of the possibility of experimenting and throwing away. The best unicorns started off as 10, 20, 30, or 150 failed ideas. If you want a good read on making (tons of) money despite massive failure at some points in the past,