One of the greatest challenges business leaders and, by extension, their enterprises face in today’s disruptive world is the ability to respond quickly to constant, unforeseen changes like this one. When someone comes out of left field with an idea that turns your market sideways, how are you going to get your whole organization to adapt on a dime?

1. By Faisal Hoque
founder of:
WHY AGILITY DRIVES
INNOVATION AND
DISRUPTION
Here's what
an agile
mind-set's
made of.

2. Want to know what disruption
looks like?
Take a look at the video on the next slide of a few Australian guys
beach-fishing for tuna with the help of a drone.
The squid bait was loosely dangled from the drone, which whizzed out to
sea, its camera easily finding the fish in the seawater as its operators
watched on an iPad. Before long, one have to guide the drone to plant its
bait in front of the fish, and wham—a successful take. The drone then even
filmed the enEre catch.

3. Now, if I were a charter boat captain for sport fishing, I would be seriously
worried. My method of doing business may have to change to incorporate a
similar experience, or sooner or later I may be out of business.
One of the greatest challenges business leaders and, by extension, their
enterprises face in today’s disrupEve world is the ability to respond quickly
to constant, unforeseen changes like this one.
When someone comes out of left field with an idea that turns your
market sideways, how are you going to get your whole organization
to adapt on a dime?

4. Agility, by definiEon, is a business's response to change—whether those
come from new macro- or micro-economic condiEons; aNer all, some
disrupEon snowballs from something that starts small, and other Emes
it arises from massive pressures.
Truly agile organizations can not only sense and respond to
competitors’ strategic moves within exisEng product markets, they
can do the same for less obvious pressures—like subtle environmental
signals, shiNs in customer desires, or small tweaks in technologies that
might have big repercussions.
AGILITY: IT'S ALL IN YOUR HEAD

5. Here are a few concrete ways to
embrace a more agile mind-set:

6. It is sEll important to start with an
understanding of your place in the market, but
try not to get too comfortable with it.
Today’s organizations are forced to work
in markets that are constantly reinventing
themselves. Their market posiEons are ever-
changing—which makes them less reliable
indices of a company's future success.
Throw out the old goalposts

7. The commercializaEon of space travel
seemed like only a billionaire’s dream a
few years ago, but Elon Musk has
invigorated a whole new realm of mass
possibiliEes.
Being different has
always mattered, but now
it matters even more

8. Investors in the shale oil industry rode the
wave of “energy independence” unEl
confronted with tumbling prices and a
self-inflicted supply glut.
The right choices can
become the wrong
choices very quickly

9. HOW TO PRACTICE AGILITY
OrganizaEons that can successfully navigate these sorts of disrupEons
need to then put that agile mind-set into pracEce, and do a few key
things—repeatedly and well:

10. Continuously scan their environments to idenEfy
both threats to exisEng posiEons and opportuniEes to
stake out new ones.
Learn to radically reinvent their competencies—
including those that made them the most compeEEve
only yesterday.
Photo: David Marcu

11. Regularly engage in strategic experiments by tesEng
small-scale iniEaEves to gain experience—whether it's
with emerging technologies, product or service concepts,
or with new customer segments.
Devise adaptive business architectures that can
keep up, making sure their assets (and their partners'
assets) can be realigned quickly—shuVng down acEviEes,
commencing new ones, or shiNing resources from one
venture or iniEaEve to the next.

12. Building an agile organizaEon isn't
easy. Bringing in a persuasive leader or
two might help the transformaEon, but
it comes down to the ability of the
leadership team to foster
collective change-management
skills.

13. More crucial to that success,
however, is the need to embrace
new ways of doing business
altogether. This means new
organizaEonal structures, the
creaEon and sharing of new types of
informaEon, and the establishment
of new decision-making processes.

14. The Aussies in that drone-fishing video didn’t set
out to disrupt the sport fishing industry (and in the
end, they very well may not). They simply owned a
drone video business and had a creaEve idea about
how to use what they already knew in order to do
something dramaEcally different than what they’d
done before.
Disruptions come about—through
experimental, "aha" moments that very often
lead nowhere, but occasionally reel in
something big.

15. Agility, at the organizaEonal
level, isn't about catching the
next big fish to swim by. It's
about teaching your entire
company to go drone-
fishing, and changing the
rules for making a catch.

17. Shadoka’s por=olio of offerings enables
entrepreneurship, growth, and social impact. Our
customers and partners aspire to create sustainable
value. They are focused on repeatable and
measurable impact. We enable their aspiraEons.
We bring together the management frameworks,
digital pla=orms, and thought leadership for:
• EvaluaEon, execuEon, and monitoring of
programs
• Scaling sales, revenue, and profitability
• CreaEon and management of digital
communiEes and marketplaces
About SHADOKA
Follow us @shadokaventures
shadoka.com

18. About Me
Founder of Shadoka and other companies. Shadoka
enables entrepreneurship, growth, and social impact.
Formerly of GE and other global brands. Author of
several books, including Everything Connects – How
to Transform and Lead in the Age of Crea:vity,
Innova:on and Sustainability (McGraw Hill) and
Survive to Thrive – 27 Prac:ces of Resilient
Entrepreneurs, Innovators, And Leaders (MoEvaEonal
Press).
Follow me @faisal_hoque
faisalhoque.com