ENSURING CONTINUAL BUSINESS VIBRANCY VIA PROACTIVITY AND CREATIVITY

To kick start this posting, I like to share a quote from a renowned global business adviser.  “The issue facing business leaders in 2015 (the year this quote appeared) is not how to cope with change. It is about how to anticipate changes coming down the track, understand their implications before competitors, and utilise them to improve your market position and profitability.”

Extracted from IN THE BLACK business magazine, Professor Ram Charan quipped: “More than ever, business is about ideas, about innovations and intellectual property, and also about social change.”

According to him, much mental focus of managements have been on how to do better the things currently and normally being carried out, but that is not good enough in a very competitive business world.

To me, he is implying managements of businesses should not merely plan for, and be satisfied with, organic growth. Rather, it is timely now, in the face of intense competitive business scenarios, to explore creative/innovative growth. 

The call for creativity prompts me to ask readers one question …….. how does one shift to the creative/innovative mode efficaciously? Well, I would say surely there must be an essential base serving as the source to germinate workable creative ideas and concepts. Predictive proactivity supports enlightening creativity – the former comes first in order to manifest the latter.

Proactivity equates to anticipation of imminent changes ahead. It is not about thinking how to cope with changes already knocking on business doors now – that is being reactive, not proactive. Proactivity means visualising emerging changes and realising how the phenomena will impact the business if nothing is done soonest possible. It also means taking urgent actions to leverage on readiness to grab hold of market position plus revenue opportunities. 

But the common scene in most corporations is top executives being totally entrenched in business-as-usual escalation objectives like improving operating efficiency for incremental growth. They do not allot sufficient time to explore revolutionary concepts for achieving quantum leaps. 

To push a business forward continually, its top executives should put on a new cap to think not only out of the current management box but also from a new box. They should direct some attention to brainstorming sessions to explore new business horizons. But first, they need to anticipate proactively the changing trends and possible new fads. Failure to recognise changing trends could even cause a conglomerate to fade out of the market.  Creating new initiatives without sound underlying basis will be a futile waste of effort. Only with proactive visualisation can there be a high probability of conceiving successful ideas.

Apple, originally in computer business, made great waves in the mobile phone industry with the launch of iPhone in 2007. Some people in a leading mobile phone giant before that year knew about Apple’s patent filing, yet they brushed it aside, thinking that a computer player would not seriously move into mobile phone business.  Had they been more proactive in exploring the possible rise of a new genre of mobile phones, that once leading brand would not have become defunct in the industry. 

An erstwhile popular American camera brand which faded out of the scene in 2012 is yet another example of a conglomerate’s failure to recognise imminent shifts to new opportunities.  Although the photography business giant was the first to experiment the innovation of the prototype digital camera, its top executives felt that people still preferred to look at hard copy photo prints and stored in physical albums. They thought people would not be used to view captured images on screen. They did not explore proactively the likely change in consumer preference within the realm of increasing proliferation of IT trends.

Outstanding creativity based on proactivity emanates from the acquisition of wide pertinent knowledge.  Realising this, some corporations have established their respective prominent market intelligence & analysis – alternatively called business strategic, or research & development  - department. Technocrats seasoned in such tasks ought to be engaged to exploit workable new avenues. Team members, under the leadership of a maestro, should be encouraged to discover new  “moments of truth” for consumers, then contemplate on the right innovations to drive the conceptualised needs.

Needless to say, the team is entrusted to gather updates on the latest events pertaining to society, economy, politics, demography and whatever likely in store for the near future. Also pertinent is to reckon the likely directions the industry concerned may head to, especially in the light of indicative signals transmitted by regulators to test market responses. Such information has great bearing to future business landscapes, thus constituting part of the prime tasks of these technocrats. Proactive preparedness to leverage on the correctly perceived new changes with the view of formulating vibrant new initiatives will secure the lasting competitive edge. 

In America, a survey conducted in September 2013 revealed close to 30 per cent of the women interviewed named beer as their favourite alcoholic beverage. The number of lady beer drinkers is increasing. To some beer brewers there, this new trend signalled opportunities to quickly tap the fast emerging female market. Proactively, they quickly launched craft beers, or “girly beers” – specially “crafted” to suit the light taste preference of the female gender. Mixed varieties and blends then crept up with increasing sales, such as fruit flavoured beers, golden ales and radlers. And “girly beers” are gaining quick speed in market share. 

In a Southeast Asian country, more and more male executives switch preference to whiskey, especially the single malt concoctions. It is imperative beer brewers there take cognizance of this switch by males and it is high time to produce more beer varieties that entice the finer taste buds of lady executives. I believe a vast alternative market opportunity exists in this respect.

I had a hobby of browsing around large bookstores for leisure, checking out books promulgating practical tips on management, leadership, human behaviour, psychology and philosophy. The hobby ceased few years ago because I found the business environment in these outlets was no longer customer friendly. I could not flip through the pages to know whether the topics were of interest to me because all books were sealed in transparent plastic wrappers; only the front cover with price tag could be viewed. 

I can guess the transparent wrappers were meant to protect the books from being smeared or worn off by the hands of browsers. But why would a person buy a book without knowing at least the contents outline? Will you? This is the catch 22 situation faced by bookstores – either loses potential customers or stands the risk of displaying smudged items on the shelves, which then causes a loss the other way around. 

Publishers, together with bookstores, ought to proactively start migrating in stages to the e-book platform in anticipation of challenging times for the conventional distribution chain. The migration process must include marketing concepts to promote books the e-way. If I were a publisher of e-books, I would front a synopsis to complement the topics outline as the free preview for each book. Such may entice intended readers to make purchase on-line. The book purchased could either be a downloaded soft copy or hard copy delivered by parcel. Is this not more convenient than having to go to a bookstore which imposes restrictions on previewing the contents of a book?

In the female fashion business, designers frequently engage young alluring models to parade catwalks in trendy clothes, often the mod type too. If I were a female fashion designer, I would proactively take cognizance the increasing number of top lady executives in both public and private corporate sectors. I would recognise the market potentials in office attire for them who are mainly in the middle age group. I would engage middle-aged female models parading in front of invited female senior executives, knowing that the latter could afford the expensive price tags. 

A new business terminology called “disruptive innovation” is seeping into the corporate world. The terminology refers to entirely new initiatives that create new markets and new values distinctively different from established norms, entailing not just thinking out of the box but more so forming new think boxes. Corporations begin to acknowledge disruptive innovation is much desired if they wish to thrive well continually.

Rightly so, Ram Charan’s executive test resonates aloud in the new era. He encourages top executives to ponder at least four times a year what new developments they could take advantage of to create a new need or a more compelling experience to customers. And what is it out there that they ought to know about?

Creativity also involves the power of imagination, covering the ultimate impounding promotion campaigns to launch new products or services to targeted consumers. However, most advertisements aim at instilling brand consciousness - and precisely all that these can do is to make people aware of the brands, nothing more. The high costs of advertisements may be a waste of financial resources if merely for the purpose of conveying brand consciousness.

Although brand consciousness is necessary to some extent, an enticing advertisement propounds the distinct values of the product that stands out among the pool in the market. Effective advertisements involve more than mere branding efforts. In other words, what is so special about this advertised brand compared to numerous other brands? For example, in the case of a craft beer brand targeting at ladies, what is the exuding unique essence that satiates their refined taste buds?

SUMMARY: 

In the era of prolific competition penetrating into the various business worlds, a corporation’s survival in the longer term cannot depend on business-as-usual growth focus. Business mind-sets are moving away from the conventional mode to the revolutionary mode. 

Proactive and creative minds (also termed revolutionary minds) no longer promulgate that the type of chicken eggs always depend on the type of chickens reared by the farmer. Conventional minds say, “Free range chickens produce better eggs than chickens reared in small coops, so I just rear free range chickens in larger tracts of farm land.” Revolutionary minds say with the end in mind first, “I foresee the type of quality eggs I want to sell in order to stay ahead of competition, then I think of how to genetically breed the type of chickens to produce the special eggs.” See the difference?  

   

Conventional minds lead to business-as-usual incremental business growth for a while, which then dwindles gradually by not adapting to changes. Revolutionary minds prompt disruptive innovative growth, by keeping close touch with imminent changes in order to germinate workable new initiatives so that the business can thrive ahead for long.