5 essential principles to help your business thrive

BCBusiness + RED Training

No matter the age and size of your business, nor what it sells—whether cups of coffee or luxury homes—the nature of commerce is changing faster and more often than ever. According to Jonas Altman, RED Academy‘s innovation consultant, in order to establish and maintain success, every organization and its employees should adopt these five principles

1. Be aware of “disruption” and turn your business into a learning organization

“There are new, fast-moving technology start-ups that, virtually overnight, can overtake their largest competitor. This is how Airbnb has overtaken the Hyatt hotel group, how Uber has disrupted the taxi industry. It’s very hard to pivot when you have 5,000 or 50,000 employees across several continents, versus a five-person team in San Francisco. Disruptors take advantage of new business models, create new markets and value networks, and leverage exponential technologies. The question to ask is, are you going to disrupt or be disrupted?”

2. Surround yourself with “super teams”

“If a project is handed to a company, there could be ‘X’ number of people who immediately are interested and volunteer for it. But do they have the combined skills to best execute on the project? Research shows it’s not teams made out of superstars that are best; it’s the ones with the most diversity. When you say ‘super team,’ it’s really about the job that needs to be done and optimizing specifically for that, and it can involve both the most veteran and the newest employees—whatever works best.”

3. Resisting change is no longer an option

“In the start-up world, change is good—not taking a risk is the worst risk you can take. At huge, age-old corporations, they don’t have the structure and the processes to embrace change in the same way, so risk is inherently bad and opportunity needs to be de-risked. You have to look honestly at your company’s wider industry and say, ‘Change is inevitable and we need to be constantly creating the environment for innovation to happen.’”

4. Recognize that the definition of “culture” has expanded

“Culture is now synonymous with brand. The website Glassdoor will show you what employees—both former and current—think. Some may be evangelists while others believe the job was the worst of their life. Everyone has a voice, so it provides a new kind of business transparency. The employer’s concern is whether their company culture attracts and keeps the right people. If it doesn’t, then they have a fundamental problem. It used to be buyer beware, and now it’s seller beware. The Internet flipped it.”

5. Growth never ends

“All smart companies are using data to make decisions about growth. Coca-Cola will always spend unfathomable amounts of money on branding, but you can be sure their digital-marketing teams are doing all sorts of experiments to find out, say, what’s working in Croatia versus what’s working in Nairobi? So, when they launch a campaign, the millions they’re spending are being spent in the right channels and with a compelling story.”

RED Training is hosting four Masterclasses (beginning September 8) that are tailor-made to help you learn these five principles—and much more. For more information and to register, visit www.RedTraining.com

Created by BCBusiness in partnership with RED Training