Entdeckt auf dem Harvard Business Blog von Umair Haque.
…und hier eingefügt, weil es die perfekte Weekend-Inspiration ist:
Imagine what would happen if GM and Ford collaborated to invest in the components and architecture of a better public transport network — and then licensed it for free to cities, states, and countries.
Imagine what would happen if pharma players directly invested in better hospitals and clinics — instead of in trying to own the relationship with doctors, and furiously outspending one another when marketing blockbusters.
Imagine what would happen if Wal-Mart invested in town squares and parks — instead of just in featureless warehouses draining what little vitality remains in already bleak exurbs.
Imagine what would happen if P&G and Unilever invested in people’s opportunities for education, global mobility, and meaningful, authentic relationships with others — instead of just trying to control distribution channels, and then push-market more stuff to you.
That’s a radically different vision for a better kind of business. One where the value that’s created is authentic, durable, and meaningful to humans; one where your „unfair advantage“ isn’t simply just the flipside of my disadvantage; one where that illusion no longer narcotizes an entire economy.
Hopelessly naïve – right? Wrong. Today’s revolutionaries are already bringing this vision to life, and using it to topple yesterday’s most powerful and privileged incumbents. Radically better is not just what business must – and will – become: it is what business is already becoming.
Who’s breathing life into this vision? And why should anyone do so – isn’t it irrational for companies to make moves like those above?
Consider Google’s recent release of Chrome, its own open-source browser – and how Chrome is going to help Google discover how to redefine advantage.
There’s much debate about Chrome. Is it a platform, an OS of the future? Yes – but not one that yields orthodox advantage – because anyone can copy it. Is it just raw technology, that will make the web faster, safer, richer? Certainly – but technology itself is quickly commoditized.
Chrome feels bigger, more vital, more important somehow. So what is Chrome – really? Chrome – behind the economic veil – is something as radical as it is disturbing to incumbents still playing the tired games of orthodox strategy.
Chrome is a shared resource that ensures the sustainable growth of a larger ecosystem. There are two key words in that sentence. The first is shared. Google is investing in a shared resource because it has the potential to expand the pie dramatically for all, and so Google stands to benefit more than by hoarding it. The second is sustainable growth: through Chrome, Google ensures the ecosystem stays a level playing field, amplifying incentives for innovation, quality, and productivity.
Chrome lets Google play a market creation game. The game Chrome lets Google play isn’t about winningmarket share. It’s not about dominance „over“ Microsoft. Rather, Google is using Chrome to alter the basis of competition entirely.
The point of Chrome is to utterly explode the boundaries of yesterday’s market – and let everyone compete to serve richer and more relevant ads across an open market for lightweight, remixable, low-cost apps distributed nearly frictionlessly. Now that’s revolutionary – and that’s just the potential of a single revenue stream.
Chrome takes Google from core to edge. Chrome isn’t about building and strengthening core competencies, but edge competencies: competencies shared with others. The more Chrome – remember, it’s open source – is hacked, remixed, and tweaked, into still better browsers, engines, and plug-ins, the less Google itself has to invest to explode the utility of the entire www itself for everyone.
Stop for a second and think about those economics – because they have the strategic force of a supernova behind them.
Let’s connect the dots. Why did we begin by discussing a future where Ford, pharma players, Wal-Mart, and P&G all invested in shared resources? Because that’s exactly what Google’s doing with Chrome – and then it’s using those shared resources to create new markets, instead of contest old, tapped-out ones, and build flexible, powerful edge competencies, instead of rigid, stifling core competencies. Those are next-gen economics – and it is those new economics that can only be tapped by a better kind of business.
Rethinking and rebuilding business in a radically better mold is the fundamental challenge today’s boardrooms face. It is what the 21st century demands. Because as a confluence of crises tells us, tired, rusting, obsolete industrial era business as usual cannot go on.
Yet, making business better isn’t about responsibility, altruism, or justice – it is the single most significant strategic opportunity today’s boardrooms can seize. Google’s series of revolutions tell us that it is when we forget how business is and has been – and instead, focus on what business can be and should be – that we can rediscover and reignite new paths to advantage.
So where do the rest of us start? Here’s a single, simple question.
Where is the Chrome in your strategy? What shared resource have you invested in – or should you invest in – to expand the pie sustainably for everyone over the long-run?
If the answer’s „none,“ it’s likely that you’re living on borrowed time. Because Chrome is a textbook example of asymmetrical competition. You don’t need to invest billions to disrupt industries with shared resources – a few million devoted to a handful of bright people will do. What Google did with Chrome, tomorrow’s revolutionaries will inevitably begin doing across industries – that’s why asymmetrical competition is so dangerous and so difficult to fight.
Einen inspirierenden Sonntag wünsch ich euch!
