Sodan Selva - When Followers Become Leaders: Rewiring Established and Non-Tech Companies To Lead In An Age of Accelerating Disruptions

WHEN
FOLLOWERS
BECOME

LEADERS

Rewiring Established
and Non-Tech
Companies To Lead
In An Age of
Accelerating Disruptions

Sodan Selva

Copyrighted Material

When Followers Become Leaders. Rewiring Established and Non-Tech Businesses To Lead In An Age of Accelerating Disruptions.

Copyright 2020 by Selvasodan Selvaretnam. All Rights Reserved.

No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any meanselectronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwisewithout prior written permission from the publisher, except for the inclusion of brief quotations in a review.

For information about this title or to order other books and/or electronic media, contact the publisher.

Published by Movement Maker Productions, an imprint of Chia Ventures, Inc.

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ISBNs:

978-1-7345601-0-7 (print)

978-1-7345601-1-4 (eBook)

Printed in the United States of America

Company names included in this book are used in an editorial fashion only. No infringement is intended.

To my wife, Irina: Thank you for your infinite patience and love through this adventure called life.

To my children, Kaillah and Mihlaan: Your arrival ignited the fire for me to be the best version of myself and gives me meaning to move things in the world to where they ought to be.

To all my students: Youve given me more inspiration than you will ever know to move the world of business forward to its next incarnation. Keep on keeping onthe tide is rising in your favor.

To my work friends and colleagues: Thank you for being the threads of the tapestry of my professional experience that weaved together to bring me to this.

Foreword

T HE 21ST CENTURY WILL BE A CENTURY of accelerating multi-faceted disruptions, some of which we can expect in the areas of technology and climate and others that will truly be Black Swan events. These disruptions will continually reshape the world in many ways: daily living, workplace collaborations, global supply chains, industry configurations, regulations and others. During these times, we find ourselves in situations where the business frameworks and tools that have worked for us in the past may be falling short in terms of effectively moving us into these new directions. It is in the midst of these disruptions that we can awaken to the realization that we need a boldly innovative way forward, a paradigm shift in the way we operate to navigate and thrive in these new realities. This approach moves beyond primarily technology as the holy grail to our future problemsthe problems are much bigger and far more complex.

When Followers Become Leaders goes squarely after a very big business problem of our times: how established and non-tech companies will survive the disruptions to level the playing field. This is where classical 20th century systems, frameworks and innovation models are falling short. This book outlines the foundations of the Movement Maker program, which enables established and non-tech businesses to transform repeatedly as they adapt to multifaceted disruptions. It moves beyond the standard operating models of strategy, innovation and execution to forge a powerful path forward during this time of accelerating change and increasing unknowns. The foundations outlined in this book are taken from the Movement Maker program, which blends together a set of techniques and approaches for an operator-crafted transformation that rewires the DNA of established companies to continually reinvent themselves for a reality that will only become increasingly disruptive.

We can truly appreciate the power of a book like When Followers Become Leaders when we face reality front and center through disruptions like this recent crisis. As business leaders, it is understandable to feel flat-footed and even ill-prepared for these Black Swan events and other disruptions that are part of our world today. We would be better off if we had prepared and rewired knowing and accepting that these disruptions will be part of our 21st century reality; its never too late and, in fact, now may be the perfect time to rewire while we rationalize our operations.

In that light, this book couldnt be more timely for established businesses as it calls for transformation from within, a capital light operational discipline before moving capital heavy, and a real focus on our internal powers as a company and business leaders.

Marwan Fawaz, Executive Advisor for Google and Alphabet

CHAPTER 1

Sign of the Times

T HE WORLD IS CHANGING TODAY faster than ever before in our history. Many companies, organizations and governments see the technological disruptions, societal and consumer behavioral shifts, and ecological changes accelerating and realize they need to adapt just as fast to stay in tune with the times. Silicon Valley places its emphasis on technology as the center of our future, and its leaders like Marc Andreessen boldly claim that software is eating the world. Companies have paid close attention, and most have set upor at least started planningtheir own innovation divisions and initiatives in an effort to fight for their survival. I see more and more business leaders visiting Silicon Valley from around the world to understand the secrets behind its innovative culture and learn more about the latest developments in technologies related to cloud computing, mobility, blockchain, artificial intelligence, cybersecurity and others.

Governments, too, are looking to adapt to the accelerating changes and prepare their societies for the upcoming digital economy. Simply put, theres a lot going on that is affecting every sphere of life, and its happening faster than at any other time in human history.

All these changes are marginalizing and even killing established companies and industries while the upstarts, entrepreneurs and venture capitalists work diligently and aggressively to capture the gains. The proof is in the data: The average tenure of a company in the S&P 500 has gone from sixty-one years in 1958 to less than eighteen years in 2017, and 75 percent of the companies on the S&P 500 today are projected to vanish from the S&P 500 over the next ten years.

Even successful company founders and leaders like Jeff Bezos, who has led Amazon to become a dominant business in this new era, know that relevance and dominance may be short-lived. At a 2018 all-hands meeting at Amazon, Bezos is reported to have said the following: Amazon is not too big to fail... In fact, I predict one day Amazon will fail. Amazon will go bankrupt. If you look at large companies, their lifespans tend to be thirty-plus years, not a hundred-plus years. Its a reality no leader can or should deny, or else the consequences for their company and people are dire. If that is not enough to motivate them, their legacy will also be tarnished by their refusal to acknowledge and adapt successfully to the sign of the times.

These accelerating changes are keeping many CEOs and business leaders of established companies awake at night. Non-technology and established businesses are at even greater threat of falling behind the innovation curve and even going bankrupt driven by accelerating disruption. The collateral damage of the failure or marginalization of these businesses should keep politicians awake at night too. The people in their communities may be rendered irrelevant and unemployed, creating upheavals that may rock the foundations of a cohesive social structure. Even the technology giants like Microsoft, Facebook and Google will in time, too, be on high alert as technical foundations and architectures are changing faster than ever before; and they, too, can quickly be at risk, especially when the underlying technologies do not adhere to increasingly strident demands for trust and transparency. Throughout the twenty-first century, we will need to continually adapt to accelerating change or die. The educational and technological frameworks created in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries leave us vulnerable and ill-prepared for the bumpy road ahead.