Enterprises struggle with disruption. Their records of dealing with major disruptive technologies – such as the advent of the web, smartphone, and cloud – are generally not encouraging. Responses are often too narrow, reactive, and late. In our team’s close collaborations with the late Harvard Business School Professor Clayton Christensen and since we’ve seen a relatively small number of enterprises rise to the challenge and capture the upside of upheaval. It isn’t easy, but a...
While shopping for party clothes for his daughter, Shridhar Marri had his epiphany about where e-commerce should head.
Leading a start-up is all-consuming. Company leadership is doing everything at once, never has enough time, and is making quick decisions that can make or break their personal wealth. It’s not surprising that keeping the company paperwork tidy is not a priority.
Beware of “facts.” In our pursuit of data-driven decisions, we tend not to question facts, and rather focus on their implications. This is when big mistakes can happen. Consider the words of Peter Drucker, arguably the greatest management scholar of the past century:
“The customer rarely buys what the business thinks it sells him.” I often use this quote from the great Peter Drucker to help explain the concept of Jobs to be Done (I took it from Clay Christensen, who did the same). But the quote goes much further, and it relates to much more. Consider these examples:
