Business Strategy Is Your Company Just Road Kill on the Economic Highway?
Implementing these new trends would require us to make big changes in the way we do things, and set Modern Engineering in a new direction in order for us to remain competitive. However, if we were to ignore these changes, there is a high probability that we will be left to die as road kill on the economic highway.
Change in general reminds me of spring – with its renewal of nature and the increase in activity from local wildlife. With the arrival of spring, we see more and more squirrels crossing the road right in front of our moving vehicles as they forage for food to feed themselves and their families. When we encounter them in front of our vehicles, these squirrels do 1 of 4 things:
1. Dart across the road to get to the other side
2. Hesitate and then dart off to the side of the road
3. Remain sitting fixed in the middle of the road seemingly not knowing what do
4. Dart back and forth in the middle of the road not knowing what to do
These four seem to be typical for the squirrels in my area. The first two reactions normally allow the squirrel to live to see another day. The last two reactions usually mean the squirrel has a high probability of perishing. The dead squirrel in the middle of the road is what we usually call “road kill!”
We can equate this squirrel example to both companies and people who do not take new breakthroughs in technology seriously. We should be paying attention to new trends, and carefully examining if they can be an advantage to our businesses. It does not mean your business has to embrace every new technology that comes along, but it is important to seriously consider them.
The companies and people who seriously consider new technology trends are like the first two squirrels in our example above. One will immediately examine the trend to see if it’s applicable to their business. If the trend is applicable, they will embrace it and move on or they will reject it and move on. The second squirrel will spend a little more time considering options, but will ultimately do the same as the first squirrel. These are the type of companies and people who are very aware of their competitive environment and are prepared for change, because they recognize that change has a tendency to ensure their survival.
The people who act like squirrel number three, who sits in the middle of the road doing nothing, are usually those that look at trends and dismiss them as unimportant. Many times they don’t know what to do because they do not understand, or they just choose to ignore, these trends. Squirrel number four, who runs around in the middle of the road but doesn’t go anywhere, sees the trends but just spins in circles — not knowing if it wants to do something or not. Unlike the third squirrel who basically does nothing and sits there in a daze, the fourth dabbles in the trend but really only plays with it, not knowing how to implement it in a meaningful way.
Both squirrels three and four make themselves vulnerable to the negative implications that not embracing these trends may have on their business. The outcome of ignoring, or just playing with a trend instead of fully embracing it and implementing it, can be very tragic.
Every day we read or hear about companies and individuals who have heeded the trends and taken advantage of them. Some of them become wildly successful because of their willingness to try new technologies.
The bottom line is that those who embrace new technology survive to meet another day. And in many cases, those who do not embrace new technological trends run into serious problems in their businesses.
If you’re stuck doing nothing, like our third and fourth squirrels, and the technology trends you refuse to embrace become the standard technological practice in your industry, you’ll quickly find your company becoming just another piece of road kill under your competitors’ tires.