by Adam Hartung | Sep 25, 2012 | Disruptions, In the Rapids, Innovation, Leadership, Transparency, Web/Tech
I like writing about tech companies, such as Apple and Facebook, because they show how fast you can apply innovation and grow – whether it is technology, business process or new best practices. But many people aren't in the tech industry, and think innovation applies a lot less to them.
Whoa there cowboy, innovation is important to you too!
Few industries are as mired in outdated practices and slow to adopt technology than construction. Whether times are good, or not, contractors and tradespeople generally do things the way they've been done for decades. Even customers like to see bids where the practices are traditional and time-worn, often eschewing innovations simply because they like the status quo.
Skanska, a $19B construction firm headquarted in Stockholm, Sweden with $6B of U.S. revenue managed from the New York regional HQ refused to accept this. When Bill Flemming, President of the Building Group recognized that construction industry productivity had not improved for 40 years, he reckoned that perhaps the weak market wasn't going to get better if he just waited for the economy to improve. He was sure that field-based ideas could allow Skanska to be better than competitors, and open new revenue sources.
Skanska USA CEO Mike McNally agreed instantly. In 2009 he brought together his management team to see if they would buy into investing in innovation. He met the usual objections
- We're too busy
- I have too much on my plate
- Business is already too difficult, I don't need something new
- Customers aren't asking for it, they want lower prices
- Who's going to pay for it? My budget is already too thin!
But, he also recognized that nobody said "this is crazy." Everyone knew there were good things happening in the organization, but the learning wasn't being replicated across projects to create any leverage. Ideas were too often tried once, then dropped, or not really tried in earnest. Mike and Bill intuitively believed innovation would be a game changer. As he discussed implementing innovation with his team he came to saying "If Apple can do this, we can too!"
Even though this wasn't a Sweden (or headquarters) based project, Mike decided to create a dedicated innovation group, with its own leader and an initial budget of $500K – about .5% of the Building Group total overhead.
The team started with a Director of innovation, plus a staff of 2. They were given the white space to find field based ideas that would work, and push them. Then build a process for identifying field innovations, testing them, investing and implementing. From the outset they envisaged a "grant" program where HQ would provide field-based teams with money to test, develop and create roll-out processes for innovations.
Key to success was finding the right first project. And quickly the team knew they had one in one of their initial field projects called Digital Resource Center, which could be used at all construction sites. This low-cost, rugged PC-based product allowed sub-contractors around the site to view plans and all documentation relevant for their part of the project without having to make frequent trips back to the central construction trailer.
This saved a lot of time for them, and for Skanska, helping keep the project moving quickly with less time wasted talking. And at a few thousand dollars per station, the payback was literally measured in days. Other projects were quick to adopt this "no-brainer." And soon Skanska was not only seeing faster project completion, but subcontractors willing to bake in better performance on their bids knowing they would be able to track work and identify key information on these field-based rugged PCs.
As Skanska's Innovation Group started making grants for additional projects they set up a process for receiving, reviewing and making grants. They decided to have a Skansa project leader on each grant, with local Skansa support. But also each grant would team with a local university which would use student and faculty to help with planning, development, implementation and generate return-on-investment analysis to demonstrate the innovation's efficacy. This allowed Skansa to bring in outside expertise for better project development and implementation, while also managing cost effectively.
With less than 2 years of Innovation Group effort, Skanska has now invested $1.5M in field-based projects. The focus has been on low-cost productivity improvements, rather than high-cost, big bets. Changing the game in construction is a process of winning through lots of innovations that prove themselves to customers and suppliers rather than trying to change a skeptical group overnight. Payback has been almost immediate for each grant, with ROI literally in the hundreds of percent.
You likely never heard of Skanska, despite its size. And that's because its in the business of building bridges, subway stations and other massive projects that we see, but know little about. They are in an industry known for its lack of innovation, and brute-force approach to getting things done.
But the leadership team at Skanska is proving that anyone can apply innovation for high rates of return. They
- understood that industry trends were soft, and they needed to change if they wanted to thrive.
- recognized that the best ideas for innovation would not come from customers, but rather from scanning the horizon for new ideas and then figuring out how to implement themselves
- weren't afraid to try doing something new. Even if the customer wasn't asking for it
- created a dedicated team (and it didn't have to be large) operating in white space, focused on identifying innovations, reviewing them, funding them and bringing in outside resources to help the projects succeed
In addition to growing its traditional business, Skanska is now something of a tech company. It sells its Digital Resource stations, making money directly off its innovation. And its iSite Monitor for monitoring environmental conditions on sensitive products, and pushing results to Skanska project leaders as well as clients in real time with an app on their iPhones, is also now a commercial product.
So, what are you waiting on? You'll never grow, or make returns, like Apple if you don't start innovating. Take some lessons from Skanska and you just might be a lot more successful.
by Adam Hartung | Mar 29, 2012 | Current Affairs, Disruptions, Innovation, Leadership, Lock-in, Openness, Transparency
No businessperson thinks the way to solve a business problem is via the courts. And no issue is larger for American business than health care. Despite all the hoopla over the Supreme Court reviews this week, this is a lousy way for America to address an extremely critical area.
The growth of America's economy, and its global competitiveness, has a lot riding on health care costs. Looking at the table, below, it is clear that the U.S. is doing a lousy job at managing what is the fastest growing cost in business (data summarized from 24/7 Wall Street.)
While America is spending about $8,000 per person, the next 9 countries (in per person cost) all are grouped in roughly the $4,000-$5,000 cost — so America is 67-100% more costly than competitors. This affects everything America sells – from tractors to software services – forcing higher prices, or lower margins. And lower margins means less resources for investing in growth!
American health care is limiting the countries overall economic growth capability by consuming dramatically more resources than our competitors. Where American spends 17.4% of GDP (gross domestic product) on health care, our competitors are generally spending only 11-12% of their resources. This means America is "taxing" itself an extra 50% for the same services as our competitive countries. And without demonstrably superior results. That is money which Americans would gain more benefit if spent on infrastructure, R&D, new product development or even global selling!
Americans seem to be fixated on the past. How they used to obtain health care services 50 years ago, and the role of insurance 50 years ago. Looking forward, health care is nothing like it was in 1960. The days of "Dr. Welby, MD" serving a patient's needs are long gone. Now it takes teams of physicians, technicians, nurses, diagnosticians, laboratory analysts and buildings full of equipment to care for patients. And that means America needs a medical delivery system that allows the best use of these resources efficiently and effectively if its citizens are going to be healthier, and move into the life expectancies of competitive countries.
Unfortunately, America seems unwilling to look at its competitors to learn from what they do in order to be more effective. It would seem obvious that policy makers and those delivering health care could all look at the processes in these other 9 countries and ask "what are they doing, how do they do it, and across all 9 what can we see are the best practices?"
By studying the competition we could easily learn not only what is being done better, but how we could improve on those practices to be a world leader (which, clearly, we now are not.) Yet, for the most part those involved in the debate seem adamant to ignore the competition – as if they don't matter. Even though the cost of such blindness is enormous.
Instead, way too much time is spent asking customers what they want. But customers have no idea what health care costs. Either they have insurance, and don't care what specific delivery costs, or they faint dead away when they see the bill for almost any procedure. People just know that health care can be really good, and they want it. To them, the cost is somebody else's problem. That offers no insight for creating an effective yet simultaneously efficient system.
America needs to quit thinking it can gradually evolve toward something better. As Clayton Christensen points out in his book "The Innovator's Prescription: A Disruptive Solution for Health Care" America could implement health care very differently. And, as each year passes America's competitiveness falls further behind – pushing the country closer and closer to no choice but being disruptive in health care implementation. That, or losing its vaunted position as market leader!
Is the "individual mandate" legal? That seems to be arguable. But, it is disruptive. It seems the debate centers more on whether Americans are willing to be disruptive, to do something different, than whether they want to solve the problem. Across a range of possibilities, anything that disrupts the ways of the past seems to be argued to death. That isn't going to solve this big, and growing, problem. Americans must become willing to accept some radical change.
The simple approach would be to look at programs in Oregon, Massachusetts and all the states to see what has worked, and what hasn't worked as well. Instead of judging them in advance, they could be studied to learn. Then America could take on a series of experiments. In isolated locations. Early adopter types could "opt in" on new alternative approaches to payment, and delivery, and see if it makes them happy. And more stories could be promulgated about how alternatives have worked, and why, helping everyone in the country remove their fear of change by seeing the benefits achieved by early leaders.
Health care delivery, and its cost, in America is a big deal. Just like the oil price shocks in the 1970s roiled cost structures and threatened the economy, unmanagable health care delivery and cost threatens the country's economic future. American's surely don't expect a handful of lawyers in black robes to solve the problem.
America needs to learn from its competition, be willing to disrupt past processes and try new approaches that forge a solution which not only delivers better than anyone else (a place where America does seem to still lead) but costs less. If America could be the first on the moon, first to create the PC and first to connect everyone on smartphones this is a problem which can be solved – but not by attorneys or courts!
by Adam Hartung | Jan 22, 2012 | Defend & Extend, In the Rapids, Innovation, Leadership, Lock-in, Transparency, Web/Tech
Turning over a new year inevitably leads to selections for "CEO of the Year." Investor Business Daily selected Larry Page of Google 3 weeks ago, and last week Marketwatch.com selected Jeff Bezos of Amazon. Comparing the two is worthwhile, because there is almost nothing similar about what the two have done – and one is almost sure to dramatically outperform the other.
Focusing on the Future
What both share is a willingness to focus their companies on the future. Both have introduced major new products, targeted at developing new markets and entirely new revenue streams for their companies. Both have significantly sacrificed short-term profits seeking long-term strategic positioning for sustainable, higher future returns. Both have, and continue to, spend vast sums of money in search of competitive advantage for their organizations.
And both have seen their stock value clobbered. In 2011 Amazon rose from $150/share low to almost $250 before collapsing at year's end to about $175 – actually lower than it started the calendar year. Google's stock dropped from $625/share to below $475 before recovering all the way to $670 – only to crater all the way to $585 last week. Clearly the analysts awarding these CEOs were looking way beyond short-term investor returns when making their selections. So it is more important than ever we understand what both have done, and are planning to do in the future, if we are to support either, or both, as award winners. Or buy their stock.
Google participates in great growth markets
The good news for Google is its participation in high growth markets. Search ads continue growing, supplying the bulk of revenues and profits for the company. Its Android product gives Google great position in mobile devices, and supporting Chrome applications help clients move from traditional architectures and applications to cloud-based solutions at lower cost and frequently higher user satisfaction. Additionally, Google is growing internet display ad sales, a fast growing market, by increasing participation in social networks.
Because Google is in high growth markets, its revenues keep growing healthily. But CEO Page's "focus" leadership has led to the killing of several products, retrenching from several markets, and remarkably huge bets in 2 markets where Google's revenues and profits lag dramatically – mobile devices and search.
Because Android produces no revenue Google bought near-bankrupt Motorola to enter the hardware and applications business becoming similar to Apple – a big bet using some old technology against what is the #1 technology company on the planet. Whether this will be a market share winner for Google, and whether it will make or lose money, is far from certain.
Simultaneously, the Google+ launch is an attempt to take on the King Kong of social – Facebook – which has 800million users and remarkable success. The Google+ effort has been (and will continue to be) very expensive and far from convincing. Its product efforts have even angered some people as Google tried steering social networkers rather heavy-handidly toward Google products – as it did with "Search plus Your World" recently.
Mr. Page has positioned Google as a gladiator in some serious "battles to the death" that are investment intensive. Google must keep fighting the wounded, hurting and desperate Microsoft in search against Bing+Yahoo. While Google is the clear winner, desperate but well funded competitors are known to behave suicidally, and Google will find the competition intensive. Meanwhile, its offerings in mobile and social are not unique. Google is going toe-to-toe with Apple and Facebook with products which show no great superiority. And the market leaders are wildly profitable while continuously introducing new innovations. It will be tough fighting in these markets, consuming lots of resources.
Entering 3 gladiator battles simultaneously is ambitious, to say the least. Whether Google can afford the cost, and can win, is debatable. As a result it only takes a small miss, comparing actual results to analyst expectations, for investors to run – as they did last week.
Amazon redefines competition in its markets
CEO Bezos' leadership at Amazon is very different. Rather than gladiator wars, Amazon brings out products that are very different and avoids head-to-head competition. Amazon expands new markets by meeting under- or unserved needs with products that change the way customers behave – and keeps competitors from attacking Amazon head-on:
- Amazon moved from simply selling books to selling a vast array of products on the web. It changed retail buying not by competing directly with traditional retailers, but by offering better (and different) on-line solutions which traditional retailers ignored or adopted far too slowly. Amazon was very early to offer web solutions for independent retailers to use the Amazon site, and was very early to offer a mobile interface making shopping from smartphones fast and easy. Because it wasn't trying to defend and extend a traditional brick-and-mortar retail model, like Wal-Mart, Amazon has redefined retail and dramatically expanded shopping on-line.
- Amazon changed the book market with Kindle. It utilized new technology to do what publishers, locked into traditional mindsets (and business models) would not do. As the print market struggled, Amazon moved fast to take the lead in digital publishing and media sales, something nobody else was doing, producing fast revenue growth with higher margins.
- When retailers were loath to adopt tablets as a primary interface for shoppers, Amazon brought out Kindle Fire. Cleverly the Kindle Fire is not directly positioned against the king of all tablets – iPad – but rather as a product that does less, but does things like published media and retail very well — and at a significantly lower price. It brings the new user on-line fast, if they've been an Amazon customer, and makes life simple and easy for them. Perhaps even easier than the famously easy Apple products.
In all markets Amazon moves early and deftly to fulfill unmet needs at a very good price. And then it captures more and more customers as the solution becomes more powerful. Amazon finds ways to compete with giants, but not head-on, and thus rapidly grow revenues and market position while positioning itself as the long term winner. Amazon has destroyed all the big booksellers – with the exception of Barnes & Noble which doesn't look too great – and one can only wonder what its impact in 5 years will be on traditional retailers like Kohl's, Penney's and even Wal-Mart. Amazon doesn't have to "win" a battle with Apple's iPad to have a wildly successful, and profitable, Kindle offering.
The successful CEO's role is different than many expect
A recent RHR International poll of 83 mid-tier company CEOs (reported at Business Insider) discovered that while most felt prepared for the job, most simultaneously discovered the requirements were not what they expected. In the past we used to think of a CEO as a steward, someone to be very careful with investor money. And someone expected to know the business' core strengths, then be very selective to constantly reinforce those strengths without venturing into unknown businesses.
But today markets shift quickly. Technology and global competition means all businesses are subject to market changes, with big moves in pricing, costs and customer expectations, very fast. Caretaker CEOs are being crushed – look at Kodak, Hostess and Sears. Successful CEOs have to guide their businesses away from investing in money-losing businesses, even if they are part of the company's history, and toward rapidly growing opportunities created by being part of the shift. Disruptors are now leading the success curve, while followers are often sucking up a lot of profit-killing dust.
Amazon bears similarities to the Apple of a decade ago. Introducing new products that are very different, and changing markets. It is competing against traditional giants, but with very untraditional solutions. It finds unmet needs, and fills them in unique ways to capture new customers – and creates market shifts.
Google, on the other hand, looks a lot like the lumbering Microsoft. It has a near monopoly in a growing market, but its investments in new markets come late, and don't offer a lot of innovation. Google's products end up competing directly, somewhat like xBox did with other game consoles, in very, very expensive – usually money-losing – competition that can go on for years. Google looks like a company trying to use money rather than innovation to topple an existing market leader, and killing a lot of good product ideas to keep pouring money into markets where it is late and not terribly creative.
Which CEO do you think will be the winner in 2015? Into which company are you prepared to invest? Both are in high growth markets, but they are being led very, very differently. And their strategies could not be more different. Which one you choose to own – as a product customer or investor – will have significant consequences for you (and them) in 3 years.
It's worth taking the time to decide which you think is the right leadership today. And be sure you know what leadership principles you are adopting, and following in your organization.
by Adam Hartung | Jan 10, 2011 | Defend & Extend, Disruptions, Innovation, Leadership, Web/Tech
Summary:
- Communication is now global, instantaneous and free
- As a result people, and businesses, now adopt innovation more quickly than ever
- Competitors adapt much quicker, and react much stronger than ever in history
- Profits are squeezed by competitors rapidly adopting innovations
- But many business leaders avoid disruptions, leading to slower growth and declining returns
- To maintain, and grow, revenues and profits you must be willing to implement disruptions in order to stay ahead of fast moving competitors
- Amidst fast shifting markets, greatest value (P/E multiple and market cap) is given to those companies that create disruptions (like Facebook, Groupon, Twitter)
All business leaders know the pace of competitive change has increased.
It took decades for everyone to obtain an old-fashioned land line telephone. Decades for everyone to buy a TV. And likewise, decades for color TV adoption. Microwave ovens took more than a decade. Thirty years ago the words “long distance” implied a very big cost, even if it was a call from just a single interchange away (not even an area code away – just a different set of “prefix” numbers.) People actually wrote letters, and waited days for responses! Social change, and technology adoption, took a lot longer – and was considered expensive.
Now we assume communications at no cost with colleagues, peers, even competitors not only across town state, or nation, but across the globe! Communication – whether email, or texting, or old fashioned voice calls – has become free and immediate. (Consider Skype if you want free phone calls [including video no less] and use a PC at your local library or school building if you don’t own one.) Factoring inflation, it is possible to provide every member of a family of 5 with instant phone, email and text communication real-time, wirelessly, 24×7, globally for less than my parents paid for a single land-line, local-exchange only (no long distance) phone 50 years ago! And these mobile devices can send pictures!
As a result, competitors know more about each other a whole lot faster, and take action much more quickly, than ever in history. Facebook, for example, is now connecting hundreds of millions of people with billions of communications every day. According to statistics published on Facebook.com, every 20 minutes the Facebook website produces:
- 1,000,000 shared links
- 1,323,000 tagged photos
- 1,484,000 event invitations
- 1,587,000 Wall posts
- 1,851,000 Status updates
- 1,972,000 Friend requests accepted
- 2,716,000 photos uploaded
- 4,632,000 messages
- 10,208,000 comments
Multiply those numbers by 3 to get hourly. By 72 to get daily. Big numbers! Alexander Graham Bell had to invent the hardware and string thousands of miles of cable to help people communicate with his disruption. His early “software” were thousands of “operators” connecting calls through central switchboards. Mark Zuckerberg and friends only had to create a web site using existing infrastructure and existing tools to create theirs. Rapidly adopting, and using, existing innovations allowed Facebook’s founders to create a disruptive innovation of their own! Disruption has allowed Facebook to thrive!
Facebook has disrupted the way we communicate, learn, buy and sell. “Word of mouth” referrals are now possible from friends – and total strangers. Product benefits and problems are known instantaneously. Networks of people arguably have more influence that TV networks! Many employees are likely to make more facebook communications in a day than have conversations with co-workers! Facebook (or twitter) is rapidly becoming the new “water cooler.” Only it is global and has inputs from anyone. Yet only a fraction of businesses have any plans for using Facebook – internally or to be more competitive!
Far too many business leaders are unwilling to accept, adopt, invest in or implement disruptions.
InnovateOnPurpose.com highlights why in “Why Innovation Makes Executives Uncomfortable:”
- Innovation is part art, and not all science. Many execs would like to think they can run a business like engineering a bridge. They ignore the fact that businesses implement in society, and innovation is where we use the social sciences to help us gain insight into the future. Success requires more than just extending the past – because market shifts happen. If you can’t move beyond engineering principles you can’t lead or manage effectively in a fast-changing world where the rules are not fixed.
- Innovation requires qualitative insights not just quantitative statistics. Somewhere in the last 50 years the finance pros, and a lot of expensive strategy consultants, led business leaders to believe that if they simply did enough number crunching they could eliminate all risk and plan a guaranteed great future. Despite hundreds of math PhDs, that approach did not work out so well for derivative investors – and killed Lehman Brothers (and would have killed AIG insurance had the government not bailed it out.) Math is a great science, and numbers are cool, but they are insufficient for success when the premises keep changing.
- Innovation requires hunches, not facts. Well, let’s say more than a hunch. Innovation requires we do more scenario planning about the future, rather than just pouring over historical numbers and expecting projections to come true. We don’t need crystal balls to recognize there will be change, and to develop scenario plans that help us prepare for change. Innovation helps us succeed in a dynamic world, and implementation requires a willingness to understand that change is inevitable, and opportunistic.
- Innovation requires risks, not certainties. Unfortunately, there are NO certainties in business. Even the status quo plan is filled with risk. It’s not that innovation is risky, but rather that planning systems (ERP systems, CRM systems, all systems) are heavily biased toward doing more of the same – not something new! Markets can shift incredibly fast, and make any success formula obsolete. But most executives would rather fail doing the same thing faster, working harder, doing what used to work, than implement changes targeted at future market needs. Leaders perceive following the old strategy is less risky, when in reality it’s loaded with risk too! Too many businesses have failed at the hands of low-risk, certainty seeking leadership unable to shift with changing markets (GM, Chrysler, Circuit City, Fannie Mae, Brach’s, Sun Microsystems, Quest, the old AT&T, Lucent, AOL, Silicon Graphics, Yahoo, to name a few.)
Markets are shifting all around us. Faster than imaginable just 2 decades ago. Leaders, strategists and planners that enter 2011 hoping they can win by doing more, better, faster, cheaper will have a very tough time. That is the world of execution, and modern communication makes execution incredibly easy to copy, incredibly fast. Even Wal-Mart, ostensibly one of the best execution-oriented companies of all time, has struggled to grow revenue and profit for a decade. Today, companies that thrive embrace disruption. They are willing to disrupt within their organizations to create new ideas, and they are willing to take disruptive opportunities to market. Compare Apple to Dell, or Netflix to Blockbuster.
Recent investments have valued Facebook at $50B, Groupon at $6B and Twitter at almost $4B. Apple is now the second most valuable company (measured by market capitalization). Why? Because they are disrupting the way we do things. To thrive (perhaps survive by 2015) requires moving beyond the status quo, overcoming the perceived risk of innovation (and change) and taking the actions necessary to provide customers what they want in the future! Any company can thrive if it embraces the disruptions around it, and uses them to create a few disruptions of its own.
by Adam Hartung | Dec 27, 2010 | General, In the Rapids, Leadership, Web/Tech
"Too Add Value Through IT, Pick Up the Ball" headlines my latest article published by IDG group. For years IT leaders thought their job was to "keep the joint running." Today, that's insufficient. Nobody can avoid being part of the growth agenda if they are to be a successful leader or manager.
To drive success, and keep their jobs, IT leaders now have to move beyond simply being defensive. Keeping the systems running, and cutting operating costs, is not enough to be a great CIO. Too many have ended up outsourcing almost everything in order to lower costs, only to discover that IT becomes far too rigid and unable to support market needs when so many services are outsourced to third parties.
Today's CIO has to spend more time figuring out how to flexibly, adaptively, bring new solutions to both insiders and customers. It's important CIOs not just track historical (and accounting) data, but behave like the offensive team, identifying and tracking considerably more market-based data. And creating various future scenarios to help the company spot trends and opportunities. On top of this, IT must demonstrate how using emerging solutions – from Salesforce.com to Groupon, Foursquare and Facebook (examples) – can reach more customers, faster – driving higher revenues.
Read how important it is for IT to become part of the growth engine at one of the locations where this article has been published:
@ CIO Magazine – @ PC World – @ Network World – @ IT World Canada – @ CIO Australia – @ ComputerWorld Norway
Additionally, read my latest article on effective strategic planning – for IT or any part of the organization – published by the Strategic Planning Society of the UK "Disrupting the Marketplace". This article describes how to add maximum value, growing revenue, cash flow and profits, by identifying and implementing opportunities to disrupt the marketplace. And allowing those disruptions to invade your own organization for more dynamism.
