Confessions of a Neophiliac

 First of all yes that is actually a real word, but don’t be frightened just yet. I didn’t know what this was until I started to try and understand what some of the traits of a Digital leader are and the first trait listed was that Digital leaders are Neophiliacs. I was like what in the world is a neophiliac? ... well, apparently it is someone who has a “love of or enthusiasm for what is new or novel”. This immediately resonated with me, I have a good friend who always referred to me as the “Blue sky boy” his take I guess on always coming up with something new, whether a new way to solve a challenge, a new product idea, new partnerships or simply a new idea to be discussed and assessed for consideration to execute. I love the fact that this has a definition, I can see myself introducing, “Hi I am Nathan Bell and yes I am a neophiliac”. On second thoughts that might simply scare the hell out of people as they take two steps back. 

Over the years I have learned that the “guy” with the new idea can quickly be side-lined if they haven’t thought through the implications, the value and investment required to see it through, simply identifying something as being “cool” is not enough when you are dealing with the continual constraints of time, budget and resources to execute with. Sometimes I reflect that this lesson for me took a while to sink in as I was fortunate to work with teams who were willing to see my ideas through, whether related to a product, customer segments, customer experience or even designing organisations.

As leaders it's important that we are always open to new ideas, these ideas can come from anyone, those with a fresh perspective, voice of the user / customer, or those facing the challenge they have a solution to on the frontline. As I shared though the idea alone is not enough, in fact, having a great idea is like showing someone a picture of a car I have drawn when I was five and the response being, “well yes that’s nice but how is it actually going to work?”.

When we are supporting our teams with the ideas they bring to us as leaders it is a joint responsibility. Challenging the individual or team to come up with the answers to how the idea would be executed and the value that would be realised, equally important is your commitment as a leader to see through the execution of that idea either with funding, resources or time. Many businesses today talk about ideation, and how any idea can be brought forward, however without the commitment to see it through or sharing a framework that team members can understand, collaborate around and ultimately realise the personal satisfaction of driving change within their own business, will only lead to frustration, disillusionment, and negativity. 

Therefore it is important that while we want to encourage our neophiliacs to engage with the business, leverage them to help solve problems, drive real change, without the right framework to support such thinking, we can end up with neophiliacs becoming pessimistic. Hence let’s think through the framework for ideation, how will we encourage people, teams to thrive but in a way that is transparent and drives accountability and ultimately hope in how change within a business will be driven from within rather than top down or externally.

Hopefully this has given you some ideas, and if not at least given you pause to consider how you could help guide your idea people to their full potential.

Your truly,

A Neophiliac

Fail fast or suffer slow

Telstra recently released its Connecting Countries thought leadership report, which was based on a survey of some 4,100 executives across Asia capturing their views on best practices, challenges and overall business performance in the region. It was exciting to read that there were a number of management lessons that businesses can take with them as they seek to invest into Asia as well as an insight into the profile of an Asia Business Champion – one who doesn't only recognize best practices but also lives and breathes them.  While there were a number of takeaways from the report,  there was one which jumps out at me particularly as it relates to driving success in an Asia market place. One of the key management lessons for success in Asia was looking at the need to move forward with multiple growth strategies concurrently.

Now I have always believed that a person cannot multi-task (despite my numerous attempts to try!) hence this strategy could only ever exist for a large size business and not an individual or SMB. But the need to look at multiple strategies is important for international businesses to consider in order to balance the potential risk of one failing due to internal or market challenges. I must make clear though there are limits to running multiple strategies. A couple of years ago for example, one vendor shared with me their plans to run 25 new initiatives in parallel. Now I don’t care how big you think you are or how mature your strategy execution process is, but when you talk about multiple strategies to this degree it is simply a death warrant for the strategy itself and puts the business at risk of losing its way. I am glad to see that San Francisco based vendor has since realized this and re-evaluated how many initiatives it takes on at the one time.

Now when a business is looking at multiple strategies it needs to understand the levers it can use, for example how quickly a strategy decision can be moved into action and equally, how quickly it can be shut down. These days it is increasingly common place that a strategy is dependent on people, systems and communication. Now, we know we have the ability to redeploy people to other projects and – as hard as it can be at times – sometimes people choose or must move on , however for Systems and communication platforms we often have to make investments that tend to have a pay back only after 3-5 years,. This can cause a challenge as businesses then need to assess how they can mitigate risks to drive a strategy to a positive outcome. For this reason it is important for businesses to adopt what is increasingly being known as a “Fail Fast” principle. The Fail Fast principle looks at prioritizing initiatives that need an investment based on requiring limited capex and leveraging platforms that can be turned up quickly and equally turned off with very little delay post a decision, if it is not working.

Take for example the idea of replicating a solution into a new vertical, which  might require assigning people temporarily, adding  system capacity for marketing campaigns, tracking opportunities and managing customer deployed solutions. But what if all of this could be set up within weeks and taken down even quicker? Would that make you rethink your prioritization of business strategies and equally consider additional initiatives, knowing your investment risk is significantly reduced and not committing the business to years of investment? Well hopefully the answers to both are yes, if not then perhaps a multi path strategy is not for you (either that or you have money and resource to burn).

Historically this would have been a challenge; however the virtualization of IT and communications means that businesses are now more empowered than ever to introduce the Fail Fast principle into their strategy decisions. Now considering the feedback from the Connected Countries survey that businesses need to consider multiple strategies in order to achieve success – at the beginning of this article it would be perfectly normal to think this is only achievable by either very large businesses or for those who have learned through expensive or painful experiences of what strategies work and equally which don’t. However hopefully now you are thinking about how your business could introduce a multiple path strategy by leveraging the advancements of technology that exist today, combined with the key principle in defining which strategies to go after based on their ability to align to a fail fast approach.

We are not talking about transformation or changing the way your business operates. This is very much about understanding how a business can be successful in a market like Asia where the only constant is change. But there are clearly multiple market opportunities and with the right approach –  as demonstrated by the Asia Business Champions – combined with the right principles, businesses can create the environment needed to succeed by failing fast, which ultimately has to be a better approach than suffering slow and not reaping the rewards of a multi path strategy.

You can find the Connected Countries report at the attached link - http://www.telstraglobal.com/connectingcountries/?concountries=tgbanner

Look Mum - No Hands!

Look Mum – No hands!

Remember your first attempt at trying to ride a bike without holding the handlebars, how did that end? Well why is it that most businesses have a tendency to try and replicate this in the business world? Businesses seem to consider where they have had success and believe they then understand how to do business in a new market? Should we just move into another region and do what we’ve been doing because it’s worked in one part of the world?  I get the sense that they honestly believe they can continue doing “business as usual” while expanding.  Of course, they arrive at this belief having made several assumptions and comparisons between their home market and the new market. There is only one assumption that has consistently held true.  Within any market a business plans to enter, there are always new growth opportunities.   However, whether they can translate what they do today, into a new market, will determine how they benefit from those opportunities. 

Our global economy is a small place.  We are all increasingly aware of the successes and failures of any business as they move beyond their home market.  Why is it then that business’s fail to learn from those who go before them?  Whether into new geographies or in adjacent markets? Consider for a moment you are looking to build a plane. Would you really start from zero knowing the lessons learned over the decades? Of course you wouldn’t! So why should business plans targeted at entry into new markets be any different?

Yes, there are some unique cases where businesses have managed to replicate what they have done in their home market successfully into a new market usually due to the market demand being so high for a unique product they are willing to overlook any localization requirements, but these are and remain incredibly isolated instances. There are a larger and more significant number of companies that have failed. Why?  An organizations complete failure to interpret the dynamics of the real opportunity and the behaviour of the market they are seeking to enter. As such, they have either had to sink significant spending into the opportunity, just to stay afloat, or change their operating model significantly to achieve some form of success.   Both activities result in a depreciated or even possibly a negative outcome.

I have seen countless businesses state they have identified an opportunity and are best placed to address that opportunity due to their home market success and then fail. They usually base their analysis on a few common principles: size of population, spend in relevant segment, and growth of local competitors and if they are really sophisticated, access to their supply chain requirements in that market. At best, these criteria are only to identify if there “is an opportunity”, but nothing more. Even when looking at adjacent markets what are the requirements for the right to participate and how much change is required by your business to make that change? You don’t jump off a cliff without checking what is below. Do You – sorry I don’t know many cliff divers out there!

Looking at the Information, Communications and Technology (ICT) industry, which is becoming very crowded, there is a growing view that through their niche success they are best placed to expand into new markets.  This is not at all surprising given that everything these days is somehow connected to “mobile” or “in the cloud” and basically revolving “around networks”.  So, many businesses feel ICT organizations don’t just have an opportunity to compete in new or adjacent markets but, they have a right to, given their home market success. This is both lacking in logic and potentially dangerous for their business when their starting point is an operating model which is based upon their local market success.  

Leveraging partners as you enter unknown terrain provides your business with a set of “handlebars” and ultimately can result in a more stable and inherently positive outcome. They will enable you to adapt to whatever terrain you come across, or challenges placed in front of your business.  Adaption is really the key to understanding new markets – start by assuming you are going to adapt during the journey and then the only question you have to ask yourself is by how much?  Once you’ve made those determinations, you can then establish your plan for that market and then begin to understand how much of your existing capability can be leveraged. There is a growing wave of expectation for ICT firms to build their own ecosystems and to start offering services with best of breed partners that are complimentary.  This is being driven by an increasing demand for integrated solutions by customers - and as a result experiences.  Just like riding a bike through rocky terrain whilst holding the handlebars, support when entering non familiar territory is not a bad thing. If you fell of your bike riding over rough terrain without holding the handlebars would you really repeat the exercise or use a little more caution?

Doing the same thing again and again and expecting a different outcome will never deliver you the result you are looking for – I know surprising right? Therefore, don’t seek to blindly follow the path of your competitor, but learn from their journey both the good and the bad. Don’t simply do what you’ve successfully achieved in a different market, instead capitalize on your knowledge and capabilities! Leverage these capabilities in a relevant way, a way which is aligned to the market you are seeking to enter. Ultimately defining your concept for all markets is perfectly fine but the execution of that concept must be relevant to the market you are seeking to enter. Above all be ready to adapt to the dynamic nature of the market you are seeking to enter! Last but not least consider your partner ecosystem in the market you are trying to enter, because if you don’t get ready for a ride down the mountain as you enter the new market without being able to hold the handlebars for control – because they simply won’t be there!  I am sure similar to many of you that when I was starting out on my bicycle heading down that hill without holding on that first time… the idea of shouting out to Mum saying “Look Mum no hands!” was great in concept however the outcome was simply not a pretty sight!

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