The organizations that thrive though disruption will make digital transformation and innovation part of a holistic business perspective.
A strategy that is fit for today’s digital world embraces duality by deploying the latest technologies while preparing for the unknown innovations that will emerge in the near future. This requires making innovation and transformation an integral part of the core business and the understanding that the organization must continuously evolve.
Rather than treating digital or innovation as discrete strategies, the organizations that thrive though disruption will make digital transformation and innovation part of a holistic business perspective. They will recognize that every business process must adapt to be fit for a digital world and adopt “re-strategy”: frequently revisit the plan, re-design the future, and re-pilot concepts.
To prepare for this future, organizations should look to the following areas where duality plays an integral role:
- Expand ecosystems: Partnerships can provide much-needed capabilities now and new possibilities later. Corporations should also think about ecosystems, networks and innovative formats for collaboration to enable duality not only within the organization but also from the outside in.
- Embrace the upside of disruption: Government and business leaders should move from a mindset of humans versus machines to one of humans and machines. Instead of looking at disruptive technologies like AI and robotics as a driver for job loss, we should explore how innovations can augment human capabilities, enhance our experiences, increase our job satisfaction and make technology more inclusive.
- Enable creativity: Good design and core business are not mutually exclusive. User experience is growing in importance as a differentiator for brands, both externally and internally. This calls for design and creativity in every aspect of the core business.
- Put digital first: In conversations with chief digital officers, we hear two approaches. One is focused on a separate digital unit with the mandate to develop new business models for an evolving digital world, while the other relys on an organization-wide mandate for digital transformation. Every organization needs both at the same time.
- Redefine global and local approaches: With the rise of community-level activity and enablement around the world, companies should develop a strategy that redefines the duality of global and local. Many communities in regions, cities and small towns work together to take advantage of the upside of disruption through local education initiatives, job creation based on new technologies, and an effort to increase quality of life.
The transformation of every organization to be fit for a digital world has become an imperative. This requires not only continuous and rapid change in both legacy technologies and organizational culture, but also a shift in the mindset of management to acknowledge that change is here to stay.
Disruption is not risk-free—we have recently seen the impact of failing to make sure that the upsides of technology innovation and globalized markets is shared by all. By seizing the upside of disruption in a more inclusive and beneficial way, duality can enable businesses to both navigate and ultimately succeed in our digitally accelerated world.
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Summary
To attract investment, CEOs and their firms need to be disruption ready. They can achieve this by embracing a mindset of duality.
