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This essay discusses the importance of embracing change and pursuing innovation to stay relevant and successful. It explores the concept of creating a dramatic difference in the market and highlights examples of companies that have achieved this. The author emphasizes the need for originality, passion, and daring in order to stand out and succeed in today's competitive landscape.
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Tom Peters’Excellence2006:The RelentlessPursuit ofDramatic Difference!Huntington Beach/0328.2006LONG
“If you don’t like change, you’re going to like irrelevance even less.”—General Eric Shinseki, Chief of Staff. U. S. Army
Franchise Lost!TP:“How many of you[600]reallycravea new Chevy?”NYC/IIR/061205
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“A focus on cost-cutting and efficiency has helped many organizations weather the downturn, but this approach will ultimately render them obsolete.Only the constant pursuit of innovation can ensure long-term success.”—Daniel Muzyka, Dean, Sauder School of Business, Univ of British Columbia (FT/2004)
“I don’t believe in economies of scale.You don’t get better by being bigger. You get worse.”—Dick Kovacevich/Wells Fargo/Forbes/08.04 (ROA: Wells, 1.7%; Citi, 1.5%; BofA, 1.3%; J.P. Morgan Chase, 0.9%)
“I am often asked by would-be entrepreneurs seeking escape from life within huge corporate structures, ‘How do I build a small firm for myself?’ The answer seems obvious:Buy a very large one and just wait.”—Paul Ormerod, Why Most Things Fail: Evolution, Extinction and Economics
Different!**“Dramatic Difference” (DH), “Remarkable Point of view” (SG)
“The ‘surplus society’ has a surplus of similar companies, employing similarpeople, with similareducational backgrounds, coming up with similarideas, producing similarthings, with similarprices and similarquality.” —Kjell Nordström and Jonas Ridderstråle,Funky Business
“To grow, companies need to break out of a vicious cycle of competitive benchmarking and imitation.”—W. Chan Kim & Renée Mauborgne, “Think for Yourself —Stop Copying a Rival,” Financial Times/2003
“Value innovation is about making the competition irrelevant by creating uncontested market space. We argue that beating the competition within the confines of the existing industry is not the way to create profitable growth.” —Chan Kim & Renée Mauborgne (INSEAD), from Blue Ocean Strategy (The Times/London)
“TV is not dead, but if you’re going to do TV, you have to create stuff that people seek out. Just because you buy 30 seconds doesn’t mean you’ll have an impact. You have to do something remarkable with it.” —David Lubars, Creative Director, BBDO (USA Today/12.19.2005)
“Every time we come to a comfort zone, we will find a way out.” “No Cloning.” “‘Reinvent the brand’ with each new show.” “A typical day at the office for me begins by asking, ‘What is impossible that I am going to do today?’” —Daniel Lamarre, president, Cirque du Soleil
“This is an essay about what it takes to create and sell something remarkable. It is a plea for originality, passion, guts and daring. You can’t be remarkable by following someone else who’s remarkable. One way to figure out a theory is to look at what’s working in the real world and determine what the successes have in common. But what could the Four Seasons and Motel 6 possibly have in common? Or Neiman-Marcus and Wal*Mart? Or Nokia (bringing out new hardware every 30 days or so) and Nintendo (marketing the same Game Boy 14 years in a row)? It’s like trying to drive looking in the rearview mirror.The thing that all these companies have in common is that they have nothing in common.They are outliers. They’re on the fringes. Superfast or superslow. Very exclusive or very cheap. Extremely big or extremely small. The reason it’s so hard to follow the leader is this: The leader is the leader precisely because he did something remarkable. And that remarkable thing is now taken—so it’s no longer remarkable when you decide to do it.” —Seth Godin, Fast Company/02.2003
Innovation’s Saviors-in-WaitingDisgruntled CustomersOff-the-Scope CompetitorsRogue EmployeesFringe SuppliersWayne Burkan, Wide Angle Vision: Beat the Competition by Focusing on Fringe Competitors, Lost Customers, and Rogue Employees
CUSTOMERS:“Future-defining customers may account for only 2% to 3% of your total, but they represent a crucial window on the future.”Adrian Slywotzky, Mercer Consultants
COMPETITORS: “The best swordsman in the world doesn’t need to fear the second best swordsman in the world; no, the person for him to be afraid of is some ignorant antagonist who has never had a sword in his hand before; he doesn’t do the thing he ought to do, and so the expert isn’t prepared for him; he does the thing he ought not to do and often it catches the expert out and ends him on the spot.” —Mark Twain
“Don’t benchmark, futuremark!”Impetus: “The future is already here; it’s just not evenly distributed.” —William Gibson
Employees:“Are thereenoughweird peoplein the lab these days?”V. Chmn., pharmaceutical house, to a lab director
Why Do I love Freaks? (1) Because when Anything Interesting happens … it was a freak who did it. (Period.) (2) Freaks are fun. (Freaks are also a pain.) (Freaks are never boring.) (3) We need freaks. Especially in freaky times. (Hint: These are freaky times, for you & me & the CIA & the Army & Avon.) (4) A critical mass of freaks-in-our-midstautomatically make us-who-are-not-so-freaky at least somewhat more freaky. (Which is a Good Thing in freaky times—see immediately above.) (5) Freaks are the only (ONLY) ones who succeed—as in, make it into the history books. (6) Freaks keep us from falling into ruts. (If we listen to them.) (We seldom listen to them.) (Which is why most organizations are in ruts. Make that chasms.)
Measure “Strangeness”/Portfolio QualityStaffConsultantsVendorsOut-sourcing Partners (#, Quality)Innovation Alliance PartnersCustomersCompetitors (who we “benchmark” against)Strategic Initiatives Product Portfolio (LineEx v. Leap)IS/IT ProjectsHQ LocationLunch MatesLanguageBoard
No Wiggle Room!“Incrementalism is innovation’sworst enemy.”Nicholas Negroponte
“Beware of the tyranny of making SmallChanges to SmallThings. Rather, make Big Changes to BigThings.”—Roger Enrico, former Chairman, PepsiCo
Five MYTHS About Changing Behavior*Crisis is a powerful impetus for change*Change is motivated by fear*The facts will set us free*Small, gradual changes are always easier to make and sustain*We can’t change because our brains become “hardwired” early in lifeSource: Fast Company/05.2005
“Rewardexcellent failures. Punishmediocre successes.”Phil Daniels, Sydney exec
“Execution is the jobof the business leader.”—Larry Bossidy & Ram Charan/ Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done
“Execution isasystematic processof rigorously discussing hows and whats, tenaciously following through, and ensuring accountability.”—Larry Bossidy & Ram Charan/ Execution: The Discipline of Getting Things Done
Innovation Index: How many of your Top 5 Strategic Initiatives/Key Projectsscore 8 or higher(out of 10) on a“Weirdness”/ “Profundity”/ “Wow”/ “Gaspworthy”/ “Game-changer”Scale?
