So, you’ve got some decent players, you have a team name and colours and a nice crest. Everyone knows what they have to do – go forward and score.
But hang on..how do they go about scoring? What are the tactics? And what are the opposition going to do?
What formation will you play? What players in what positions? Which channels will they play through?
In football, just being on the pitch guarantees nothing. Just being able to kick the ball forward towards the goal does not mean you will score. You need a strategy. Much like Digital.
Like an England team 1-0 up in the World Cup Quarter Finals with 30 minutes to go, many companies have a ‘kick it away and hang on’ attitude to digital strategy too. A kind of ‘siege mentality ’ approach. These companies generally get buffeted by the winds of innovation worst than most and not surprisingly suddenly find themselves at the bottom of their group about to be dumped out of the tournament. Kodak, Blockbuster, HMV have already been through that – and there will be many more to come.
Digital is building up a hurricane of change for a lot of industries. Many mistook the initial calm they experienced as they watched other industries being decimated as meaning the storm had passed them by – but they have since discovered the calm was actually the eye of the storm. Now, as they look around at the carnage, it is too late. They must rebuild from scratch.
The trinity of the digital revolution is – 1. business model innovation, 2. technology upgrade & integration, and 3. customer behaviour change. And like a 3 legged robotic monster, this triad of change is roaming the business world causing havoc and reducing once successful businesses one after another to dust with no respect for reputation or history.
As Bill Shankly might have said had he become a Strategist and not gone in to football,
‘Digital Strategy? It’s not life and death, it is much more important than that!’
Justin K Small 