Introduction: There’s an old expression that points out that, “If you don’t stand for something, you’ll fall for anything.” I’ve listened to companies describe themselves as strategic, when from my perspective they were simply opportunistic.
They were so opportunistic they wound up reacting to all sorts of environmental occurrences. They were so buffeted by opportunities that their resources became scattered rather than focused for a significant impact.
They made false starts and distracted themselves with deals too good to pass up individually, but which cumulatively lacked the desired synergy.
This situation often arises when the business idea is fuzzy. It can occur when you get sucked into defining yourself in relation to your competitor’s tactics or strategy. It indicates the lack of a strong, consistent understanding of your company in the context of your business’s ecosystem.
This often happens to companies who find themselves drawn into competing on price and then living with constantly shrinking margins, because they lose sight of their business idea and the value they could build into their brand.
A different aspect of an inadequate point of view arises from being stuck with an overly rigid point of view. The Roman legions where unbeatable when their organization and discipline overwhelmed the chaotic attacks of armies comprised of individual warriors fighting on foot.
However, due to their rigid adherence to their system of fighting, they were ultimately inadequate in the face of the cavalries of tribes who swept into the empire from the grasslands to the east.
They couldn’t shift gears adequately. They stuck with a good idea, one that used to work, for a bit too long. It is easy to slip into the mindset of making excuses or blaming the customer for falling sales, instead of stretching yourself as an organization to learn and grow.
Companies today simply cannot allow such complacency to develop. This takes a commitment from leaders throughout the organization. The antidote is a deliberate, active commitment to strengthen the organization’s thinking skills. This makes it a combined responsibility rather than placing the burden on a few, probably overworked, corporate thinkers.
What Do Inadequate Points Of View Look Like? Companies with inadequate perspectives are self absorbed and often more enamored of the past than the future.
New ideas are frequently seen as irrelevant, and are written off as being for someone else, some other company in some different category. If new ideas get airtime, what you really see are flurries of activities that peter out without any lasting evidence that they were ever considered at all.
Any new ideas are superficially applied over a shopworn point of view, rather than being thoroughly digested and incorporated into the workings of the organization.
These companies are often surprised by developments in the marketplace. Their rigid, self-referent perspective puts them into a position where they have trouble interpreting the implications of some of what they see and hear.
I worked with a company that looked at what its best competitor was doing that this company didn’t do. They then launched into a campaign to match their competitor’s capabilities within three years. What they didn’t work to anticipate was what their competitor would be doing over the next three years; they wouldn’t be standing still.
Rather than changing their business idea in a way that would offer other, unique value to their customers, they were blindly copying what worked for someone else. They didn’t understand the competitor’s bigger vision. They didn’t realize that in three years, they would show up and offer yesterday’s news to the same customers the more farsighted competitor was after.
So What? Organizations in this category display thinking that shows deficits. They aren’t doing extraordinary work. They aren’t stretching themselves to be ever smarter, more clever and able to out think those who try to go against them.
They are aping others rather than thinking for themselves. They hope that what’s worked for them in the past will be good enough tomorrow. These are not the thinking skills that lead to competitive advantage. They display a tendency not to exploit---to squander---the intellectual talents that reside within their companies. Champions are seldom that wasteful
Diagnosing Problems Caused By Inadequate Points Of View
A Company With Inadequate Points Of View Indicates:
- An unacknowledged fear on the part of the business leadership that they are in over their heads, that change is beyond them, rather than something to be sought out and embraced.
- A naiveté about the rate and speed of change in the business world today.
- A cockiness that past victories will be sufficient to pay the fee for future success.
- A lack of confidence in the capacity of the company as a whole to learn new skills and apply them quickly or skillfully.
Remedying Problems Caused By Inadequate Points Of View – Action Steps
Steps to take:
- Expand and stretch your thinking skills.
- Develop an external perspective by building the capability to gather and analyze information (see competitive intelligence). Start and maintain conversations with customers that are collaborative in nature; become an active part of their success.
- Use techniques such as assigning a person to play the role of a contrary thinker or devil’s advocate, and launching red team/blue team exercises designed to change the perspective of the organization to a more adaptive one.