The “new economy” is a term coined over 15 years ago and yet, despite its monumental impact and importance, it is a business concept and point of view still not very well understood. Almost assuredly, its scope is significantly misunderstood and its essential premise confused and diluted.
Simply put – the rules have changed.
Size and scale no longer matter. The current belief is that ultimate “victory” will go to those who understand that speed, agility and originality are what will create sustainable performance in the 21st century.
The bottom line?
Watch what you watch.
Watch what you measure.
Watch what others are watching and measuring.
Yesterday is gone and will not return. Even large doses of nostalgia will not help your organization thrive or survive. The drivers of business success have changed with the times.
Choose your battle:
- Share of market – leads to an ever smaller piece of the pie
- Share of wallet works – so long as there is a wallet to open.
The future of business rests in improving your share of opportunity.
Opportunity to produce new products and services. Opportunity to meet new customers. Opportunity to make mistakes, and fix them. Opportunity to re-invent your organization, always outpacing the competitors.
The key today is to understand the new order – the new economy. To capitalize on a strategy that focuses on increasing your share of opportunity, you must understand that opportunity runs on one type of fuel. Opportunity runs on a single, high-octane, unleaded, rocket fuel.
In the business world this fuel is called – ideas.
We believe too many organizations today are spending far too much time searching in vain for the next “home run” concept or business proposition. They seem single-mindedly obsessed with discovering a new concept that will completely redefine who they are, what they do, and how they do it.
Instead, they should be looking at ideas, and how they might support and augment each other. Author and social observer Frans Johansson suggests there is a much different and more effective way of finding new ideas. His theory is based on the belief that it is two existing concepts or ideas which meet at what he calls an “intersection” that have the tremendous potential to be combined into that elusive breakthrough concept.
